1503494 Air cushion vehicles; railway systems BLISS PENDAIR Ltd 8 May 1975 [8 May 1974] 20244/74 Headings B7K and B7L An air cushion vehicle transportation system comprises a load carrying body 2 supported by hangers 4 from a lift platform 6 and by struts 14 from end bogies 10, the platform and bogies running within an inverted channel section track 8 and being supported by ambient air pressure due to the formation of a zone 12 of lower-than-ambient pressure, the struts 14 being so constructed as to bias the bogies 10 towards the top wall of the track 8 by a force equal to at least a substantial portion of the weight of the bogies. The struts 14 are each constructed as an hydraulic piston and cylinder device (Fig. 3, not shown) connected to an accumulator 16 and a motor driven pump which maintains a substantially constant pressure within the strut cylinder so that the bogie is supported at all times. As shown in Fig. 7 air is drawn from the suction space 73 by a fan within a main duct and the space is sealed laterally by edge sections 50 each comprising a hollow section having a bearing 58 slidably mounted on a rod 57 and guided by rollers 54, the section being sealed to lift platform 6 by a flexible seal 55 and connected by a flexible duct 70 to the main duct below fan whereby the section may be fed with pressurized air. A skirt assembly 52 is supported by pivot 64 on a spring-loaded slidable rod 53 and further connected to section 50 by a bellows duct 71, the assembly comprising a plenum chamber 60 formed with an apertured resilient layer 61, and a replaceable strip 62 forming a labyrinth 67 within which are formed positive pressure air cushions which co-operate with the respective vertical inner wall of the track. A seal 66 connects section 50 to the skirt assembly 52. The end bogies are provided with rollers to engage the inner top and side walls of the track and apparatus is provided to automatically maintain platform 6 in an optimum position in the depth of the track (Fig. 9, not shown).
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