Martin-Baker

Martin-Baker Aircraft Co. Ltd. is a British manufacturer of aircraft ejection seats and was a pioneer in their design and manufacture. The Company also produce a series of unique crashworthy seats for helicopters and a range of fixed-wing crew and mission seats that can be fitted in most maritime patrol and reconnaissance aircraft.

Martin-Baker are currently the market share leader, equipping ejection seats for over 88 Air Forces throughout the World. Over the years, Martin-Baker seats have been fitted into over 80 aircraft types - the most recent being the JSF F-35 programme.

Since the first live ejection test on the 24th January 1946, by Bernard Lynch, over 7280 lives have been saved using a Martin-Baker ejection seat. That is approximately one in ten ejection used which are used to save a life.

History

Martin-Baker is the world's longest established and most experienced manufacturer of ejection seats and related equipment to safeguard the aviator throughout the escape, survival, location and recovery phases.

The Company's Headquarters are in Higher Denham, Buckinghamshire, England with other locations in France, Italy and United States and representative all over the world, Martin-Baker has established an extensive range of unique and modern facilities and specialist engineering capabilities to support ejection seat work and insuring that these products are of the highest quality and reliability, and will perform as designed - the first time. The Company continues as a successful family run business headed by the twin sons of the late founder, Sir James Martin, as joint Managing Directors. The Directors, like their father, are engineers. They are great enthusiasts for the product and actively run the Company, day-to-day together with an extremely loyal and skilful workforce.

It is the only company that can offer a fully integrated escape system that satisfies the very latest in pilot operational capability and safety standards offering a complete 'end-to-end service' from helping the customer to establish operational safety and escape requirements, design, development and qualification, to ongoing support throughout the entire service life of the aircraft.

Martin-Baker started off as an aircraft maker, founded in 1934 by Captain (later Sir) James Martin CBE DSc CEng FIMechE FRAeS (11 September 1893 – 5 January 1981) and Captain Valentine Baker MC AFC (24 August 1888 – 12 September 1942). Baker was a flying instructor and took the role of company test pilot.

Gloster Meteor WA638, owned by Martin Baker and used for ejection seat tests

Meteor WL419 is also used for ejection seat tests

World War II

Martin-Baker designed and produced several prototype military aircraft before and during the Second World War, although none entered production. They included:

• Martin-Baker M.B.1 (1935) - a two-seat light aircraft
• Martin-Baker M.B.2 (1938) - a Napier-powered fighter prototype
• Martin-Baker M.B.3 (1942) - a six-cannon fighter design; Val Baker was killed in a crash while testing the prototype
• Martin-Baker M.B.4 (1943) - a Griffon-engined fighter, cancelled on the drawing board
• Martin-Baker M.B.5 (1944) - a Griffon-engined fighter with contra-rotating propellors
• Martin-Baker M.B.6 (1945) - a Second World War jet fighter project with swing-arm, 0/0 spring-loaded ejection seat
• Martin-Baker M.B.7 (1946) - Black Bess - a postwar interceptor/high-speed test aircraft concept. Small, flight models made but the concept was cancelled in 1947.

Throughout the Second World War, Martin-Baker manufactured aircraft components including armoured aircraft seats for Supermarine Spitfires. In 1944 the company was approached by the Ministry of Aircraft Production to investigate providing ejection systems for high-speed fighter aircraft to enable pilots to bail out safely.

Ejection seats

Martin-Baker Ejection seat MK.GT5 in F-84 Thunderjet 1961–1976

Martin-Baker started to investigate ejection seats from 1934 onward, several years before Germany (1938) and Sweden. The company concluded that an explosive-powered ejection seat was the best solution. Studies found the limits of upward acceleration that the human body could stand and experiments were conducted using a volunteer, Bernard Lynch, who was a fitter at the factory. The first seat was successfully live tested by Lynch on 24 July 1946, who ejected from a Gloster Meteor travelling at 320 miles per hour (510 km/h) IAS at 8,000 feet (2,400 m) over Chalgrove Airfield in Oxfordshire.

The first use of an ejector seat in a practical application by a British pilot involved the Armstrong Whitworth A.W.52 flying wing experimental aircraft in May 1949.

Martin-Baker was a leading pioneer in expanding the operational envelope of the ejection seat to enable it to be used at low altitudes and airspeeds leading eventually to a "zero-zero" capability.

Martin-Baker has supplied approximately 69,000 ejection seats of which 19,000 are currently in service. 7,195 to date—10% of the total delivered—have been used by aircrew to abandon aircraft. It also manufactures fixed shock-absorbing helicopter seats designed to help occupants survive crashes.

A 1998 episode of the TV series JAG was titled "The Martin Baker Fan Club" in reference to a character's survival after ejection from a military jet.

The company also sponsors an "Ejection Tie Club," producing a specialized tie and lapel pin for those whose lives have been saved by a Martin-Baker ejection seat.

Space flight

The company has diversified into spacecraft re-entry systems such as heatshields and parachutes and the pyrotechnics for deploying them. It designed and manufactured the parachute system for ESA's Huygens probe which was launched on-board Cassini in 1997 and landed on Titan on January 14 2005. This was the first planetary landing system to have been made in Western Europe. In 1998 the experience with Huygens led to the company becoming a member of the consortium that developed Beagle 2, intended to land on Mars. However, in June 2001 the company withdrew from the project due to "irreconcilable commercial differences" with the project's industrial prime contractor, which subsequently had severe problems in developing a system within the constraints of mass, time and cost.[1] The Beagle 2 Mars landing on December 25 2003 was unsuccessful.

Operations

The company maintains its own airfield, Chalgrove Airfield, in Oxfordshire for operational testing of ejection seats. A second airfield (the former RAF Langford Lodge near Crumlin in County Antrim) is also used for testing, and houses a 6,200 feet (1,900 m) high-speed rocket sled track.

Two Gloster Meteor aircraft, WL419 and WA638, remain in service with the company as flying testbeds. Another Meteor (WA634), used in early development of ejection seats, is retained at the RAF Museum at RAF Cosford.

References

Bibliography

• Bowyer, Michael J.F. Interceptor Fighters for the Royal Air Force 1935-45. Wellingborough, UK: Patrick Stephens Ltd., 1984. ISBN 0-85059-726-9.
• Green, William, ed. "Mr. Martin's Memorable M.B.5." Air International Vol. 16, no. 2, February 1979.
• Green, William. War Planes of the Second World War: Fighters, Volume Two. London, Macdonald & Co. (Publishers) Ltd., 1961.
• Green, William and Gordon Swanborough. WW2 Fact Files: RAF Fighters, Part 2. London: Macdonald and Jane's Publishers Ltd., 1979. ISBN 0-354-01234-7.
• Zuk, Bill. Janusz Zurakowski: Legends in the Sky. St. Catharine's, Ontario: Vanwell, 2004. ISBN 1-55125-083-7.

External links

• Martin-Baker Aircraft Company Limited
• Electronic Library, see Propulsion Systems Contribution to Success of Aircrew Emergency Escape Systems (PDF File, pay site)