LEYLAND TURBINE
The magazine concluded that “If the pace of development over the past five years is maintained it is reasonable to speculate that within the next 10 years we shall see the gas turbine competing on a far wider scale as a source of vehicle power, competing with diesels of any output as well as with petrol engines in cars. It will obviously need comparative road tests to show the full picture of consumption but there are definite signs that the gas turbine will give at least comparable fuel consumption with a diesel of the same output in the relatively near future.”
However, despite the significant resources applied to the research and development project the Leyland Gas Turbine proved to be a commercial failure and today diesel and petrol engined vehicles reign supreme.
Some insight into the testing of the new Gas Turbine lorries is provided by a report which Roger Mortimore kindly made available from his archives. This report relates to the testing carried out on a vehicle made available to Shell-Mex and BP Ltd which was one of three which British Leyland released into operators’ service on a trial basis. This was regarded as an extension to their research and development programme of the gas turbine vehicle.
The introduction
