John Ackroyd (engineer)
John Gilbert Ackroyd (31 January 1937 – 25 January 2021) was a British engineer.
Early and personal life[edit]
Ackroyd born in Muttra, India, on 31 January 1937, and grew up in England from the age of seven.
He was educated in Ryde, Folkestone and Ardingly College.[1]
Ackroyd married Birgit Häggman in 1963. The couple divorced in the early 1980s. They had two daughters Anna and Lisa.
Career[edit]
Ackroyd started his engineering career with an apprenticeship at Saunders-Roe in East Cowes on the Isle of Wight. His final job as an apprentice was in the design department working on the SR53 prototype fighter aircraft with a mixed jet and rocket propulsion system.
Ackroyd then took a lead role in designing and engineering at Cushioncraft for Britten-Norman.[2] The CC7 launched in 1969 but when the company was sold Ackroyd was again out of a job.
After two years in Germany with the aircraft manufacturer Dornier, he became the project designer of the world's first production electric car for the Isle of Wight-based Enfield Automotive, which commenced sales in 1973 as the Enfield 8000.
In 1978 he joined the Thrust 2 land speed record project, which went on the achieve the record in 1983.[3]
In 1981 he was involved with the Vanishing Point rocket sled which achieved the World Ice Speed Record at 248 mph (399.1 km/h) in 1981, and in 1999, the Gillette Mach 3 Challenger which set the motorcycle speed record of 365 mph (587.4 km/h).
In 1987 he teamed up with the Swedish aeronautical engineer Per Lindstrand and Richard Branson for a project to cross the Atlantic in a balloon. Ackroyd designed the pressurised capsule for the Virgin Atlantic Flyer, and the first to cross the Atlantic Ocean in 1987.
Death[edit]
Ackroyd died of complications from Alzheimer's disease on 25 January 2021, aged 83.
References[edit]
- ^ "Visionary engineer and family man John Ackroyd dies at the age of 83". The County Press. 3 February 2021. Retrieved 22 August 2023.
- ^ "John Ackroyd". Isle of Wight Hidden Heroes. Retrieved 22 August 2023.
- ^ "John Ackroyd obituary". The Times. 23 February 2021. Retrieved 22 August 2023.