Landship
Encyclopedia
A landship is a large vehicle
that travels on land, as opposed to on water, air, or in space. Because of their large size, their use on land is seen as impractical due to terrain obstacles, and soft ground that cannot support such large weight. Such problems are non-existent on water and in space. However, vehicles similar to the concept of landships have appeared in various forms in the real world, and more commonly in works of fiction.
Compare with tram
s and train
s, which are large segmented land vehicles (or groups of vehicles) that use rail
tracks, road train
s, which are large land vehicles that use roadways, articulated bus
es (another road vehicle type), amphibious vehicle
s, which can drive on land and on water, and hovercraft
s, which travel above the surface of both masses on an air cushion.
was formed to investigate these ideas for equipping the Naval Brigades. The impracticality of building such large vehicles and the needs of the British Army
for more numerous smaller vehicles led to the much smaller first tanks. However, until after the Second World War, the British
would continue to think of tanks in naval terms
; e.g., the Cruiser tank
operating like the ships of the same name. Quickly proving impractical were the battleship
-equivalent heavy tanks, such as the multi-turreted Vickers A1E1 Independent
and its assorted offspring. The Russian Tsar Tank
, a super-heavy tricycle gun platform, was scrapped after a prototype proved difficult to maneuver and the vehicle was deemed vulnerable to ground fire.
Two super-heavy tank
s, the Landkreuzer P. 1000 Ratte and Landkreuzer P. 1500 Monster
, were the closest things ever to be designed that approaches the popular fictional conception of a landship. The Maus
was the only super-heavy tank built by the Germans in WWII.
Bucket-wheel excavator
s are the biggest (externally-powered) land vehicles ever built by man, but do not fit into the popular conception of a landship. The largest self-powered land vehicles are NASA
's two crawler-transporter
s.
The Mountbatten class hovercraft
is the largest civilian hovercraft
ever built, and is capable of traveling over relatively smooth land in addition to water. It is capable of carrying 418 people, and 60 cars. Hovercraft are also used by the military for their amphibious landing capabilities. They are commonly referred to as air-cushioned landing craft
. These vehicles are usually very large compared to other land vehicles, and commonly carry other land vehicles like jeeps and armored vehicles.
, as their high mass presents a large amount of inertia
to overcome. For this reason, the propulsion system must be able to supply considerable amounts of initial torque to get the machine moving from standstill. For instance, the Leopard 2
main battle tank
's engine maxes out at 4,700 N·m (3,458 lbs·ft).
If power supply is not a problem, electric motors may also be considered, as some types are able to produce maximum torque from zero revolutions per minute
(rpm) and virtually maintain it all the way to redline
. In comparison, internal combustion engines steadily build their torque as rpm increases until they hit a "torque peak", after which torque output begins to drop if engine speeds continue increasing.
s with horsepower
levels measured in thousands. They either mechanically propel the machine through a drivetrain
(like most tank
s or the aforementioned unbuilt Landkreuzer P. 1000 Ratte), or ultimately end up running electric motor
s through intermediate generators
, essentially being large electric vehicle
s (like the Terex 33-19 "Titan"
).
An example of the latter is the NASA crawler-transporter: the 16 traction motor
s have their own power supply, consisting of two 2,750 hp Alco
diesel engine
s driving four 1 megawatt
generators.
The type of solid physical contact maintained with the ground usually comes in the form of large continuous track or wheel
arrays.
's mechanical drives are onboard, the power needed to run them comes from an external source. Alternatively, a landship may be pushed or pulled by the land equivalent of a tugboat
, or even run on sail
power.
In fiction, a landship is a very large ship or vehicle designed for travel over land. They can be of various sizes, shapes, made of different materials and have different methods of propulsion. Fictional landships have appeared in books, comics and films.
Vehicle
A vehicle is a device that is designed or used to transport people or cargo. Most often vehicles are manufactured, such as bicycles, cars, motorcycles, trains, ships, boats, and aircraft....
that travels on land, as opposed to on water, air, or in space. Because of their large size, their use on land is seen as impractical due to terrain obstacles, and soft ground that cannot support such large weight. Such problems are non-existent on water and in space. However, vehicles similar to the concept of landships have appeared in various forms in the real world, and more commonly in works of fiction.
Compare with tram
Tram
A tram is a passenger rail vehicle which runs on tracks along public urban streets and also sometimes on separate rights of way. It may also run between cities and/or towns , and/or partially grade separated even in the cities...
s and train
Train
A train is a connected series of vehicles for rail transport that move along a track to transport cargo or passengers from one place to another place. The track usually consists of two rails, but might also be a monorail or maglev guideway.Propulsion for the train is provided by a separate...
s, which are large segmented land vehicles (or groups of vehicles) that use rail
Rail
Rail or rails may refer to:Railway transportation* A generic term for railroads, railways, rail transport, and related matters* Rail tracks, or railway lines, the running surface of a railway...
tracks, road train
Road train
A road train or roadtrain is a trucking concept used in remote areas of Argentina, Australia, Mexico, the United States and Canada to move freight efficiently. The term "road train" is most often used in Australia. In the U.S. and Canada the terms "triples," "turnpike doubles" and "Rocky Mountain...
s, which are large land vehicles that use roadways, articulated bus
Articulated bus
An articulated bus is an articulated vehicle used in public transportation. It is usually a single-deck design, and comprises two rigid sections linked by a pivoting joint...
es (another road vehicle type), amphibious vehicle
Amphibious vehicle
An amphibious vehicle , is a vehicle or craft, that is a means of transport, viable on land as well as on water – just like an amphibian....
s, which can drive on land and on water, and hovercraft
Hovercraft
A hovercraft is a craft capable of traveling over surfaces while supported by a cushion of slow moving, high-pressure air which is ejected against the surface below and contained within a "skirt." Although supported by air, a hovercraft is not considered an aircraft.Hovercraft are used throughout...
s, which travel above the surface of both masses on an air cushion.
History
In the First World War, the British proposed building "landships" - large (300 tons or more) vehicles capable of crossing the trench systems of the Western Front, and the Landships CommitteeLandships Committee
The Landships Committee was a small British war cabinet committee established in February 1915 to deal with the design and construction of what would turn out to be tanks during the First World War...
was formed to investigate these ideas for equipping the Naval Brigades. The impracticality of building such large vehicles and the needs of the British Army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...
for more numerous smaller vehicles led to the much smaller first tanks. However, until after the Second World War, the British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
would continue to think of tanks in naval terms
Glossary of nautical terms
This is a glossary of nautical terms; some remain current, many date from the 17th-19th century. See also Wiktionary's nautical terms, :Category:Nautical terms, and Nautical metaphors in English.- A :...
; e.g., the Cruiser tank
Cruiser tank
The cruiser tank was a British tank concept of the inter-war period. This concept was the driving force behind several tank designs which saw action during the Second World War....
operating like the ships of the same name. Quickly proving impractical were the battleship
Battleship
A battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of heavy caliber guns. Battleships were larger, better armed and armored than cruisers and destroyers. As the largest armed ships in a fleet, battleships were used to attain command of the sea and represented the apex of a...
-equivalent heavy tanks, such as the multi-turreted Vickers A1E1 Independent
Vickers A1E1 Independent
The Independent A1E1 is a multi-turreted tank that was designed by the British armaments manufacturer Vickers during the interwar period. Although it only ever reached the prototype stage it influenced many other tank designs....
and its assorted offspring. The Russian Tsar Tank
Tsar Tank
The Tsar Tank , also known as the Netopyr which stands for pipistrellus or Lebedenko Tank , was an unusual Russian armoured vehicle developed by Nikolai Lebedenko , Nikolai Zhukovsky , Boris Stechkin , and Alexander Mikulin...
, a super-heavy tricycle gun platform, was scrapped after a prototype proved difficult to maneuver and the vehicle was deemed vulnerable to ground fire.
Super-heavy tank
Super-heavy tanks are armored vehicles of very large size, generally over 75 tonnes. Programs have been initiated on several occasions with the aim of creating an invincible vehicle for penetrating enemy formations without fear of being destroyed in combat; however, only a few examples have ever...
s, the Landkreuzer P. 1000 Ratte and Landkreuzer P. 1500 Monster
Landkreuzer P. 1500 Monster
The Landkreuzer P 1500 Monster was a German pre-prototype super-heavy tank designed during World War II, representing the apex of the German extreme tank designs.- Conception :...
, were the closest things ever to be designed that approaches the popular fictional conception of a landship. The Maus
Panzer VIII Maus
Panzerkampfwagen VIII Maus was a German World War II super-heavy tank completed in late 1944. It is the heaviest fully enclosed armoured fighting vehicle ever built. Only two hulls and one turret were completed before the testing grounds were captured by the advancing Soviet forces.These two...
was the only super-heavy tank built by the Germans in WWII.
Bucket-wheel excavator
Bucket-wheel excavator
Bucket-wheel excavators are heavy equipment used in surface mining and mechanical engineering/civil engineering. The primary function of BWEs is to act as a continuous digging machine in large-scale open pit mining operations...
s are the biggest (externally-powered) land vehicles ever built by man, but do not fit into the popular conception of a landship. The largest self-powered land vehicles are NASA
NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research...
's two crawler-transporter
Crawler-Transporter
The crawler-transporters are a pair of tracked vehicles used to transport spacecraft from NASA's Vehicle Assembly Building along the Crawlerway to Launch Complex 39. They were originally used to transport the Saturn IB and Saturn V rockets during the Apollo, Skylab and Apollo–Soyuz programs....
s.
The Mountbatten class hovercraft
Mountbatten class hovercraft
The SR.N4 hovercraft was a large passenger and vehicle carrying hovercraft built by the British Hovercraft Corporation . BHC was formed by the merger of Saunders-Roe and Vickers Supermarine in 1966...
is the largest civilian hovercraft
Hovercraft
A hovercraft is a craft capable of traveling over surfaces while supported by a cushion of slow moving, high-pressure air which is ejected against the surface below and contained within a "skirt." Although supported by air, a hovercraft is not considered an aircraft.Hovercraft are used throughout...
ever built, and is capable of traveling over relatively smooth land in addition to water. It is capable of carrying 418 people, and 60 cars. Hovercraft are also used by the military for their amphibious landing capabilities. They are commonly referred to as air-cushioned landing craft
Air-cushioned landing craft
An air cushioned landing craft, also called an LCAC is a modern variation on the amphibious landing boat. These craft are based on small- to mid-sized multi-purpose hovercraft, also known as "over the beach" craft...
. These vehicles are usually very large compared to other land vehicles, and commonly carry other land vehicles like jeeps and armored vehicles.
Methods of propulsion
The main concern with moving such vehicles on land is torqueTorque
Torque, moment or moment of force , is the tendency of a force to rotate an object about an axis, fulcrum, or pivot. Just as a force is a push or a pull, a torque can be thought of as a twist....
, as their high mass presents a large amount of inertia
Inertia
Inertia is the resistance of any physical object to a change in its state of motion or rest, or the tendency of an object to resist any change in its motion. It is proportional to an object's mass. The principle of inertia is one of the fundamental principles of classical physics which are used to...
to overcome. For this reason, the propulsion system must be able to supply considerable amounts of initial torque to get the machine moving from standstill. For instance, the Leopard 2
Leopard 2
The Leopard 2 is a main battle tank developed by Krauss-Maffei in the early 1970s for the West German Army. The tank first entered service in 1979 and succeeded the earlier Leopard 1 as the main battle tank of the German Army. Various versions have served in the armed forces of Germany and twelve...
main battle tank
Main battle tank
A main battle tank , also known as a battle tank or universal tank, is a tank that fills the heavy direct fire role of many modern armies. They were originally conceived to replace the light, medium, heavy and super-heavy tanks. Development was spurred onwards in the Cold War with the development...
's engine maxes out at 4,700 N·m (3,458 lbs·ft).
If power supply is not a problem, electric motors may also be considered, as some types are able to produce maximum torque from zero revolutions per minute
Revolutions per minute
Revolutions per minute is a measure of the frequency of a rotation. It annotates the number of full rotations completed in one minute around a fixed axis...
(rpm) and virtually maintain it all the way to redline
Redline
Redline refers to the maximum engine speed at which an internal combustion engine or traction motor and its components are designed to operate without causing damage to the components themselves or other parts of the engine...
. In comparison, internal combustion engines steadily build their torque as rpm increases until they hit a "torque peak", after which torque output begins to drop if engine speeds continue increasing.
Self-propelled
Self-powered "landships" are usually powered by internal combustion engineInternal combustion engine
The internal combustion engine is an engine in which the combustion of a fuel occurs with an oxidizer in a combustion chamber. In an internal combustion engine, the expansion of the high-temperature and high -pressure gases produced by combustion apply direct force to some component of the engine...
s with horsepower
Horsepower
Horsepower is the name of several units of measurement of power. The most common definitions equal between 735.5 and 750 watts.Horsepower was originally defined to compare the output of steam engines with the power of draft horses in continuous operation. The unit was widely adopted to measure the...
levels measured in thousands. They either mechanically propel the machine through a drivetrain
Powertrain
In a motor vehicle, the term powertrain or powerplant refers to the group of components that generate power and deliver it to the road surface, water, or air. This includes the engine, transmission, drive shafts, differentials, and the final drive...
(like most tank
Tank
A tank is a tracked, armoured fighting vehicle designed for front-line combat which combines operational mobility, tactical offensive, and defensive capabilities...
s or the aforementioned unbuilt Landkreuzer P. 1000 Ratte), or ultimately end up running electric motor
Electric motor
An electric motor converts electrical energy into mechanical energy.Most electric motors operate through the interaction of magnetic fields and current-carrying conductors to generate force...
s through intermediate generators
Electrical generator
In electricity generation, an electric generator is a device that converts mechanical energy to electrical energy. A generator forces electric charge to flow through an external electrical circuit. It is analogous to a water pump, which causes water to flow...
, essentially being large electric vehicle
Electric vehicle
An electric vehicle , also referred to as an electric drive vehicle, uses one or more electric motors or traction motors for propulsion...
s (like the Terex 33-19 "Titan"
Terex 33-19 "Titan"
The Terex 33-19 "Titan" was a prototype off-highway, ultra class, rigid frame, three-axle, diesel/AC electric powertrain haul truck designed by the Terex Division of General Motors and assembled at General Motors Diesel Division's London, ON, Canada assembly plant in 1973. Only one 33-19 was ever...
).
An example of the latter is the NASA crawler-transporter: the 16 traction motor
Traction motor
Traction motor refers to an electric motor providing the primary rotational torque of a machine, usually for conversion into linear motion ....
s have their own power supply, consisting of two 2,750 hp Alco
American Locomotive Company
The American Locomotive Company, often shortened to ALCO or Alco , was a builder of railroad locomotives in the United States.-Early history:...
diesel engine
Diesel engine
A diesel engine is an internal combustion engine that uses the heat of compression to initiate ignition to burn the fuel, which is injected into the combustion chamber...
s driving four 1 megawatt
Watt
The watt is a derived unit of power in the International System of Units , named after the Scottish engineer James Watt . The unit, defined as one joule per second, measures the rate of energy conversion.-Definition:...
generators.
The type of solid physical contact maintained with the ground usually comes in the form of large continuous track or wheel
Wheel
A wheel is a device that allows heavy objects to be moved easily through rotating on an axle through its center, facilitating movement or transportation while supporting a load, or performing labor in machines. Common examples found in transport applications. A wheel, together with an axle,...
arrays.
Externally-powered
In this type, the main power supply is not on the vehicle itself. For instance, while the Bagger 288Bagger 288
Bagger 288 , built by the German company Krupp for the energy and mining firm Rheinbraun, is a bucket-wheel excavator or mobile strip mining machine...
's mechanical drives are onboard, the power needed to run them comes from an external source. Alternatively, a landship may be pushed or pulled by the land equivalent of a tugboat
Tugboat
A tugboat is a boat that maneuvers vessels by pushing or towing them. Tugs move vessels that either should not move themselves, such as ships in a crowded harbor or a narrow canal,or those that cannot move by themselves, such as barges, disabled ships, or oil platforms. Tugboats are powerful for...
, or even run on sail
Sail
A sail is any type of surface intended to move a vessel, vehicle or rotor by being placed in a wind—in essence a propulsion wing. Sails are used in sailing.-History of sails:...
power.
Fictional appearances
In fiction, a landship is a very large ship or vehicle designed for travel over land. They can be of various sizes, shapes, made of different materials and have different methods of propulsion. Fictional landships have appeared in books, comics and films.