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Want to support this channel and help us preserve old films? Visit Visit our website This short, silent film from the collection of Jeff Vilencia, shows some of the inventions that were developed by Franklin A. Dobson of Newport Beach, California. These included the Convertiplane, an experimental vertical take-off and landing aircraft, and the Aircar experimental hovercraft. The two are connected in that the one inspired the other. Dobson stated, ''My work (with ground effect vehicles) started as a by-product of a Vertical Take-Off design effort. I thought there should be some way to increase the ground effect of a helicopter by enclosing the rotor downwash, so I worked out the plenum chamber theory and later the annular jet. At the time, I wasn't aware of work being done elsewhere, either in the United States or Great Britain. 'To test my theory, I built a six-foot model with the help of a friend, using a homemade double rotor from an earlier VTOL
