Adrian Albert Lombard, CBE (9 January 1915 – 13 July 1967) was an English aeronautical engineer. Despite having no formal training in aerodynamics,[1] he became one of the world's foremost designers of jet engines.[2] He was involved with the Rolls-Royce company in a variety of roles for almost 30 years.
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Adrian Lombard was born in the city of Coventry, Warwickshire, on 9 January 1915. He was the second of three sons of Arthur, a toolmaker, and Louisa. Lombard was taught at the John Gulson Central Advanced School, and later attended evening classes at the Coventry Technical College.[1] After leaving school at the age of 15, he began training in the drawing office of the Rover Company. Lombard was married to Joan Taylor on 18 April 1940 and the couple had three children, one of whom died in infancy. He was awarded a CBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours in June 1967. Lombard died of a brain haemorrhage at the Derbyshire Royal Infirmary in Derby on 13 July 1967, at the age of 52.[1][2]
After spending five years with Rover, Lombard took a job with the Morris Motor Company where he was put in charge of engine stress calculations and worked as a motor car engineer.[3] However, he returned to Rover in 1936 and within four years was part of Maurice Wilks' design team.[1] In April 1940 Lombard began his work with jet engines when the team was entrusted with the task of preparing the Whittle W.2B jet engine for production. His designs during this period incorporated a new combustion system and were the precursor to the later successful Rolls-Royce Nene and Derwent engines, which powered most of the first generation of British jet fighters.[2]
In 1943, Rover and Rolls-Royce completed a deal in which the latter took over interest in the jet engine production factories in Clitheroe and Barnoldswick. Lombard subsequently joined Rolls-Royce and was appointed chief engine designer of factories in the north of England. He assembled a team that built 100 of the W.2B engines for use in Gloster Meteor fighter planes, while simultaneously supervising the design of the Derwent engine. In October 1945, a Meteor equipped with Derwent V engines broke the world speed record at 603 mph.[1] The design centre was relocated to Derby in 1946, and there Lombard became chief projects designer.[2] His team designed the Avon engine, which powered the Fairey Delta, the first aeroplane to exceed 1000 mph, and other civil jet aircraft including the De Havilland Comet.[1] In 1949, Lombard was promoted to chief designer at the Derby plant, and was made Rolls-Royce's chief aeronautical designer three years later.
Lombard was appointed chief engineer at Rolls-Royce in 1954, and around this time he was involved in the production of the Conway engine, which was used in the Vickers VC10 and installed in a several Boeing 707 aircraft.[2] He also joined the council of the Royal Aeronautical Society, and was also involved with the Air Registration Board and the Aeronautical Research Council. Lombard became the director of the Rolls-Royce aeronautical engine division in 1958,[1] and was responsible for overseeing the production of all the company's jet turbines. Under his guidance, the company developed a new technology for building jet engines solely from plastics.[4] In November 1962, he visited Japan to meet with several companies that had expressed an interest in Rolls-Royce's vertical take-off aircraft engines. During the trip, he predicted that such engines would be in general civil use within ten years.[5] Lombard and Stanley Hooker, then technical director of Bristol Siddeley, were jointly awarded the James Clayton award by the Institute of Mechanical Engineers in February 1967, for their pioneering work with vertical take-off engines.[6] Following his death in July 1967, it was written that Rolls-Royce had been "deprived of one of the finest trouble-shooting engineers in the industry".[7]