Lindstrand Balloons - Manufacturers of hot air balloons, gas balloons, airships and tethered aerostats. Lindstrand Balloons Ltd (LBL) are based in Shropshire, England. The Lindstrand team have been building lighter-than-air vehicles on the same site for almost 21 years. With designs certified in 48 countries and a perfect safety record LBL is the world's largest manufacturer of airships. The roots of LBL go back to 1976. Twenty three years later the LBL team have designed, manufactured and type-certified the following lighter- than-air vehicles: Over 4,500 hot air balloons, currently operated in 48 countries Over 100 hot airships Over 110 gas balloons, helium and hydrogen capable The largest ever hot air balloon, 73,600m? The largest ever manned super-pressure balloon, 36,086m? The largest ever thermal airship, 8,500m? The GA-42 helium airship, 26m long, 1,190m?. This was the world's first certified civil aircraft with fly-by-wire control with no mechanical back-ups Largest manufacturer of manned tethered aerostats. LBL has a policy of in-house design and manufacture and has two factories in Oswestry, one solely devoted to hot air manufacture and one for gas inflatables and special projects. Gas balloon manufacture is dominated by tethered aerostats, which are manufactured by overlap welding of continuous longitudinal gores. This process allows for the welding machine to run on the rail track while the balloon material is almost stationery and the welding process is conducted by a hot air nozzle blowing into the two jointing surfaces. The largest balloon manufactured on existing machinery is a 36,086m? manned super-pressure balloon. A 60,000m? balloon could be built on existing machine tools and existing premises. Much of the machinery used in LBL's balloon manufacture is unique to LBL and has been largely developed in-house as LBL have comprehensive machine shop facilities and a full electronic/electrical workshop. LBL has designed, developed and built a number of impulse welding machines and long arm sewing machines.