





The Tyco Typhoon was the first ready to run R/C hovercraft. It made use of Tyco's new 9.6 volt battery pack. It had three fans. The two on the rear of the craft were used to steer, while the central fan was used to make the craft hover. This fan drew alot of power and led to relatively short running times. A battery pack would generally not last more than 10 minutes. You could turn off this fan by remote control to perform skids, but if you were on open water the Typhoon would sink.



Not long after it was released, Nikko released the Pirate, which was a dual fan hovercraft. Steering was performed with a rudder.



A few years later Tyco released the Mini Typhoon, which was a smaller version of the orginal. On this unit the central fan was always operational. The skirt had holes in the bottom and did not work as well as the original.



Tyco then released the Typhoon II which featured a larger skirt. It was faster than the original Typhoon and could perform jumps.