[ARC5] Airplane radios in tanks

[Mike Morrow]

Gene wrote:

>     I also had read that Rommel's communications among his Afrika Corps 
>tanks were intercepted by Hams on the US east coast, and that the freqs 
>Rommel was operating on were in the 10M band.  It seems plausible to me - we 
>all know what 10M can do when suspots are peaking, and wasn't 1940 on an 
>upswing in sunspot activity?

It was past its peak in 1940, and at its minimum in 1944.  But we've all seen
instances when the 10 meter band can come alive even at a solar minimum.

A graph going back to 1915 is here:

http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/Media/graphics/SolarCycle.gif

It looks like 1948 would have been a great year for thousand-mile contacts
on the SCR-508 gear (20 to 28 MHz).

A friend who flew helicopters as an Army WO in South Vietnam in 1968 and 
1969 has told me of many instances where he could use his AN/ARC-131 (30 to
76 MHz, 10 watts, tactical VHF-FM) to talk to bases in Korea, but could not
contact stations in Vietnam.  That's not too unnexpected, given the solar
conditions in the late 1960s.  I suspect it sometimes occurred with the
AN/PRC-25 and -77 sets too.

Mike / KK5F