[ARC5] MFPO- Before or After

[WA5CAB at cs.com]

When the MFP treatment was first developed, it was in relatively short 
supply and was mostly reserved for treatment of equipment going to the Pacific. 
Equipment going to Europe didn't get treated until later. The lot of WW-II 
vintage LS-3's I bought were all unpackaged, treated and repackaged in 1951 
or 52. The 1952 production ones were treated at time of manufacture. I've 
seen a fair quantity of NOS BC-611-C and -E replacement chassis (made 1944) 
that were treated in May and June of 1945.

Robert Downs - Houston
wa5cab dot com (Web Store)
MVPA 9480

In a message dated 04/04/2012 13:20:16 PM Central Daylight Time, 
1oldlens1 at ix.netcom.com writes: 
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "J. Forster" <jfor at quikus.com>
> To: <ARC5 at mailman.qth.net>; <milsurplus at mailman.qth.net>
> Cc: <Vintage-Military-RADAR at yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, April 03, 2012 7:38 PM
> Subject: [ARC5] MFPO- Before or After
> 
> 
> >Recently, I got a NOS (?) Output Meter for an ASB-5 RADAR 
> >set. I powered
> >it today and smelt like something was burning, so powered 
> >it down.
> >
> >It turns out the filament series resistor, a standard 
> >ceramic wirewound
> >type had burn marks on it. I was puzzled because the 
> >resistor had looked
> >new ten minutes before. It turns out, there was some 
> >varnish on the
> >resistor that had charred when the resistor got hot. (It 
> >scraped off
> >easily).
> >
> >Now, I would have expected that the unit would have been 
> >tested before
> >shipment. Had that happened, the resistor would have been 
> >charred.
> >
> >So, the question is, would an MFP coating have been 
> >applied after final
> >test or before. This unit implies it was applied after, 
> >but that doesn't
> >really make sense either.
> >
> >Best,
> >
> >-John
> >
>      I have seen a number of pieces of military equipment 
> with dates stamped on them for the MFP treatment, some 
> several years after original manufacture. I suspect some 
> equipment was built and put into stock for a time, and then 
> MFP treated and returned to stock.  I don't know this for 
> certain but think its true.
>      BTW, just today I saw a notice in a 1945 QST that 
> stated that "now that the European war is ended un-needed 
> equipment is being tropicalized and sent to the Pacific".
>