[ARC5] B-17 radios? I think not...

[Mike Everette]

I have the flight manuals (on CD) for the B-17C/D models and maybe the B also, I forget exactly.  Been a while since I looked them over.  All the ones I have show the SCR-183 or 283 to be the command set in the early B-17 versions.

73

Mike
W4DSE

--- On Thu, 4/18/13, Mike Morrow <kk5f at earthlink.net> wrote:

> From: Mike Morrow <kk5f at earthlink.net>
> Subject: Re: [ARC5] B-17 radios? I think not...
> To: arc5 at mailman.qth.net
> Date: Thursday, April 18, 2013, 10:16 AM
> 
> > What makes you think that the ATA sets were never
> fitted in the B17s?
> 
> The simple **complete lack** of any justification for, or
> evidence of, such
> installations should be sufficient, I think.  :-)
> 
> > These particular ones most likely weren't,
> 
> They definitely were not, except maybe at Area 51. :-)
> 
> > but wouldn't early B17s have had ATA/ARA command sets
> 
> Navy gear did not appear in US Army Air Corpse (as our
> Educated Ruler
> would say) aircraft.  Plus, early B-17s pre-dated the
> USN's 1940 ARA/ATA
> command set, even if the USAAC had for some odd reason been
> inclined
> to use USN equipment.  I doubt that the USN would have
> released its sets.
> 
> USAAC aircraft before 1941 carried SCR-*-183/283 command
> sets.  There
> was a long and unsuccessful USAAC search for a better
> command set until
> a reduced-scope slightly-modified version of the USN set was
> adopted
> as the SCR-274-N in 1941 (about the same time USAAC became
> USAAF).
> 
> > or were they strictly used only by the Navy?
> 
> Strictly USN and Marine Corpse (as the Anointed One would
> say) use,
> and possibly Coast Guard.  The later AN/ARC-5 was also
> a USN set
> developed from the ARA/ATA (originally as
> ARA-2/ATA-3).  It too
> was not used in USAAF aircraft during WWII...although the
> Bell
> X-1 carried the AN/ARC-5 VHF set in 1947.
> 
> > My hybrid command set T19/ARC5/BC456/SCR274N setup
> includes an
> > ATA antenna relay unit with the manufacture date
> clipped off...
> > Didn't that have something to do with units produced
> for Lend
> > Lease shipment to the Brits while we were still neutral
> in 1940? 
> 
> Not at all.  The presence of such information can be
> used by the bad
> guys to help determine production rates.  There's no
> need for it
> to appear on the equipment.  It's a contract date, not
> a manufacturing
> date.  In some sense, that effort was defeated or
> abandoned in the
> US Army Signal Corpse (as the All-Knowing One would say)
> with the
> stamping of moisture-fungus proofing (MFP) date stamps all
> over the
> gear.
> 
> Aside from that, I am unaware of any B-17s going to the UK
> in 1940
> and 1941.
> 
> FWIW, the USAAC SCR-274-N is **electrically** identical to
> the USN
> ARA/ATA except for the AF impedance of the receivers and the
> modulator
> side-tone output.  The USN set used 300 ohm.  The
> USAAC set used 4000
> ohm in -A models, and 4000 or 300 ohm in later models.
> 
> Also, there is nothing **electrically** interchangeable
> between the
> ATA and SCR-274-N transmitter components and those in the
> USN's
> AN/ARC-5 except the antenna relay and the modulator
> dynamotor.
> (I address only proper military usage...all bets are off
> with hams.)
> 
> There is a pretty good but not too long article on these
> command sets
> at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARC-5 .
> 
> In the history of one service using gear developed by
> another, the USN
> in WWII used very commonly the SCR-269-* ADF, the SCR-522-A
> VHF-AM
> command set, and ultimately for appropriate aircraft the
> RC-103-A
> localizer and AN/ARN-5* glide slope ILS system.  The
> USN's ABK-* Mark
> III IFF system was used by the USAAF with SCR-595-A as
> official
> nomenclature, but the actual gear displayed USN name
> plates.  Similarly,
> the USAAF's SCR-695-A Mark III/G IFF system was used by the
> USN with
> ABF-* as official nomenclature, but the actual gear carried
> USAAC name
> plates.  The USN's ZB-* VHF homing system became the
> AN/ARR-1 homing
> adapter for both the USN and USAAF, but it was still
> referred to as
> the "ZB" on in B-29 manuals and on actual controls.
> 
> Regardless...evidence for USAAC use of the ARA/ATA is
> non-existent.
> 
> Mike / KK5F
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