[ARC5] X-1 Radios

[Robert Eleazer]

I have a book on the X-1, "Bell X-1 Variants" by Ben Guenther and Jay Miller, one of the Aerofax series.

It shows a VHF ARC-5 installation in the second generation X-1A, while it was still under construction, including views of the receiver, transmitter and MD-7.  The pictures of the radio switch panel for the X-1A are too small to read but appear to consist of a volume control and channel selector switch.

For the original X-1's (or XS-1's as they were known originally) I have no photos of the actual radio installation in the airframe but there is a view of the right sub-console of X-1 S/N 6063 which has a switch marked "ARC-5 Bands 1 2 3 4 5." 

Interestingly enough there is one photo of one of the original X-1's, 6062, during assembly that shows a panel on the right front side marked "ARC-7", with a knob marked "Increase Volume",  and a switch marked "Power On."  (This is an obvious typo on the panel.  Clearly, one of the first X-1's must have had an ARC-8, with an ART-13 and BC-348.  Sure must have been crowded in that tiny cockpit!)  The S/N 6062 ARC-7 controls were in the same location as the ARC-5 "bandswitch" on S/N 6063.    

By the way, the panels, both X-1 and X-1A, also show a switch for a radar beacon, although on the X-1A it was marked just "Radar."  Unless they stuck an SCR-720 in there, too.....

Wayne