[ARC5] US Pushbutton VHF-AM Control Boxes - Insight Again

[Mike Morrow]

Mike/W6MAB wrote:

> ...The Saufley Field Tape.  Four instructors intercepted four students
> on their way to their aircraft and took their place, pretending to be
> the students.  They then proceed to totally screw up in the air and
> drive the instructor berserk.  You can hear the victimized instructor
> yelling his head off over the radio.  It was all recorded on these two
> tapes:
>
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?hl=nl&gl=NL&v=Snq_CT_7rrk
> 
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5LoTgDfYYg

Amusing!  Aviators made up 55 percent of the officers of the
USN when I served, and it always seemed that as a class of
people they had a better sense of humor than my nuclear navy
peers.

> Upon reviewing the Saufley Tape (I hadn't done so in years)
> I hear channels 5 and 8 mentioned.  I would say that definitely
> takes the VHF transceivers being used out of the ARC-5 category
> and more like ARC-3.

These recordings **do** indicate a great detail with respect to
the radio sets being used:
(1) The AN/ARC-3 is NOT likely to be the radio set.
(2) The AN/ARC-1 is MOST likely to be the radio set (if a VHF
    set is being used).

The eight channels in the AN/ARC-3 are designated by **letter**,
not number...channels A though H.

The push-buttons on the C-118*/ARC-3 have plastic button faces
that are 0.75-inch in diameter, each with a letter 0.33-inch in
height.  The later panel-type C-404*/A control for the AN/ARC-3
has an eight-position rotary channel select switch with positions
A though H.  The crystal positions in the R-77* and T-67*/ARC-3
are marked A though H.  No channel *numbers* anywhere, anytime.

I doubt that a number would be used to refer to a channel of
the AN/ARC-3, even one in USN service.

OTOH, the USN AN/ARC-1 has channel *numbers* for nine channels
(1 through 9) plus guard channel (GC).  I suspect that the
aircraft in the recordings above are using AN/ARC-1 sets
because of the reference to channel 5 and channel 8, rather
than channel E and channel H.  There would have been plenty
of AN/ARC-1 sets available by 1953, as the USN had progressed
to UHF-AM with the AN/ARC-12 and the new AN/ARC-27 and phased out
the AN/ARC-1.  But the AN/ARC-1 never had a push-button control
box.

I agree with Mike/KC4TOS that most of the C-30/ARC-5 control
boxes should have been long withdrawn, even in training aircraft.
The C-30A/ARC-5 was available before the end of WWII and it was
a direct replacement electrically and mechanically.  But still
...in a military training aircraft one can never be sure.  The
T-34B aircraft in which I took aviation indoctrination training
in 1972 were still using the A.R.C. Type 12 UHF-AM set (AN/ARC-60).
The TS-2A Tracker aircraft still had an AN/ARC-2 HF set, R-23/ARC-5
beacon band set, and AN/ARN-6 ADF set...in 1972 at NAS Corpus
Christi.

I'd love to see a photo or other documentation for any USN aircraft
(that had never been a USAF aircraft) that showed the AN/ARC-3.
The Saufley Field recordings indicate almost anything except an
AN/ARC-3.

Mike / KK5F