[ARC5] Command set nomenclature ATA, ARA, AN/ARC-5 and so on ...

[Mike Hanz]

On 11/25/2013 12:34 AM, Leslie Smith wrote:
>    However, looking at what you wrote below, and at the Wikipedia page
>    there is still some uncertainty in my mind.
>
>    It seems that ATA/ARA  (as I see on the Wikipedia column heading)
>    applies to a complete CLASS of transmitters (ATA) and receivers
>    (ARA).
>    To repeat this idea, using transmitters as an example: according to
>    the Wikipedia page that individual items in the "ATA"  list include
>    the following transmitters:  CBY-52232,  CBY-52208 ... and so on.
>    So CBY-52232 is an example of one item that has the nomenclature ATA -
>    is that correct?

It is indeed!

> Now to give the conflicting idea (which I NOW believe is wrong)
>    If I didn't have the Wikipedia page in front of me I'd conclude that
>    there was but a SINGLE item identified by ATA (not a set of
>    transmitters as I suggest above).
>    When some clever designer finished the SECOND transmitter was ATB.  So
>    one letter per item.

It's a nice simplistic approach, but you can appreciate that they would 
have run out of letters in a hurry with the march of technology.  Any 
puzzlement is probably caused by the fact that most often there was only 
a single set produced under the generic class, while an exception was a 
set of four transmitters under the ATA heading.

>   It seems this understanding  is wrong (i.e. one letter of the alphabet
>    does not go with a SINGLE type of receiver)

Sometimes it did, but not by intent...it was due only to the fact that 
multiple receivers were often not needed or produced for the particular 
class.  For example, the ARB covered the entire four tactical bands 
commonly used for by the Navy in 1942, so multiple receivers were not 
needed.  If separate receivers were needed, you would have seen the same 
five digit nomenclature for each of them under the ARB heading.  Another 
example besides the ARA is the RAX-1 triplet of receivers - three each 
five digit identifiers under the RAX-1 umbrella.

> What I DO understand NOW is that ATA does NOT mean "aircraft
> transmitting apparatus".  It means a specific CLASS (the first class) of
> transmitters.
>
>    How am I doing?

By george, I think he's got it! :-)

     73,
  - Mike