[Milsurplus] ?? " ZA Impedance Adapter "

[William Donzelli]

> I know nothing about the ZA.  

ZA...ZB...favorite radios in this house.

> I would conclude the the
> ZA item that you have was NOT employed with either the ZB-series or the
> AN/ARR-1.

ZA is a very early ILS system, and was fitted to most? larger Navy 
planes. It came about in the very late 1930s from the Air-Track people. 
The system is pretty crude, but they obviously had big plans for 
expansion. Like the AAFs RC-103-A sets (BC-733s), the ZAs had a 
crosspoint indicator, but only one of the needles actually did anything. 
The other was dead, but was planned to be used in later equipment.

The other end of the ZA system is the YD beacon. Neat looking thing, 
albeit a bit oddly shaped. I have a junky one in the back, but no manual. 
I think I have an extra ZA maint. manual.

The test set for this whole thing is an LS, interestingly called 
"Squadron Signal Generator Equipment".

> I suspect that any such usage
> by the USAAF of this homing system must have been in the Pacific Theater
> of Operations, if at all.

This is what I have heard - but have no hard evidence.

>  Perhaps a USN YB-type system was used as the
> homing signal transmitter.  There does not seem to be any JAN- or
> USAAF-nomenclatured equivalent tranmitter.

I have never heard of one, but it would not kill me with shock if I did 
find out about one. The beacons, YE and YG, were procured from 1939 thru 
1944, I think. The former, larger set, was to be used on carriers. The 
latter, smaller (and eligantly simple) set was used on both carriers and 
airfields.

William Donzelli
aw288@osfn.org