[Milsurplus] Robert Watson-Watt and British Radar, The Wizard War

[Mark Dinsmore]

Thanks for the nice review Dave. I watched it last night also.

I recently borrowed a library book; "The wizard war : British scientific intelligence", 1939-1945 R. V. (Reginald Victor) Jones, wherein the author refers to "the battle of the beams." Fascinating read about radar development, detection and countermeasures, along with the inter-agency struggles and more.

Mark  

On 3/25/19, 7:01 AM, "David Olean" <k1whs at metrocast.net> wrote:

    i watched the movie on Amazon Prime late last night. It seems that those 
    TU units were everywhere! I saw the same ones in many scenes but in 
    various mock-ups. It reminds me of the WW2 B-17 movie where the 
    directors had three B-17s available so they paraded them across the 
    screen to make those three look like a squadron. One trick was applying 
    different nose art to the planes so the viewer thought it was a 
    different airplane each time it came into view!
    
    I saw a few HROs including a nice scene of the back side of an HRO with 
    lighted filaments. You could clearly see the printed labels on the cans: 
    First IF, 2nd IF etc. all while the actors are raising the RADAR output 
    power to 350  KW.  There were a few VTVMs and power units on display. 
    All in all, I enjoyed the film, but wish that there would be a motion 
    picture that told more of the story of RADAR development.  I would have 
    thrown in a few VT-127s or even 100THs as well.
    
    Rather than pay attention to RWWs love life for added suspense, there 
    was plenty of suspense as Europe fell and the U-boats effects increased 
    up thru about 1943. Britain was hanging on by a slender thread.  The 
    Tizzard mission to the USA was a huge event and all of the intrigue 
    between the allied powers as they mapped out a path to victory makes for 
    plenty of suspense. I believe it was Taffy Bowen who accompanied the 
    magnetrons and other inventions when they went across the sea to the USA.
    
    Anyway, a very enjoyable film for me as it was. The Chain Home system 
    was quite effective and completed in the nick of time.  A movie about 
    its' development was a great subject in any event. Most viewers never 
    heard of it I am sure.
    
    Dave K1WHS
    
    
    On 3/25/2019 1:19 AM, Mark Dinsmore wrote:
    > The movie is available on Amazon Prime Movies, free with Prime membership... Planning on watching it this evening.
    >
    > -Mark
    >
    > On 3/24/19, 6:11 PM, "milsurplus-bounces at mailman.qth.net on behalf of Kenneth G. Gordon" <milsurplus-bounces at mailman.qth.net on behalf of kgordon2006 at frontier.com> wrote:
    >
    >      Well, I just took another look on-line for the movie I and my Wife watched yesterday entitled,
    >      "Castles in the Sky". Apparently, there is a Japanese film entitled "Castle (singular) in the
    >      Sky" which "confuses" any search engine for the British film.
    >      
    >      Anyway, as I mentioned here yesterday, who ever built the sets for the British film had quite
    >      a collection of WWII (and later) U.S.military equipment.
    >      
    >      Closeups of the electronic gear that Watson-Watt and his team were using included more
    >      than one BC-191/375 tuning unit built into the equipment racks, AND at least one BC-348
    >      mounted in the middle of a large bit of rack-panelling.
    >      
    >      Then there was the HRO receiver, quite obviously but recently completely restored to like
    >      new, sitting on a table while the actors were engaging in some sort of conference.
    >      
    >      I wish I could re-watch the entire movie with the capability of stopping action in various
    >      places just to see what other bits of electronic gear I would find.
    >      
    >      Has anyone else here seen this movie? What did you notice about the gear?
    >      
    >      Overall, I suppose the movie would be interesting to some of the
    >      less-than-electronically-aware folks who see it. It was interesting, but not as "in-depth" as I
    >      would have liked to see.
    >      
    >      Even so, I think it is well-worth seeing by some of us.
    >      
    >      Ken W7EKB
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