PMN1
27th May 2009, 21:27
From ‘Britain’s’ Shield: radar and the Defeat of the Luftwaffe’ by David Zimmerman
In 1933 Dr Rudolph Kuhnold, Chief of the German Navy’s Signals Research Division, began work on a radar detection system. The origins of this work stemmed from Kuhnold’s earlier development of an underwater acoustical device similar to modern sonar. This shows that it was possible to make the transformation from acoustical to radio detection systems. Tests on radiolocation devices began in France in January 1934 and in the Soviet Union in July of that same year.
It is more surprising, therefore, that it took until 1935 before a programme to develop radar began in Great Britain. Sean Swords, in his technical history on early radar development, managed to trace three separate suggestions, or formal proposals, for the development of similar devices dating from as early as 1926. The first of these suggestions was made on 4 August 1926 by O F Brown, a scientist with the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, to the Anti-Aircraft Research Committee. He suggested to the committee a variety of ways that a cathode-ray oscillograph, a precursor to the CRT, could be used to enhance existing acoustical mirror technology. He added that it was ‘possible that a method of location in the azimuth could be based on the use of the cathode-ray direction-finder or short wave radiation excited in the metal of aircraft by magnetos or by secondary excitation in a strong filed emitted from a ground transmitter’. Unfortunately for Lindemann, he either did not see Brown’s paper or missed the significance of this particular suggestion. However, Lindemann, in his quest to find an alternative to acoustic mirrors, certainly pursued research into the detection of radiation from aircraft magnetos.
In 1928 L S B Alder of the Royal navy’s Signal School, proposed the development of a device ‘for the employment of reflection, scattering, or re-radiation of wireless waves by objects as a means for detecting the presence of such objects’. The device could be sued as an aid to navigation or a means to detect ‘approaching ships or aircraft’. There is no record that officials at the Signals School took any notice of Alder’s proposal.
The most extensive research by British defence scientists into using the reflections of radio waves for long range detection undertaken prior to 1935 occurred at the Signals Experimental Establishment (SEE), by W A S Butement and P E Pollard. Ironically, Pollard was under secondment to SEE from Tucker’s Air Defence Experimental Establishment. In late 1930 the two conducted a series of experiments using a short-wave radio source and receiver. Based on the results of this work, on 26th January 1931, they proposed the building of an ‘apparatus to locate ships from the coast or other ships, under any condition of visibility, or weather’. The ‘apparatus depends on the reflection of Ultra Short Radio Waves by conducting objects, e.g. ships’. SEE allowed them to conduct a limited series of experiments and they were able to detect a mast at about 100 yds away. However, here too the significance of this work was missed by both the War Office and Admiralty and the research programme was terminated.
Does anyone know any more about these proposals and how close they were to what did become RDF as we know it?
What impact would an earlier RDF have?
The RN now has good warning of incoming aircraft, what does that do for the armoured box concept?
I’ve read that Oboe MkI was derived from Chain Home Low, what does an earlier RDF do for bomber navigation –before 1939, Ludlow Hewitt was making some very accurate statements about how poor the navigation was in Bomber Command.
In 1933 Dr Rudolph Kuhnold, Chief of the German Navy’s Signals Research Division, began work on a radar detection system. The origins of this work stemmed from Kuhnold’s earlier development of an underwater acoustical device similar to modern sonar. This shows that it was possible to make the transformation from acoustical to radio detection systems. Tests on radiolocation devices began in France in January 1934 and in the Soviet Union in July of that same year.
It is more surprising, therefore, that it took until 1935 before a programme to develop radar began in Great Britain. Sean Swords, in his technical history on early radar development, managed to trace three separate suggestions, or formal proposals, for the development of similar devices dating from as early as 1926. The first of these suggestions was made on 4 August 1926 by O F Brown, a scientist with the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, to the Anti-Aircraft Research Committee. He suggested to the committee a variety of ways that a cathode-ray oscillograph, a precursor to the CRT, could be used to enhance existing acoustical mirror technology. He added that it was ‘possible that a method of location in the azimuth could be based on the use of the cathode-ray direction-finder or short wave radiation excited in the metal of aircraft by magnetos or by secondary excitation in a strong filed emitted from a ground transmitter’. Unfortunately for Lindemann, he either did not see Brown’s paper or missed the significance of this particular suggestion. However, Lindemann, in his quest to find an alternative to acoustic mirrors, certainly pursued research into the detection of radiation from aircraft magnetos.
In 1928 L S B Alder of the Royal navy’s Signal School, proposed the development of a device ‘for the employment of reflection, scattering, or re-radiation of wireless waves by objects as a means for detecting the presence of such objects’. The device could be sued as an aid to navigation or a means to detect ‘approaching ships or aircraft’. There is no record that officials at the Signals School took any notice of Alder’s proposal.
The most extensive research by British defence scientists into using the reflections of radio waves for long range detection undertaken prior to 1935 occurred at the Signals Experimental Establishment (SEE), by W A S Butement and P E Pollard. Ironically, Pollard was under secondment to SEE from Tucker’s Air Defence Experimental Establishment. In late 1930 the two conducted a series of experiments using a short-wave radio source and receiver. Based on the results of this work, on 26th January 1931, they proposed the building of an ‘apparatus to locate ships from the coast or other ships, under any condition of visibility, or weather’. The ‘apparatus depends on the reflection of Ultra Short Radio Waves by conducting objects, e.g. ships’. SEE allowed them to conduct a limited series of experiments and they were able to detect a mast at about 100 yds away. However, here too the significance of this work was missed by both the War Office and Admiralty and the research programme was terminated.
Does anyone know any more about these proposals and how close they were to what did become RDF as we know it?
What impact would an earlier RDF have?
The RN now has good warning of incoming aircraft, what does that do for the armoured box concept?
I’ve read that Oboe MkI was derived from Chain Home Low, what does an earlier RDF do for bomber navigation –before 1939, Ludlow Hewitt was making some very accurate statements about how poor the navigation was in Bomber Command.