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Serrate Radar Detector
Serrate was a World War II Allied radar detection and homing device used by night fighters to track Luftwaffe night fighters equipped with the earlier UHF-band ''BC'' and ''C-1'' versions of the Lichtenstein radar. It allowed RAF night fighters to attack their German counterparts, disrupting their attempts to attack the RAF's bomber force. The first Serrate systems were developed from the AI Mk. IV radar, which just happened to have antennas almost perfectly suited to receiving the Lichtenstein signals. Serrate simply disconnected the display from the radar's own transmitter and receiver and connected it to one tuned to the Lichtenstein. This produced a display indicating the direction to the German aircraft, but not the range. By carefully watching the movement of the target on the display the operator could estimate the range in general terms, near or far. When it appeared the target was close enough, the display was reconnected to the Mk. IV's own electronics to provide both rang ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis powers. World War II was a total war that directly involved more than 100 million personnel from more than 30 countries. The major participants in the war threw their entire economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities behind the war effort, blurring the distinction between civilian and military resources. Aircraft played a major role in the conflict, enabling the strategic bombing of population centres and deploying the only two nuclear weapons ever used in war. World War II was by far the deadliest conflict in human history; it resulted in 70 to 85 million fatalities, mostly among civilians. Tens of millions died due to genocides (including the Holocaust), starvation, ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Antenna Gain
In electromagnetics, an antenna's gain is a key performance parameter which combines the antenna's directivity and radiation efficiency. The term ''power gain'' has been deprecated by IEEE. In a transmitting antenna, the gain describes how well the antenna converts input power into radio waves headed in a specified direction. In a receiving antenna, the gain describes how well the antenna converts radio waves arriving from a specified direction into electrical power. When no direction is specified, gain is understood to refer to the peak value of the gain, the gain in the direction of the antenna's main lobe. A plot of the gain as a function of direction is called the antenna pattern or radiation pattern. It is not to be confused with directivity, which does ''not'' take an antenna's radiation efficiency into account. Gain or 'absolute gain' is defined as "The ratio of the radiation intensity in a given direction to the radiation intensity that would be produced if the p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bf 110
The Messerschmitt Bf 110, often known unofficially as the Me 110,Because it was built before ''Bayerische Flugzeugwerke'' became Messerschmitt AG in July 1938, the Bf 110 was never officially given the designation Me 110. is a twin-engine (Destroyer, heavy fighter), fighter-bomber (''Jagdbomber'' or ''Jabo''), and night fighter (''Nachtjäger'') developed in Nazi Germany in the 1930s and used by the Luftwaffe during World War II. Hermann Göring was a proponent of the Bf 110, believing its heavy armament, speed, and range would make the Bf 110 the Luftwaffe’s premier offensive fighter. Early variants were armed with two MG FF 20 mm cannon, four 7.92 mm (.312 in) MG 17 machine guns, and one 7.92 mm (.312 in) MG 15 machine gun for defence (later variants would replace the MG FFs with MG 151s and the rear gunner station would be armed with the twin-barreled MG 81Z). Development work on an improved type to replace the Bf 110 - the Messerschmitt Me 210 - began befo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Battle Of Berlin (air)
The Battle of Berlin (November 1943 to March 1944) was a bombing campaign against Berlin by RAF Bomber Command along with raids on other German cities to keep German defences dispersed. Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Harris, Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief (AOC-in-C) Bomber Command, believed that "We can wreck Berlin from end to end if the USAAF come in with us. It will cost us between 400 and 500 aircraft. It will cost Germany the war". Harris could expect about 800 serviceable heavy bombers for each raid, equipped with new and sophisticated navigational devices such as H2S radar. The USAAF, having recently lost many aircraft in attacks on Schweinfurt, did not participate. The Main Force of Bomber Command attacked Berlin sixteen times but failed in its object of inflicting a decisive defeat on Germany. The Royal Air Force lost more than 7,000 aircrew and 1,047 bombers, (5.1 per cent of the sorties flown); a further 1,682 aircraft were damaged or written off. On 30 March 1944, Bom ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
RAF Bomber Command
RAF Bomber Command controlled the Royal Air Force's bomber forces from 1936 to 1968. Along with the United States Army Air Forces, it played the central role in the strategic bombing of Germany in World War II. From 1942 onward, the British bombing campaign against Germany became less restrictive and increasingly targeted industrial sites and the civilian manpower base essential for German war production. In total 364,514 operational sorties were flown, 1,030,500 tons of bombs were dropped and 8,325 aircraft lost in action. Bomber Command crews also suffered a high casualty rate: 55,573 were killed out of a total of 125,000 aircrew, a 44.4% death rate. A further 8,403 men were wounded in action, and 9,838 became prisoners of war. Bomber Command stood at the peak of its post-war military power in the 1960s, the V bombers holding the United Kingdom's nuclear deterrent and a supplemental force of Canberra light bombers. In August 2006, a memorial was unveiled at Lincoln Cathe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Heavy Bomber
Heavy bombers are bomber aircraft capable of delivering the largest payload of air-to-ground weaponry (usually bombs) and longest range (takeoff to landing) of their era. Archetypal heavy bombers have therefore usually been among the largest and most powerful military aircraft at any point in time. In the second half of the 20th century, heavy bombers were largely superseded by strategic bombers, which were often smaller in size, but had much longer ranges and were capable of delivering nuclear bombs. Because of advances in aircraft design and engineering — especially in powerplants and aerodynamics — the size of payloads carried by heavy bombers has increased at rates greater than increases in the size of their airframes. The largest bombers of World War I, the four engine aircraft built by the Sikorsky company in the Soviet Union, could carry a payload of up to of bombs. By the middle of World War II even a single-engine fighter-bomber could carry a bomb load, an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bomber Stream
The bomber stream was a saturation attack tactic developed by the Royal Air Force (RAF) Bomber Command to overwhelm the nighttime German aerial defences of the Kammhuber Line during World War II. The Kammhuber Line consisted of three layers of zones of about 32 km long (north–south) and 20 km wide (east–west). In each zone there were two German night fighter aircraft receiving ground-directed guidance from their own ''Himmelbett'' controller within each zone. While the Himmelbett control center could only handle two fighters, this was adequate for dealing with the RAF Bomber Command tactic of sending its night time bombers individually, with each bomber plotting its own route to the target, to avoid flak concentrations. At the urging of British scientific military strategist R. V. Jones, Bomber Command reorganized their attacks into streams carefully positioned to fly right down the middle of a cell. The introduction of the GEE navigation system allowed the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nightfighter
A night fighter (also known as all-weather fighter or all-weather interceptor for a period of time after the Second World War) is a fighter aircraft adapted for use at night or in other times of bad visibility. Night fighters began to be used in World War I and included types that were specifically modified to operate at night. During the Second World War, night fighters were either purpose-built night fighter designs, or more commonly, heavy fighters or light bombers adapted for the mission, often employing radar or other systems for providing some sort of detection capability in low visibility. Many night fighters of the conflict also included instrument landing systems for landing at night, as turning on the runway lights made runways into an easy target for opposing intruders. Some experiments tested the use of day fighters on night missions, but these tended to work only under very favourable circumstances and were not widely successful. Avionics systems were greatly mini ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tail Warning Radar
A tail warning radar, sometimes TW for short, was a short-lived class of aircraft-mounted radar systems used to provide warning of another aircraft approaching from the rear. They were mostly used on World War II bombers, starting with the Monica system fit to Royal Air Force (RAF) heavy bombers starting in June 1942. The set was also produced in the US as the AN/APS-13, but used primarily on late-war fighter aircraft like the Republic P-47 and North American P-51. These had to be withdrawn over Europe in 1944 when it was learned the ''Luftwaffe'' was homing in on their signals using the Flensburg radar detector. A small number were then transferred to RAF de Havilland Mosquito night fighters to attract the German fighters, and when one was seen approaching the Mosquito would perform a controlled 360 degree turn that would result in the German aircraft in front of the Mosquito and centered in their radar. During the same time, the ''Luftwaffe'' began adding additional rearwar ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Monica (radar)
Monica was a range-only tail warning radar for bombers, introduced by the RAF in June 1942. Officially known as ARI 5664, it operated at frequencies of around 300 MHz (on the boundary between VHF and UHF). The system was also used by the US Army Air Forces, under the name AN/APS-13, and the nickname Archie. History Monica was developed at the Bomber Support Development Unit (BSDU) in Worcestershire. After the ''Luftwaffe'' became aware of Monica from a crashed bomber, German scientists developed a passive radar receiver, named Flensburg (FuG 227). From early 1944, FuG 227 was used by nightfighter crews to home in on Allied bombers using Monica. However, on the morning of 13 July 1944, a 7.''Staffel''/NJG 2-flown Junkers Ju 88G-1 nightfighter equipped with Flensburg mistakenly landed at RAF Woodbridge. After examining the Flensburg equipment, the RAF ordered Monica withdrawn from all Bomber Command aircraft.Price, p. 154. An AN/APS-13 was used as a radar altimeter during t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Junkers Ju 88
The Junkers Ju 88 is a German World War II ''Luftwaffe'' twin-engined multirole combat aircraft. Junkers Aircraft and Motor Works (JFM) designed the plane in the mid-1930s as a so-called ''Schnellbomber'' ("fast bomber") that would be too fast for fighters of its era to intercept. It suffered from technical problems during its development and early operational periods but became one of the most versatile combat aircraft of the war. Like a number of other ''Luftwaffe'' bombers, it served as a bomber, dive bomber, night fighter, torpedo bomber, reconnaissance aircraft, heavy fighter and at the end of the war, as a flying bomb. Despite a protracted development, it became one of the ''Luftwaffe''s most important aircraft. The assembly line ran constantly from 1936 to 1945 and more than 15,000 Ju 88s were built in dozens of variants, more than any other twin-engine German aircraft of the period. Throughout production the basic structure of the aircraft remained unchanged.Angelucci a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Intruder (air Combat)
An intruder is a military aircraft and its crew that is tasked with penetrating deep into enemy air space, to disrupt operations. Intruders are usually fighters, attackers or light bombers. The intruder concept dates from World War II, the first radar-equipped night and all-weather fighters were able to take advantage of the cover provided by night-time and meteorological conditions. Intruder crews attack enemy fighters, airfields, radar and other infrastructure; stage diversionary attacks; and escort bombers. Intruders often loiter in the vicinity of enemy airbases to attack aircraft as they take off or land. The technique was first used in World War II. Starting in July 1940, small numbers of German fast bombers would merge into streams of Royal Air Force bombers returning from night missions over Europe. Once past the Chain Home radars, where they appeared to be returning bombers, they were free to attack RAF air bases. This often took the form of dropping light bombs, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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