IBM wrote in message . ..
Seraphim wrote in
:

[snip]

It is interesting, but I can't say that I am too suprised, the US had a
few crazy things like that durring and after WWII. I recall that the USN
did something similar with a F6F Hellcat that had a turbojet engine in
it.

Not perchance the Ryan Fireball?

Nope. The Navy and Westinghouse used an F6F as a flight test
platform for the Model 19X (J30) and 9.5X (J32) turbojets in
1943/44.
The 9.5X was a really neat thing - a fully functional
turbojet 9.5" in diameter - almost model airplane sized - intended
for use in guided missiles. It's an indication of the disparity of
resources, talent, and wealth that existed in 1945 vis-a-vis the
Allies and the Axis. While they'd been struggling to productionize
the Jumo 004 and BMW 003, we were taking the time and effort to build
turbojsts that were intended to be thrown away. Another example, that
ties in well, is a comparison between the Fritz-X and Hs 293 antiship
missiles to the U.S. Navy Bat. The Germans weren't ever able to dope
out stuff like feedback control systems. This meant, among other
things, that they were never able to match the Allies in the
development of things like AA Fire Control Systems - they never had
anything that matched the Army SCR-584 autofollow radars and M-9 Gun
Predictors, which pointed and trained the guns automatically by Remote
Power Control, and performed the fuze setting functions as well. (In a
U.S. Army AAA Gun Battery (The 90mm guns) in late 1944, the crew at
the gun mount did no aiming or firing at all - their job was to stuff
rounds in the breech as fast as they could. The engagement was run
from the radar
trailer - The radar crew would lock on to a target, and the engagement
was automatic after that.) U.S. Navy systems for guns from the 1.1"
AA gun on up, were the same. That menat more accuracy and
effectiveness in shooting, and
far better Economy of Force. Anyhow, while the Fritz-X and Hs 293
were
remote-controlled by a human in the launching airplane, twiddling a
joystick to match either the flares on the missile's tail with the
target,
or trying to interpret a fuzzy and grainy TV picture with the outside
world, the Bat was an autonomous active-radar seeeking, self-homing
launch and leave weapon. With the addition of the Westinghouse 9.5
engine
(proposed but not ready during the war), it wouldn't have been far
short
of the Harpoon in terms of raw performance. (The guidance systems,
of course, got much smarter in the intervening 30 years between Bat
and
Harpoon.)

Pete Stickney __________________________________________________ _____________________________