Re: Inventions (was: NANP Numbering)

From: Scott Dorsey <kludge_at_panix.com>
Date: 8 Jan 2004 15:51:17 -0500

Mark Brader <msb_at_vex.net> wrote:

> As for radar, the Germans, the British, the Americans, the French, and
> the Japanese *all* invented it independently, and all kept it secret
> from each other until the outbreak of war. The first to complete a
> working radar system was Rudolf Kühnold (Kuehnold) of Germany, in
> 1933-34. The Germans were initially interested in naval applications,
> and they had the first shipboard installation, in 1935.

Right, BUT, what the English had was the magnetron. Everybody else was limited to very long wavelengths, which made their systems comparatively less useful.

> Robert Watson-Watt of Britain invented radar independently in 1935,
> and was determining the distance to targets months ahead of the
> Germans. The British government committed to using it for air defense
> the same year, and by 1937 the British also had airborne radar
> systems.

This was the CHAIN HOME system, which operated on 45 MHz. The German gear of the same era was also working on similarly long wavelengths.

> In the US, work on radar began in 1934 but proceeded more
> slowly and a working system was not developed until 1936. After the
> war began, British and US researchers worked together to develop
> better systems than either country had individually; much of this work
> was in the US, which also contributed the word "radar" in 1940. --

The concept of radar is fairly intuitive and it's not surprising that many different groups in the thirties came up with it at the same time. What is amazing is the magnetron tube with the ability to generate extremely short wavelength signals for high resolution images.

--scott

"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis." Received on Thu Jan 08 2004 - 12:51:17 PST