The drone may have been the result of "fake intelligence" acted upon by the Luftwaffe during the Blitz.

Once enemy aircraft had penetrated beyond the "Home Chain" radar screen, their positions were plotted by the Observer Corps. Trying to locate aircraft accurately by sound, especially at night, was difficult. I read somewhere that our Intelligence Service planted the idea in Germany that by not having engines synchronized made it impossible to track them with the listening devices then in use. In reality, it easily identified the enemy aircraft compared with the single engined defenders then in use before the Beaufighters and Mosquitoes of later years. (A very few Blenheims were used as night fighters in 1940, but their Bristol radial engines sounded very different to Junkers and Daimler Benz engines.)

1918 Austrian-Hungarian aircraft listening device in the Vienna Military Museum. :wave:

That reminds me a little bit of this thing. Used by Penzias and Wilson to listen to the beginnings of the Universe via radio. At one time they thought that the hiss they were hearing was caused by pigeon sh1t from some unwelcome visitors that had made their home in the horn. So they rolled up their sleeves and scrubbed it all out, but the Big Bang hiss didn't go away.
The things you have to do to get a Nobel Prize .... :sweat:

Britain had them too…

Yup! I lived just outside Plymouth and we became shrapnel and bomb fins collectors and swappers. Incendiary bomb fins were common and not desirable items for swaps. Dad was in the ARP in Plymouth every night and had some serious dents in his helmet which he said were from shrapnel, probably smaller pieces than the hunks which we bartered with. We had a Junkers 88 missed our roof by literally feet and crashed in the field behind us, with bombs exploding all over the field. We kids were there first thing the next morning, all trying to get around the back of the policemen who were guarding the aircraft from us souvenir hunters.

What horrified us all was the toys, books, chocolate, etc booby traps which the dear Germans dropped all around, all capable of causing serious damage to kids. Total war, he called it.

I remember at infant school in the mid fifties (Dunrobin, Limpsfield) a uniformed policeman bringing in examples of what we were never to pick up on our 'nature walks'.

(The school took girls on to secondary school level and the headmistress, Miss Pace, was evidently something of a celebrity educator of the fairer sex. Anneka Rice was her pupil, much later than I, I am sure).

Alick, it appears that's the way we kids grew up in the war years, take pieces of bombs and tail fins to school for show and tell. I can still remember the smell of the incendiary bombs, in the army we called it WP (Willy Peter) short for White phosphorus.

I didn't know about the booby traps - I suppose they were IEDs.

My grandfather was a guest of Germany in Milag Nord, following the bombing/sinking of T&J's Dalesman in Crete in 1941.

My Dad was born in March '36.

Anyway, he went with his mates to the corner of Gorsedale Road to "explore" the pre-fabs they were building. They spotted a young adult, blonde and shirtless. Who was he?

Well, they got close and asked him his name: "Hans", he answered with an accent.
"Where are you from?", was the next question.
"Hamburg", he answered.

He was a POW, put to work. Thinking of his father and the hardships that the family had endured, it was a sort of epiphany for my Dad and a very popular story that he would relate to us.

Well, it is "Musings & Thoughts".........

Rgds.
Dave

I just spent all day replacing our water pump.

In Mexico, water arrives from the mains to a cistern and the water is pumped up to tanks on the roof, depending on use/demand and thus giving head pressure for showers, etc.

I noticed that something was wrong because, on Tuesday nght, I was washing the dishes and the water ran out!

FFS!!! It took me all day to buy a new pump, remove the old one, go and buy a 1"x1-1/4" bushing, install, pinch up to stop leaks and, finally, put it into service.

Why do things take so long to do as you get older (I am 59). Also, I am knackered!

"Musings and Thoughts"

Rgds.
Dave

That's life these days Dave.

Replaced the door closer on our screen door a month or so ago.

Simple I thought. Just get identical unit and merely replace the cylinder thing re-using the brackets on the door and the door frame.

Oh dear me (or words to that effect)..................:cloud:

Tongue on the cylinder is a bee's dick larger - drill out the pops and replace the door bracket with the one supplied.
Piston rod is larger diameter than the old one and does not fit the hole in the door frame bracket .
Replace the door bracket with the new one - no the screw holes are a different spacing.
Drill out the rod hole in the old bracket so as to reuse the existing frame holes.

Yippee it works. Only took two hours instead of five minutes. :jester:

How will the next generation cope? No drill, no pop riveter, no bloody idea. On the other hand they can, no doubt, drive a smart phone which I can't.:applause:

Geoff

I remember being able to hear Jupiter having a hissy fit on shortwave, just above 15 megahertz or so.

Yes Jupiter is very active on all manner of electro-magnetic waves. It actually radiates more energy than it receives from the Sun ! Definitely not a place you want to go for a holiday. Some of Moons though might be nice if they build a Butlins there or something ... :p

Not if the Environmentalists organise road blocking demonstrations to stop the delivery trucks, bulldozers and dumpers! I wonder if super-glueing their hands and faces to the road would work on planet Zarg? Gotta save the climate. :supercool:

I thought that the difference in sound was because British multi-engined aircraft had their engines/propellors synchronised but the Gernmans didn't bother.

Dunno but I used to get up at 6.30am, shave shower and then have my breakfast while reading the morning newspaper. By 7.30am I was in the car on my way to work.


Now I don't get up until 7.15am but although I live in the same house and follow the same shower/breakfast routine and read the same daily newspaper (different edition, smartarse :wink:), I struggle to be ready to leave the house before 10.00 am.

As I said above, I don’t think that it was a matter of not bothering to sync but done deliberately either, as I was told, to make them sound more menacing or, as also suggested, because they had been fed duff intel.

Dave, they don't take very long if you put them straight in the too difficult file, but then I am 78. Using this technique, unless it is seriously important and/or interesting, has stopped me getting knackered. So, for example, I have a problem with a toilet valve in the house but that didn't seem seriously important and so is currently in the too difficult file, However, I was asked to look at an insurance claim involving 2000 tonnes of duff fuel and that was seriously interesting and so has received my immediate and undivided attention.
You need to pace yourself ( and see below) otherwise you might not get to 78:supercool:

What's a delivery truck ? :big_tongue:

I passed loads of them on the M6 and M5 on Monday night. They all had drivers in them too, surprisingly. :shock:

Definitely to make them sound more menacing. When I was a kid we could all recognise which were ours and which were krauts, even at night - and taught to take evasive action accordingly...

Junkers flugmotor 205C (yes I know it's only one...)

https://youtu.be/MuvJIoUTA8k

Sharpen your pencil Tim because Duff Fuel is a growth industry. Off-Spec fuel can indeed be seriously interesting for Supers and Chief Engineers.

I'll second that, ES!

Going way back, we started to get reports of problems with Diesel plants throughout Latin America: Panama, Honduras, Dominican Republic, Colombia et al. The fuel pumps were wearing out very quickly and MAN B&W couldn't produce them fast enough. Just one plant, in Honduras, was the largest Diesel plant in the world when built, with 14x 16 cyl. engines, heat recovery and a steam turbine for an extra dozen MW. What was puzzling there were the deposits inside the pumps, on the injector nozzles an sticking piston rings.

With the first claim (Honduras), while I suspected microbial contamination, testing did not find this. The fuel preparation was good, quality certificates in order, so on and forth. All the plants received fuel from a major fuel broker based in Switzerland. Hmmm....Having joined the dots, the breakthrough came with one plant that collected and sent samples to Houston for independent testing. The testing facility kept witness samples of all the fuel that they tested. The plant was therefore able to get analyses of fuel samples prior to the problems starting and afterwards.

It resulted that the fuel was being "cut" with styrenes, industrial waste which costs money to dispose of safely. The fuel was being supplied from the USA, the worst culprit near New Orleans.

The problem was so serious that the plants were resorting to combing scrapheaps for any half-good pumps as MAN B&W couldn't produce them fast enough! Just in Honduras, the needed 224 fuel pumps, injectors and many pistons/rings/liners.

A very interesting case and challenging as an adjustment.

Rgds.
Dave

Interestingly,(depending on how much of a sad person you are!) the 2000 tonnes of fuel was duff but it hadn't damaged the engine as the owner claimed because it was possible to demonstrate that fuel hadn't actually been used at the time of the claim.
It is true that the engine was indeed knackered - primarily because it had run c25k hours without any maintenance, been using inappropriate cylinder oil and had probably used some pretty horrible fuels previously :bad_mad:
Be careful what you claim for!

What was up with the fuel, Tim?

Can't remember the full details but there was certainly was a problem with the cetane number and I think also fines but once it was established that fuel couldn't be part of the engine related claim I wasn't involved

Don't think I've ever been supplied with off-spec Lubricating Oil but Fuel Oil is a different kettle of fish. One wonders if the office cleaner fills out the BDN.

I have a feeling, ES, it is just a "stock form" with a few details changed!

BTW, in Ocean/BF, we had a small and efficient fuel test kit. It was just to check the bare minimum characteristics but worked. We also had one for LO after microbial contamination became known.

Then there was the Alaska HO, just a smidgeon over 1.0 relative density, the east arabian HO full of sand and the Texas HO full of waxes!!!

Best Rgds.
Dave

And Bass Strait waxy oil :cloud: It wrecked 3 Peilstick 2.2s (actually not that difficult) and resulted a 100 metre long wax candle in the bunker fuel pipe work :angry:

Yes, Tim! Hard times but, boy, did we learn a lot! Not only cause, but repair/remedy and future recommendations!

I remember the Honduras claim. When I asked if they were testing for microbial contamination, even though the plant engineers were very well experienced and qualified, I was met with blank an puzzled faces!

Rgds.
Dave

As you get older this becomes more and more appropriate .... :supercool:

Oldest daughter recently got married..........! That, or change the lock and garage door code!
Rgds.
Dave

Omicron is an anagram of moronic.
If Greek letters are being used for covid variants, I wonder whether politicians will allow the use of Xi

Talking head on TV said they would not.

They could use Diotis, if they persist with anagrams.

...... or Watts.

Or twats.
9 10

Relativity explained: :chuckle:

Technology advances ... but there are side effects: :smoking:

[QUOTE=Makko;40532]Yes, Tim! Hard times but, boy, did we learn a lot! Not only cause, but repair/remedy and future recommendations!

I remember the Honduras claim. When I asked if they were testing for microbial contamination, even though the plant engineers were very well experienced and qualified, I was met with blank an puzzled faces!

Rgds.
Yes, I could have once said The bugs ate my crankshaft. Well, actually was the City of Colombo's crankshaft - her third in 13 years. The first changed because of a design problem, the second 'cos it broke and this one just survived with a few bearings reground. A great engine the Doxford 75LB6:bad_mad: