Drones in WW II

Palmpilot

Palmpilot

Touchdown! Greaser!
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Richard Palm
I was just watching History Detectives on Channel 54.1, one of the local SF Bay Area PBS stations, and I was surprised to learn that the U.S. drone program began during WW II. They were equipped with a TV camera and piloted by a passenger aboard a piloted aircraft that was trailing the drone by as much as eight miles. Some of them actually saw combat.

The broadcast follows the efforts of an investigator to determine whether a particular propeller was made for the WW II drone program. Channel 54.1 will be repeating the broadcast on Thursday at 7:00 PM Pacific Time, and Saturday at 4:00 PM. If you look up "History Detectives" on the TV Guide Web site, you should be able to determine whether it will be carried on your local PBS affiliate.

http://www.tvguide.com/tvshows/history-detectives/202006

Additional information:

http://www.pbs.org/opb/historydetectives/investigation/drone-propeller/
 
Palmpilot said:
Apparently the propeller being researched on History Detectives was intended for a purpose-built drone. They made the drones out of wood because they weren't allowed to use metal.
Click to expand...

wooden engines? :rofl:
 
Mercury Marine made a few drone engines for the war (practice drones I believe) back in the day. We've got one sitting on display with a nice picture of a drone and ground launcher. Neat stuff.

images


They also designed some prototype aircraft for emergency pilot recovery. Small helicopter where the pilot stands on a platform and the blades are beneath him. :hairraise:

We've got a picture on the wall in engineering, but I can't seem to find one on the internet to link to.
 
Palmpilot said:
I was just watching History Detectives on Channel 54.1, one of the local SF Bay Area PBS stations, and I was surprised to learn that the U.S. drone program began during WW II. They were equipped with a TV camera and piloted by a passenger aboard a piloted aircraft that was trailing the drone by as much as eight miles. Some of them actually saw combat.

The broadcast follows the efforts of an investigator to determine whether a particular propeller was made for the WW II drone program. Channel 54.1 will be repeating the broadcast on Thursday at 7:00 PM Pacific Time, and Saturday at 4:00 PM. If you look up "History Detectives" on the TV Guide Web site, you should be able to determine whether it will be carried on your local PBS affiliate.

http://www.tvguide.com/tvshows/history-detectives/202006

Additional information:

http://www.pbs.org/opb/historydetectives/investigation/drone-propeller/
Click to expand...

In my younger days I had a lot of fun resurrecting and modifying military surplus electronics. At one point I picked up a set (camera and monitor) of the TV gear used in the abovementioned program. It worked surprisingly well, considering the state of the art at the time. The main drawback was lack of sensitivity. The camera used a primitive pickup tube called an Iconoscope - that kind of resembled a glass cooking pot. The lens was huge, and had no diaphragm (didn't need one - bright sunlight was the illumination required for it to work properly). It had mounts for detonators (to make SURE it was destroyed in the crash). Interesting curiosity - I hope a set of this equipment is preserved in a museum somewhere.

By the way - the first U.S. drones were built (on an experimental basis) during World War 1. They were reasonably decent flying machines, but the remote control mechanisms of the day were too primitive to be of any value. IIRC the History Channel had a program on that subject a couple of years ago.

Dave
 
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