Coming in on the Beam

[Davaar]

This may be the right forum to try. It is a few years, fifty one in fact, since I last did a night approach using Standard Beam Approach with landing assisted by goose-neck flares. I remember the existence of front and back beam patterns, the As and the Ns, the steady signal and the beacons, but the detail escapes me. Google is little help. Does anyone know of a publication on topic?

[PPRuNe Pop]

I found this one which is probably what you are talking about.

Anyway putting in 'Landing beam approach' on Google this and others came up.

http://www.flyingzonedirect.com/lancastercdrom/screen11.htm

[JW411]

We had SBA at Ternhill when I did basic training on the Piston Provost.

My recollection was that the audio zone to the left of centreline was an "A" zone (._) and to the right was an "N" zone (_.). The centre line was, of course, a constant tone if you were lucky enough to stay on it.

The outer marker was an audio "Onk, Onk, Onk" and the inner marker was an audio "Peep, Peep, Peep".

Once you got the hang of the thing, it was quite accurate. The only other installation in UK at the time was at Stornaway so that wasn't a hell of a lot of use in the event of a diversion!

[pigboat]

Something like this Davaar?

Range approach YVP (http://i100.photobucket.com/albums/m8/Siddley-Hawker/RNGAPPYVP.jpg).

[henry crun]

JW411: Feltwell had one, was it closed by the time you refer to ?

[Fareastdriver]

JW411's Tuneable Beam Approach, not Standard Beam Approach, remember the coffee grinder in the Provost's cockpit, at Ternhill was N's to the right. I remember because on runway 23 the N's meant that you were north of the centreline. In about 1948 at Aldergrove a Halifax flattened the BABS van. lost it's port wheel and made a final untidy mess on the runway. I don't know the serial no but it was coded YE@H.

[innuendo]

Ah yes, radio range. Lost orientation procedures in the link trainer and a syllabus including flying under the hood in the back seat of a Harvard at 3-4000 ft in summer turbulence in Southern Saskatchewan, (Regina range).
On squadron, once a year, to renew our instrument ratings, we had to demonstrate competence in the SJRA, (standard jet range approach), under the hood in the T-33. The fact that on the squadron equipment (CF-100), we rarely if ever used the range made no difference. Not many of the SJRAs were anything to be proud of but you had to complete one that you could have landed from. It was not really much of a procedure for a jet. An NDB approach was a lot more practical but the range approach had to be done and you could not select ADF to use the pointer, A and N expertise had to be demonstrated long after it was of much use.

[henry crun]

innuendo: A PM for you.

[JW411]

henry crun:

I am talking about 1960 and I think Feltwell had closed by then.

Fareastdriver:
I appreciate that the aircraft was fitted with TBA but I thought the ground installation was called SBA? It was a long time ago.

innuendo:

Is that you what call a Spanish suppository!

[Fareastdriver]

In Aldergrove, again, in the mid seventies the MU was folding the apprentices school. They had a couple of Vampire T11s, a Pembroke and a Provost that I had flown at Tern Hill that they used for marshalling practice. The Vampires were bought by an American to convert to 4 seat sports aircraft in the States, John Travolta had one. The Provost was going to some engineering college in England. It was fully serviceable apart fron the hood seal and clock. I was invited to do its last run up.. After fifteen years I got it going with the first cartridge and did the whole thing right up to 3,000 rpm at +8 boost. Those were the days.

[corofin]

Standard Beam Approach was the UK implementation of the German Lorenz Beam Approach system.
SBA was installed at a large number of UK airfields and, despite a crazy amount of investment in money and time, was almost a complete failure, being rejected by Coastal Command in 1941, and by Bomber Command in 1943. It was unreliable and unstable, and was eventually replaced by BABS and Lucero.

The early version of SBA had 'dots to the left' and 'dashes to the right'. Later (1942ish ?) this became Morse A/N coding as described. It was reckoned to be more readable.

SBA was far too bulky for single seat aircraft, hence in 1941 a system was developed to allow these aircraft to use their existing VHF R/T sets. It was named VHF or Tuneable BA and was significantly better than SBA.

[seacue]

Airports of significance in the USA had a LF four-course [A-N] radio beacons at one time. One of the courses was aligned with the instrument runway.

They were supplemented for a short while by a VHF Visual-Aural Range [VAR] which was also four-course but two of the courses were indicated by a left-right panel meter while the other two were audible A-N courses, IIRC.

VAR didn't last long and was superseded by VOR.

The four courses of the VAR beacons were apparently required to be 90 degrees apart, unlike the LF A-N beacons where they could be set considerably away from 90 degree spacings.

Mr. Davaar, I can send you a Section Aeronautical Chart from 1953 that shows a number of cases where A-N beams were aligned with airports and presumably runways. That was the period where both A-N and VOR were active. Send me a PM with your paper-mail address.

seacue

[NutherA2]

I am talking about 1960 and I think Feltwell had closed by then

Not so much closed as role-changed.By about 1958 the Provosts had been replaced by Thor ICBMs.:E