Vintage Navigation Aids
"Lorenz also made the Lorenz beam landing aid, which was the first of it's type appearing in the mid 30s."
Precursor of I.L.S., and used a similar system of two overlapping beams. Whereas I.L.S. had a display, the left/right of centreline was aural. No glide path, descent was done by starting a steady descent when passing a marker.
As regards Sonne, I have read (either R.V. Jones book, or a book "Aircraft vs. Submarine" by Alfred Price) that once it had been established what it was, plans were being made to destroy the transmitters. When the senior navigation officer of Coastal Command heard of this ( by chance, and at a late stage) he asked, successfully, that they be left in operation, on the grounds that they were more use to Coastal Command than the were to the Germans.
I remember that in the mid 60's, we still had on the Shack charts with a Consol overlay printed in them so that a position could be plotted directly, without all the nause of doing convergence corrections
Precursor of I.L.S., and used a similar system of two overlapping beams. Whereas I.L.S. had a display, the left/right of centreline was aural. No glide path, descent was done by starting a steady descent when passing a marker.
As regards Sonne, I have read (either R.V. Jones book, or a book "Aircraft vs. Submarine" by Alfred Price) that once it had been established what it was, plans were being made to destroy the transmitters. When the senior navigation officer of Coastal Command heard of this ( by chance, and at a late stage) he asked, successfully, that they be left in operation, on the grounds that they were more use to Coastal Command than the were to the Germans.
I remember that in the mid 60's, we still had on the Shack charts with a Consol overlay printed in them so that a position could be plotted directly, without all the nause of doing convergence corrections
Used to use Consol on Varisties lumbering out of Finningley in the early 70's, the charts were printed in a very pretty 40's style. Decca letdowns were also common in the Dominie, as ISTR one of the lines was virtually straight and passed through the airfield. It was very good from about 90nm out, provided there was no lane jump ...
Join Date: Oct 1998
Location: Kalgoorlie, W.A. , Australia
Age: 86
Posts: 458
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Ploneis (Quimper) 'FRQ' 257 K/cs
I often wundered why this station had 2 names which seemed interchangeable or combined. The combination is simple Ploneis is a hamlet in the district of Quimper. The single name uses are are a bit different, I have just found a web site which suggests that Quimber and Ploneis were separate stations. Quimper being the original German Sonne 6 and Ploneis is a replacement. The 2 sites appear to be about 8 miles apart.
The last A-N range that I know of was shut down in early 1980s in Saltillo Mexico. When Jepp said to pull it from the manual, I stuck the chart away. I'll look it up when I get home.
In the 1970s, Puddy Catt was flying the RAF's last Meteor F8 to an airshow in Europe...
"Report the XXX VOR"
"Sorry, don't have VOR!"
"OK, sir - report the XXX NDB"
"Sorry, don't have ADF!"
"OK sir, squawk XXXX and ident"
"Sorry - no parrot. Not even an egg!"
"Sir - what navaids do you carry?"
"I'm talking to you on it!"
Some Air Trafficker once asked me what navigation system we used to route to the entry point of the Lichfield RVC. "We use a FUNS", I told them. When asked what a FUNS was, I replied "Food-powered Universal Navigation System - and he's sitting 2 feet behind me!".
I started off with Rebecca / Eureka in the Jet Provost, plus UHF/DF. A year later, offset TACAN in the Gnat seemed like space age magic in comparison!
"Report the XXX VOR"
"Sorry, don't have VOR!"
"OK, sir - report the XXX NDB"
"Sorry, don't have ADF!"
"OK sir, squawk XXXX and ident"
"Sorry - no parrot. Not even an egg!"
"Sir - what navaids do you carry?"
"I'm talking to you on it!"
Some Air Trafficker once asked me what navigation system we used to route to the entry point of the Lichfield RVC. "We use a FUNS", I told them. When asked what a FUNS was, I replied "Food-powered Universal Navigation System - and he's sitting 2 feet behind me!".
I started off with Rebecca / Eureka in the Jet Provost, plus UHF/DF. A year later, offset TACAN in the Gnat seemed like space age magic in comparison!
Omega? In the context of this thread, hardly a Vintage Navaid - indeed it wasn't fitted to the VC 10 till after I'd finished. That said, its very mention here serves to point up how things have moved on in the last 25 years or so.
Personally, I'm more taken aback by having learned the trade in the mid-60s on the Varsity, somewhat less well equipped than Halifaxes and Lancasters at the end of WW2, in that we had no H2S.
Personally, I'm more taken aback by having learned the trade in the mid-60s on the Varsity, somewhat less well equipped than Halifaxes and Lancasters at the end of WW2, in that we had no H2S.
European Consol stations:
Bushmills 'MWN' 266 K/cs
Stavanger 'LEC' 319 K/cs
Ploneis (Quimper) 'FRQ' 257 K/cs
Lugo 'LG' 285 K/cs
Seville 'SL' 315 K/cs
Bushmills 'MWN' 266 K/cs
Stavanger 'LEC' 319 K/cs
Ploneis (Quimper) 'FRQ' 257 K/cs
Lugo 'LG' 285 K/cs
Seville 'SL' 315 K/cs
I used to have an old NAT plotting chart from 1970 which had Consol and Loran lines printed on it.
What about the long-range version of Decca; Dectra?
Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: USofA
Posts: 1,235
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
There was a Consol station just north of San Francisco. I believe it was deactivated sometime in the early 70's. We would occasionally use it when coming back from Hawaii or Japan in the 707's
more Consol
As Spooky 2 says - San Francisco 'SFI' plus Nantucket 'TUK' - known as Consolan in the USA
As Talkdownman says for Europe -
Plus Andoya 'LEX' - Bjornoya 'LJS' and Jan Mayen 'LMC'
and for USSR - on Novaya Zemlya 'KN' and Provideniya 'RB'
LFH
As Talkdownman says for Europe -
Plus Andoya 'LEX' - Bjornoya 'LJS' and Jan Mayen 'LMC'
and for USSR - on Novaya Zemlya 'KN' and Provideniya 'RB'
LFH
Join Date: Aug 2011
Location: UK
Posts: 32
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
http://sometimes-interesting.com/2013/12/04/concrete-arrows-and-the-u-s-airmail-beaco
Saw this recently.... V early navigation !
http://sometimes-interesting.com/201...beacon-system/
http://sometimes-interesting.com/201...beacon-system/
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: Lancing, Sussex
Age: 92
Posts: 255
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Vintage Navaids
No mention of Rebecca-Babs. Used that in 1952-3 . Homing on Gee accurate, fly down a postion line, if one happens to line up with runway. One did at Aldegrove
An apocryphal story that might have originated in BEA's Highland & Island service:
Practising VDF letdowns, the R/O would get the QDMs from ATC and pass them on to the pilots. One R/O allegedly would look out of the window, note current a/c position and pass on a QDM based on his observation without bothering ATC.
Practising VDF letdowns, the R/O would get the QDMs from ATC and pass them on to the pilots. One R/O allegedly would look out of the window, note current a/c position and pass on a QDM based on his observation without bothering ATC.
Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Perth Australia
Age: 80
Posts: 280
Likes: 0
Received 3 Likes
on
1 Post
In our patch, NDBs are not being installed any more and not replaced when time exed.
Australia had its own unique DME relying on a signal from the A/C to excite the station to reply and measure the time etc.
Stations were limited to the number of A/C they could handle which at the time was not a problem.
The VAR was lots of fun in a DC-3, which was slow enough to be able to stick with the aural null.
One was at Kalgoorlie, visuals to Perth and reverse to Forrest, Aural to Norseman and Laverton, favourite route check stuff.
There is more power in my GPS than the entire DC-3 navaids of the 60s, but not as much fun to follow.
memories are some times better than the actual in many things!!!
Australia had its own unique DME relying on a signal from the A/C to excite the station to reply and measure the time etc.
Stations were limited to the number of A/C they could handle which at the time was not a problem.
The VAR was lots of fun in a DC-3, which was slow enough to be able to stick with the aural null.
One was at Kalgoorlie, visuals to Perth and reverse to Forrest, Aural to Norseman and Laverton, favourite route check stuff.
There is more power in my GPS than the entire DC-3 navaids of the 60s, but not as much fun to follow.
memories are some times better than the actual in many things!!!