GO5@PSUVM.PSU.EDU (Kjell E. Grotland) (02/12/91)
From: Kjell E. Grotland <GO5@PSUVM.PSU.EDU> Somewhere in the back of my memory (as faulty as it is) i remember the germans or the allies (during WWI or WWII) putting some type of device on the tips of their bombs or artillery shells which would make a piercing whistling noise as it was falling towards its objective. This was done for psychological reasons as i recall. Does this memory of mine have any basis in reality? Thanks in advance for any help on this. go5@Psuvm [mod.note: Whistles were attached to the landing gear of the Stuka dive bomber to produce such noise, expressly for the psychological effect. I also recall reading a book entitled _He's in the Armored Corps Now_ (apparently produced for the parents of new recruits, explaining what their sons would be doing in the Army, ca. 1941). It had a picture of an M3 Stuart tank, with the caption pointing out "the siren on the fender, used to shatter enemy morale." - Bill ]
denbeste@spdcc.com (Steven Den Beste) (02/15/91)
From: denbeste@spdcc.com (Steven Den Beste) In article <1991Feb12.020147.11646@cbnews.att.com> GO5@PSUVM.PSU.EDU (Kjell E. Grotland) writes: > >Somewhere in the back of my memory (as faulty as it is) i remember the >germans or the allies (during WWI or WWII) putting some type of device >on the tips of their bombs or artillery shells which would make a piercing >whistling noise as it was falling towards its objective. This was done >for psychological reasons as i recall. Does this memory of mine have any >basis in reality? Thanks in advance for any help on this. During the Blitz, some of the bombs dropped were set with delay fuses, or with more insidious things than that. Some of these fuses were electric, and in order to prevent them from exploding in the plane, they had a rather clever mechanism: On the rear of the bomb, between the fins, there was a small propeller which would spin in the air as the bomb dropped. It was connected to a small generator which charged up a capacitor, which was then used as the power source for the fuse. I would imagine that these propellers would make a shriek as the bombs fell.
euming@mrcnext.uiuc.edu (Lee Eu-Ming) (02/18/91)
From: euming@mrcnext.uiuc.edu (Lee Eu-Ming) denbeste@spdcc.com (Steven Den Beste) writes: >On the rear of the bomb, between the fins, there was a small propeller which >would spin in the air as the bomb dropped. It was connected to a small >generator which charged up a capacitor, which was then used as the power source >for the fuse. I've seen simliar propellers on the bombs dropped by Allied planes during the brief action shots shown on CNN. An important fact, though, is that most modern strike aircraft (F/A-18, F-16, A10, but _not_ the F-117 or B-52G/H) carry the bombs outside of the fuselage, i.e. where it is exposed to the airstream. If books like 'Flight of the Intruder' are to be believed, there is a wire attached to the airplane that runs through the propeller mechanism that prevents the thing from rotating. When the bomb is dropped from the airplane, the wire slips out, allowing the propeller to spin. There was a great closeup of the ground crews, and they definitely were threading a wire through the bomb while getting the plane ready for a sortie. Now, the question is wether or not the propellers were designed to make noise... the answer, I believe is that they were not. On the other hand, I thought that most bombs (certainly the 500 lb unguided and perhaps the laser guided Paveway) were impact fused or carried enough juice to not need a propeller...