American Fighter Aircraft Radios 1942

[MiTasol]

This is a guide as there was always someone/unit who did their own thing

 

[Crimea_River]

Thank-you!

 

[MIflyer]

This is not just fighters, but it adds to what you have supplied. There is third page but it refuses to post.

 

[MiTasol]

Good one
Interesting that it lists P-51, P-40 and A-20 as Observation types at the base of page 2.

 

[MIflyer]

Here is a manual that lists and describes WWII USAAF aircraft comm radios.

 

[MiTasol]

Thanks for reminding me of that series
Here are volumes 1 and 3 to 5
There is also another manual that lists what aircraft had what radios at a different time but I have not been able to locate it. Will keep trying

 

[MiTasol]

Easiest way to find something seems to be stop looking and it will show up.
This is a good manual as it shows what when where and what it looked like at the time the manual was compiled in April 43

 

[MIflyer]

Interestingly enough, while in the ETO the USAAF had gone to SCR-522 quite early, when the 5,000th, the P-38J-20 "Yippee" came off the Lockheed production line in May 1944 the excellent air to air photos of it show that it was equipped with SCR-274-N, clearly visible aft of the pilot's seat, with wire antennas running back to the tip of each vertical fin.

 

[MiTasol]

And it does not have the small armour plate strips inboard of the turbos to stop the turbine wheels visiting the cockpit and I thought that came in earlier as well.

 

[MIflyer]

That's a good point! My friend Ward Duncan, maintenance chief of the 9th PRS, said that the exploding turbo problem came from the early airplanes that used a lower gear ratio for the mechanical supercharger, making the turbo work harder. They upped the gear ratio in the later ones to give the turbos a rest, so they may have dispensed with the turbo armor. Aside from that, pilots were told to make sure the turbos were both spun up before takeoff, and the armor screens might make direct observation of the wheels rather difficult.

I have a Minicraft 1/48 scale P-38J that is in Yippee markings. I have not opened it yet, but I wonder if the 274-N radios are depicted correctly?

 

[MiTasol]

Both the ones I worked on had that armour and one was a late model. When Dave Tallichet first got it we found the log books showed it was once operated by Tallman Aviation so the next time Frank Tallman was visiting I asked him about it. Turned out it was one of half a dozen he had that were used in some movie that he could not remember the name of and he told us about one flight where a turbo exploded on him on takeoff and how he had hit the kill switches and jumped out without thinking about the two aircraft close behind him on the runway. The aircraft rolled to a stop and was otherwise undamaged so they patched the hole with body steel and dropped a new turbo in and flew again next day. He said that armor possibly saved his life.

A few days after Franks visit we removed the turbos and found that under one turbo was a big hole in the firewall with the remains of some very rusty body steel over it.

 

[MiTasol]

The missing page from post 3 above - Thank you MIFlyer.