Seafire 12 Antenna

Thanks “Beermat“, I think your deduction is probably correct.
Regards Duggy

…reading up a bit, would agree its probably a Seafire Mk 111. the Vokes Aero Vee intake and four blade prop threw me….

Although the Uncle Dog system is technically very interesting (there has to be a modern application of this idea somewhere, surely), I checked and the antennae on the Seafire are probably not to do with this system.

What we probably have here is one short IFF Type III aerial (as Antoni said), and one ZB-type homing aerial inboard of it, slightly raked, a little further aft on the wing and longer. The angle is deceptive.

As on the Seafire XV here:
[ATTACH=CONFIG]245872[/ATTACH]

Well it’s got an arrester hook. The nose appears a little short for a Mk.IX. There’s no second cannon stub outboard (which was lacking on a few Spitfire Mk.IXs) The curve of the camouflage demarcation under the nose is not like that seen on Spitfires. The FAA had a lot of earlier Spitfire marks, but did they have any Mk.IXs? This one has Royal navy painted on it. OK, they had one, HF Mk.IX NH582, also at Arbroath in 1945 but the serial doesn’t match the one in the photo (and I’d suspect a broad-chord rudder on such a serial).

I suspect that either Mark 12 hasn’t seen this yet or we haven’t said anything too silly.

..Mark 12 knows the guff….And i think his keyboard finger is itching to write a reply…

…… gently, gently …..

…just a late edit .. are we sure this is in fact a Seafire?….I thought they were fitted with the head restraint attached to the seat armour…(and especially in 1945 when the catapults were becoming more exploited ?)…realistically it just looks like a fairly late Mk 9 Spitfire ???

Which would make it NN574 which went from Macrihanish to Burscough, and then to Yeovilton in early 1946. Or perhaps it is a 1945 photo? Either way the wartime camouflage seems more likely, but the picture still isn’t clear.

Lightening the photo shows the wing roundel’s true size, so that the size of the red is more appropriate.

It had been sent to 802 Sqn Arbroath early in 1945, then handed over to 803 Sqn until it converted to Mk.XVs in August. I’ve seen the single code letters on Seafire Mk.XVs at Ayr (I think) postwar, in my father-in-law’s photos.

Lightened the original a bit if it helps:

Can just make out what I think is 674 or 574 at the end of the serial.

Fascinating – looks right for a pair of VHF aerials.

Such a clever idea – a bit of Googling shows this to have been called AN/ARA-8, and simply fed the earphones via the standard VHF set on channel ‘D’. One question for technical bods, though – a suppressor will work instantaneously, so one signal or other will always be first until you get down practically to a quantum level. To make this work there has to be a fractional ‘threshold’ by which the suppressor delays before blocking, to allow for near-simultaneous signals. Maybe via a capacitor?

From a USAAF survey of homing equipment, 1945:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]245852[/ATTACH]

P-47, of course, not P-51

Now to look for RAF use..

Yes correct Graham, I never checked the website where it came from which stated Mk12.:rolleyes:
I wonder if the antenna are “Uncle-Dog” as used by P-51s & P-47N’s in the Pacific.
“Seventh Fighter Command frankly regarded Uncle-Dog as the greatest invention to come out of the war. It consisted of a pair of VHF antennae side by side on the 51 ‘s aft fuselage, tuned one-quarter wavelength apart. Whichever antenna got a signal first would transmit to the pilot’s earphones and suppress the other signal. The right-hand antenna gave a Morse Code letter U (dit-dit-dah) “Uncle from the phonetic alphabet. The left-hand antenna gave the letter D “Dog” (dah-dit-dit). The pilot then turned in the appropriate direction and refined the heading by watching his compass. When both signals were received simultaneously the pilot heard a steady hum, which meant he was on course for base or for the transmitting aircraft.”

Nice picture, thanks for posting. Either a Mk.II or Mk.III, going by the prop and 6-a-side exhausts. No such thing as a Mk.12.

Notice the little patch on the leading edge root, and a dint in the carburettor intake. Methinks the two were connected.

Another point of interest is the large red centre to the wing roundels – or possibly just very large wing roundels. This dates the photo to 1945 or shortly afterwards. It’s a shame the darkness makes it difficult to see whether this is in the wartime camouflage or the brief low-demarcation Extra Dark Sea Grey. I think the former.

Being picky but it isn’t a Seafire 12.

One is probably IFF.