A Master Contactor was a clockwork device used in aircraft such as the Spitfire to send electrical pulses to a Remote Contactor that then controlled a piece of equipment to operate it for 14 seconds in each minute, if required. A common use was for the Pipsqueak system that switched on the aircraft’s transmitter for identification purposes. This preceeded IFF proper.
There could be up to 4 Remote Contactors in the aircraft – the operating segments were offset so that one 14-second operating period was separated by 1 second from a second operating period, and so on.

Pipsqueak was used more for location finding than identification, the Type 1 CH and Type 2 CHL radar being unable to track aircraft over land. IFF proper was in use at the start of the war on Bomber aircraft and that worked by boosting the return signal from the CH radar to a leave bigger than you would get from any size of Aircraft formation. If I remember correctly, Pipsqueak was only switched on in the Squadron Commander and his section commander’s aircraft and were synchronised before take off for each aircraft to transmit for 14 seconds in turn. When the aircraft were ordered to use it the D/F stations dotted around the sector (6 stations on average was the figure if I remember) would each take a bearing within the 15 seconds and send to the D/F plotters at the Sector Ops room. The Plotting table had holes in it at the locations of the D/F Stations and a Compass rose markings around the hole. coming out of the hole was a piece of string on a return system with a ring on the free end. As the D/F stations each reported a bearing, the plotter for that station would pull the string out of the hole for her station on the bearing reported. Three or more D/F reports would then give a rapid fix of the Squadron’s location as well as their identification.

sad news indeed, i met him a couple of times over the last 20 or so years, both professionally (whilst i was in the RAF) and socially ( at VSCC meetings), he was always willing to chat, and always interesting.

Yes I’ve heard that as well from a number of people who have met him and I had ready contacted his publisher to forward a request for information about the attached profile. Its the Spitfire XVI of 602 Sqn that he flew on the anti V-2 mission on 14 Feb 45 that he descried on the BBC’s programme about the V-Weapons on the Secret War TV series made in the mid 1970’s.

Raymond Baxter RIP

The British Empire was too weakened and the colonial era was ending, “Globally”, You have to blame hitler for that.

Spot on phozenflame. After 1945, pulling out of India was imperative, as the UK was flat broke.

Edited as somebody covered the London talks in more detail than I did.

I know the forum rules state that consent should be obtained before posting copied material, but does that apply to photographs in books; where the book, in turn, credits a particular photographer, or may not even know who the photographer was? My understanding is the photographer always holds the rights (unless they sell them), but in a lot of these cases the photographer is either deceased, or you have no way of knowing how to contact them. If I scanned a photograph from a book and posted it on the forum, as long as I credited the photographer (if known) and gave the book title, would that be OK?

Dean.

Your breaking the copyright laws by making the scan from the book in the first place without permission. Rules for the UK can be found here

Wind in the Wires

Some of my early stuff, from the longest continuous serving aircraft Sqn in the world. 😉

Also Quick Quiz 😮 –

Which one of this aircraft was used to win the first VC for Air to Air Combat between aircraft. Name of the Pilot as well, please.

and

Which one had its pilot fall out of the cockpit in flight, what problem did he have and was trying to solve when he fell out and how did the problem save his life, its quite a strange story this one. 😉

Yes, come on chaps, it’s Battle of Britain Day today!

Of Course it is 😀 , that’s why I’m currently bulling up my No 1s at the minute 😡 to spend a day in Norwich city center tomorrow with a Wings Appel Tin for the local RAFA Branch 🙂 . On another note, Saw a Dakota overfly Norwich heading east this morning, It was too high and in the sun to make out any markings, does anybody know if anything is happening to mark what started 62 years ago on Sunday?

I like that 😀 😀 😀 Mark 😀 I can never seem to get the props on my spitfire’s to look ‘right’ 😀 😀 😀

That’s the biggest problem with doing Props on any aircraft drawing, something a professional aviation artist told me earlier this year.

you cant defeat a belief…the British tried it in Northern Ireland

Don’t you believe it! The British security services made life so difficult for the PIRA, that Adam’s and Co decided to got for the peace option without reuniting the Island as they had discovered that they were not going to beat the British (and they told the British that! Help us stop the war, because we cannot win it). The British knew that they were never going to beat the PIRA and were looking for a way-out without the government having to commit political suicide). Hence it ended in a Draw, with some major concessions given to Adam’s and Co about the Republic’s involvement in the North and Prisoner releases (Those guys are however out on Licence. Break the law and they are banged up for the rest of their sentences). Only pity is that the Orange Nutters (who started the problems in 1968) and the more extreme Republicans have not yet woken up to the fact that the troubles are over.

Anyway as a mate of mine told me, when he was in Dublin doing a job, he got friendly with loads of Dubliners and a lot of them told him in that in the eyes of a lot of the people in the south, the UK is welcome to keep the North, as they have to pay the money to keep the place afloat, money that would have to come out of the south’s coffers should Ireland be reunited.