A neat read
I worked on some 50’s era IFF transponders as we called them while in the Air Force. Some of the designs were late 40’s technologies and still retained housings for explosive devices that could be activated by the pilot if he knew the plane might fall into enemy hands. The charges would have destroyed the frequency determining components. By the time I worked on them (the late 60’s) they had stopped using the explosive devices but the hardware was still there.
The military frequently gets beat up on for waste but much of the equipment that I worked on, which was used in the A model C-130 was hardly new and some of it recycled. Our search radar antennas were gyro stabilized and the gyro that was used was a surplus auto pilot part from the B-47 and our radar transmitters were cooled with surplus B-17 defroster fans.
Gary,
I hear you about re-cycling stuff.
My ship needed a new pump for some widgit down in the Main Engine Room. The one that had been installed when we were commissioned lunched itself, and needed depot level repair. (Mind you, this was in a brand new ship of war, just barely out of its post shakedown yard period). We found out that the pump had originally been installed in a ship that had been commissioned in 1944 (this was 1984) and the only one available on short notice had just been removed from a destroyer that had been commissioned in 1943 and then remanufactured(the pump, not the destroyer).
Its amazing what a few seals, bushings and a fresh coat of paint will do for military equipment.
In 21 years, didn’t serve on a U S Coast Guard Cutter (ship - boats are less than 65 feet in length) that was made after 1945. They were all in service until after I retired in 1990. Now all the vessels I served on are all retired, also.
Would those be NAVY seals ???
I know the food they served us in boot camp had to come from the 40’s and 50’s.