FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1961
1961 - 1655.PDF
FLIGHT, 16 November 1961 759 SYSTEM SURVEY New Met Office Headquarters METEOROLOGICAL work formerly carried out in buildings in London,Harrow and Dunstable has now been concentrated in a new £600,000 block built by the Ministry of Works just east of the new town ofBracknell, Berks. The handing-over ceremony took place on November 1 when the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry ofWorks presented an inscribed key to the Permanent Under Secretary of State at the Air Ministry. Rising at its highest point to nine stories, the new building in-cludes three blocks forming three sides of a square. The top floor of the highest block houses the weather forecasting branch in air-conditioned rooms with very large windows. This is one of the eight master analysis centres of the northern hemisphere and isresponsible for forecasting weather developments over Europe and the eastern Atlantic. The office also provides guidance for all fore-casting stations in the British Meteorological Service, both for The GPS Terravision visual attachment for flight simulators is to come into use early next year for the Argosy C. 1 simulator being installed at RAF Benson. A complete public-address system for the ten Short Belfasts for theRAF has been ordered from Trix Electronics Ltd. a subsidiary of Ultra Electronics Ltd. The system will combine Trix and Ultra equipmentand cost about £12,000. Deliveries will begin early next year. Elliott-Automation Ltd have formed E-A Space and Advanced Military Systems Ltd as a parellel company to Elliott-Automation Systems Ltd in the non-industrial field. It is planned that the new company will play a large part in promoting British military and space systems for European and other foreign countries. Amplivox now manufacture a new miniature encapsulated three-transistor amplifier with full MoA type approval. Designed for use with magnetic and noise-cancelling microphones, the amplifier weighs2/3oz, has a voltage gain of 50db and contains a surge-limiting diode and output control. Component density is more than 300 per cu in. A Redifon Action Speed Tactical Teacher which simulates navalexercises involving surface craft, submarines and aircraft was recently shipped in a Braathens SAFE DC-4 to Bergen for the Royal Nor-wegian Navy. The Royal Navy, RAN, RCN and USN already use Redifon Tactical Teachers. Six complete Verdan airborne digital computers and six sets of com-ponents have been bought by Elliott Brothers (London) Ltd from Auto- netics. There is a technical assistance agreement between the two com-panies. Delivery will be completed by March 1963; and Elliott will market Verdan to military users in Britain. Two modified B-57s are being used in Germany to simulate theflight of Martin Mace air-breathing surface-to-surface missiles for training purposes. The B-57s carry the Atran (Automatic TerrainRecognition and Navigation) radar and fly the course that would have been followed by the Mace after practice alignment and count-down.Atran apparently involves the comparison of the actual radar mapping picture with prepared film of the track to be flown. Another section of the new Meteorological Office building: the tele- printer room, where hourly observations are received from NW Europe and the eastern Atlantic and retransmitted by radio and landline The forecasting room on the seventh floor of the new Meteorological Office building. The room is air-conditioned. (See first news-item) ground level and high altitudes. Forecasts are prepared for theBBC, the national Press, public utilities and other bodies. The eighth floor houses the communications centre where weatherobservations are received and transmitted by radio and landline to internationally agreed schedules. Teleprinters are connected directlyto Canada, France, West Germany and Holland. On the fifth floor is a Ferranti Mercury computer in a roomscreened with copper mesh and effectively earthed. The computer and laboratories on other floors are used for a wide variety ofresearch programmes including several involving satellites. There is also a small printing press operated by HMSO for printing weathercharts and forecasts, and two wind tunnels for testing meteorolo- gical equipment. The UK national library of meteorology ishoused at ground level and includes weather records dating back to the 18th century or earlier. 150:1 Size Reduction THE USAF Aeronautical Systems Division and Texas Instrumentslnc, demonstrated a computer containing 587 digital circuits, each formed within a minute bar of silicon material, in a volume ofonly 6.3 cu in and a weight of lOoz. This provides electrical func- tions identical with those of a computer containing 8,500 conventionalcomponents and having a volume of 1,000 cu in and a weight of 480oz. The computer was developed as part of the MolecularElectronic Programme and was made by Texas Instruments as a practical application of semiconductor networks. The companyclaims that the computer demonstrated their ability to solve prob- lems of interconnection, thermal dissipation, electrical interactionand maintenance of high-density packaging in complex equipment. Semiconductor networks allow considerable reduction in connec-tions and individual packaging required for conventional com- ponents; and the network is formed by relatively few process steps,allowing a high degree of control and employing only very high purity material. Texas Instruments Ltd in Bedford is co-operating with theAmerican parent company in developing semiconductor networks. The British company is studying basic processes, semiconductortechnology, the design of circuit networks, encapsulation and the application of the complete circuit in equipment and systems. Racal Instruments announce their new SA.512 40Mc/s divider unitfor direct measurement of frequencies up to 40Mc/s in conjunction with the Racal digital frequency meter SA.505 or other meters withstandard decade time-base settings. The SA.512 is fully transistorized, is housed in a bench-mounting cabinet and takes its power supply fromthe SA.505. Development of the Time Division Data Link for the USAF is nowreported complete. Nicknamed Tiddles. the system can transmit from an air-defence computer interception instructions to several hundredintercepters, in some cases controlling the autopilot in the aircraft. A central interception computer is connected to numerous dispersedtransmitters and the aircraft carry decoding receivers. British Standard Code of Practice CP 1012: 1961, now issued, dealswith the abatement and measurement of radio interference from elec- trical installations in civil aircraft. The code was prepared at the re-quest of the IEE Committee on Radio Equipment for Civil Aircraft, who prepared Radio CARS for the ARB. It includes a new technique,which may become standard, whereby interference is measured at the receiver end of the aerial feeder terminals. Appropriate limits are alsorecommended. Copies, price 10s, are obtainable from the British Stan- dards Institution Sales Branch, 2 Park Street, London Wl.
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
