Comments by "Sar Jim" (@sarjim4381) on "The A6M Naval Carrier Fighter - Zero or Hero?" video.

  1. Yes, all that noise and static on the HF (2 MHz to 29.995 MHz) led to the British developing, with the assistance of ham radio operators, VHF (30 MHz to 40 MHz) radios. These were smaller, lighter, and more immune for manmade and atmospheric noise. The US Signal Corps then improved the British radios, because that's what we always did. The British has their VHF radios in operation by mid-1940, but it took the USN until early 1943 to equip most of their planes with VHF radios because we certainly couldn't just copy a British radio. To be fair, the Signal Corps did make some significant improvements in miniaturization and tube (valve) longevity, as well as a single unit transceiver control panel with only two dials for the pilot. One was for the channel, of which there were four, and all crystal controlled, the other being for volume. By contrast, Japanese pilots had a separate HF receiver and transmitter. They had to find the right frequency on the receiver while tuning up the transmitter on the same frequency, something that took two hands and a trained monkey on the ground. It's not surprising that some Japanese pilots pitched their radios. Things were going swimmingly for the RN and USN with their VHF radios, since pilots could have a better chance of hearing each other and their carrier. The radios had an added benefit of only having a range of about 20 miles, so that meant the Japanese couldn't hear our transmissions...or at least that's what we thought. All the VHF test were conducted at labs located inland. The concept of thermal ducting of VHF signals over water was unknown until the invasion of the Philippines. Because there were so many carriers and carrier aircraft scattered all across the islands, there was a lot of VHF traffic, mostly pilots jawjacking. It was soon discovered that, when conditions were right, pilots in North Luzon were able to talk to each other and to carriers located off the southern tip of Mindanao, a distance of nearly 500 miles! Panic soon spread across the fleet. Since VHF traffic was unencoded, it now looked like the Japanese could be monitoring our transmissions. There was an immediate clampdown on chatter between pilots, and the Signal Corps rushed to design UHF radios, since those signals really didn't travel further than 10-20 miles. The first UHF radios weren't completed until after the end of the war. To our relief, postwar interviews with Japanese radio officers revealed that the Japanese never monitored our traffic. They didn't develop reliable and sufficiently sensitive VHF radios until just before the end of the war. They too believed their planes or ships wouldn't get close enough to our fleet to monitor our VHF traffic, so they didn't put any effort into doing so. Now, did those new UHF radios solve all our airborne communications issues? Well, that's something for another post. I'll just leave you with a teaser that the answer involved a beautiful move star and a Prussian xylophone player. :-)
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  2. I don't know if there was espionage from one side or the other or just coincidental development, but the T-6 Texan and the A6M Zero shared a lot of airframe characteristics, The length, wingspan, wing loading, empty and loaded weight, and even the wing placement in the fuselage were all very close. The T-6 also had a "greenhouse" canopy, and even the tailwheel placement and construction was very similar to the Zero. The T-6, being primarily used as a trainer, had a much smaller engine (600 HP vs 1,000 HP), but armed versions of the T-6 were capable of carrying nearly the same weight and types of armament as the Zero. I wonder if there's any information about how these two aircraft became so similar?
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