Lancaster H2S radomes

[alpine_modeller]

Hi all,

Whats the right colour for the rear section of a Lancaster H2S radome ?

Aluminium ?

I am a wee bit confused why Revell have created the part in clear plastic, but seen enough photos to know that the front section is night.

Rgds

Geoff

[Work In Progress]

It's in clear plastic because the whole H2S radome is made of perspex. It is after all a radome and needs to be transparent to the frequencies involved. Making it of aluminium would be counterproductive. In more modern times it would have been some GRP-like composite.

Also I believe that when the radome was fitted it covered some downward ID lights at the rear, which was a reason for them not to paint the whole thing black. That said, most of them seem to have been painted black all over so presumably the downward ID lights were not particularly wanted by that stage of the war, much as the Spitfire signal flare chute was deleted as unnecessary.

Edited October 2, 2015 by Work In Progress

[alpine_modeller]

Thanks for the info. So the most common convention for H2S radomes was black, you are saying ? The part definitely has a differentiation line on it, and I have seen some pictures with a dully silvery finish on the back. I though it was the more common convention, but if black is ok, what the hell...

[Work In Progress]

As always, feel free to paint what you think you see in relation to any good photos you have of the specific airframe you are modelling

The model part has a demarcation line to show where it was left clear when that was the case, but that certainly wasn't universal. Most of the pics I have relating to ww2 service are of all black painted radomes or predominantly black with the small see through section at the rear. The full size part is a one-piece moulding. It's possible that in service some of the rear sections were scuffed or sanded to make it hard for external observers to see the HS2 antenna.

The Airfix kit also provides it as a one piece moulding on the clear sprue.

This thread shows the downward ID lights, modelled by direct reference to surviving airframe NX611 "Just Jane". About half way down page 3.

http://uamf.org.uk/viewtopic.php?t=6968&p=137222

Edited October 2, 2015 by Work In Progress

[alpine_modeller]

Thanks for the excellent reference; think I will do mine like this.

[Troy Smith]

as WIP shows, the rear was often unpainted, here's a good wartime shot showing this clearly.

[Radpoe Spitfire]

Hi Geoff, much of the confusion model wise is probably down to earlier kits of the Lancaster having solid radomes, I.e. Airfix 1st tooling, Frog and Matchbox all were culprits for this. The first Lancaster kit to have a transparency was to my knowledge the Tamiya 1/48. The first in 1/72 I believe was The airfix 2nd tooling.

Regards adrian

[Work In Progress]

Airfix's first Lancaster didn't have a radome at all!

[Graham Boak]

Possibly the Halifax has been mistaken for a Lancaster (again). The Airfix Halifax came with a solid H2S dome - I've just been through Merrick's latest tome and every wartime picture shows a solid Night radome, so it seems that these half-and-half ones were restricted to Lancasters, This may be explained by the story about the lights.

[dogsbody]

From a Granger drawing:

Chris

[dogsbody]

The Halifax's radome didn't interfere with any of the underside ID lights so it was painted overall black. The same with the few Stirlings that had H2S fitted.

Only the Lanc had the rear end of the Plexiglas dome left unpainted so as to not obscure the ID lights

Chris

[Graham Boak]

The Stirlings were disappearing from Bomber Command by the time H2S became common. It seems that those still around were often fitted with ventral guns - are reported by Johnen when attacking one - but the details of the fit seem to have escaped my references.

[stever219]

The RAF's B-17Gs had their radomes painted Night overall, but if I remember Martin Streetly's "Aircraft of 100 Group" articles in Scale Models they were slightly translucent. I don't think the Lincoln had the same "issue" as the Lancaster IIRC as the radome was located on the rear fuselage extension immediately abaft the weapons bay (but I could be wrong......).

[dogsbody]

From the IWM:

http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205127154

[stever219]

Dogsbody my browser's playing up so I can't enlarge your image, but your Stirling looks like she's got the Mk. III dorsal turret and possibly a joint, or exposed strip of clear Perspex around 3/4 of the way back along the radome (about where the front of the clear part on the Lancaster 'dome would be.

[dogsbody]

The IWM image from above plus a few that I have on my 'puter from various sources:

Chris

[alpine_modeller]

Wow, you guys are really helpful, thanks !!!

Since it is a Lancaster I am doing, I will leave the back part clear and put the ID lights on.

Chris, a question about the drawing you attached - the scanner looks like it is facing backwards in relation to the blister and ID lights. From what little I understand of the function of H2S for navigation and bomb-aiming, shouldnt the scanner be forward facing ? Or am I missing something ?

[Selwyn]

Wow, you guys are really helpful, thanks !!!

Since it is a Lancaster I am doing, I will leave the back part clear and put the ID lights on.

Chris, a question about the drawing you attached - the scanner looks like it is facing backwards in relation to the blister and ID lights. From what little I understand of the function of H2S for navigation and bomb-aiming, shouldnt the scanner be forward facing ? Or am I missing something ?

The scanner "scans" i.e. Rotatates so it stops in the position it was in when the power went off.

Selwyn

[alpine_modeller]

The scanner "scans" i.e. Rotatates so it stops in the position it was in when the power went off.

Selwyn

Shows how little I know. I thought it just swept a forward arc, not completely rotated through 360deg.

[dpm1did1]

A nice on/off view of the radome and scanner curtesy of wiki:

And what was actually seen on the scope:

This is cologne and you whilst it may not look like much the fact you could make out water features and other significantly different radar reflections was a huge advance when navigating and bombing at night.

Edited October 5, 2015 by dpm1did1

[Don McIntyre]

With a good nav chart and prominent physical features that would stand out on RADAR, an experienced operator would be able to pick necessary details for bombing out of that. Now if chaff, jamming and deceptive camouflage (decoys) would make it much harder...

[GordonM]

Are there any figures for Stirlings equipped with H2S? Given the survival rate for Stirlings on raids and as been pointed out they were coming to the end of their operational life I'm surprised valuable H2S sets were risked in them?

[Graham Boak]

Rather less valuable than trained crews. As long as the Stirlings were still front-line aircraft, they were still required to hit the targets they were sent to. However, it may be interesting to check which squadrons still had Stirlings at the time H2S became widely used - possibly just Pathfinders and 100 Group? It is probably significant that the TV code is not a front-line unit but an OCU. Crews still had to be trained on the equipment they would meet in the front-line units, even though not always on the same aircraft type.

[12jaguar]

Going back to the silvery line on the H2S dome on the Stirling, it is in fact an IFF aerial, you can see that it isn't actually part of the radome itself when you zoom in

John

[Ascoteer]

With a good nav chart and prominent physical features that would stand out on RADAR, an experienced operator would be able to pick necessary details for bombing out of that. Now if chaff, jamming and deceptive camouflage (decoys) would make it much harder...

Not as easy as you might think.

I spent a tour on the Dominie navigational trainer where, in the early days the Navs would use the Ecko 190 weather radar in ground mapping mode - not for nothing was the display termed 'orange porridge'!

A very good friend of mine was a Wartime Nav on Halifaxes. He told me that H2S was fine for big water features and coastlines but bugger all use for anything else especially over the Rhur. That, coupled with the fact that the Germans were known to be able to home on it, meant that from 'coasting in' he switched it off and placed more reliance upon 'GEE'.