Talk:V-1 flying bomb
From Academic Kids
| Contents |
'Simple device': incl engine?
"simple device" "constructed in around fifty man-hours of mainly sheet metal" -- does that include the engine?
- It was a very simple engine - so quite possibly, yes. Mind you' I'm only guessing that. Tannin
Number of V-1's produced
From the entry: Almost 30,000 V1s were manufactured. 9,521 were fired at England. I have another figure: V1's launched against England, not including the V1's that landed short of their targets or fell into the sea = 10,753. It's doubtful that both are right. Can anyone provide a reasonably certain estimate?
Engine sound recording
The sounds stops, I suppose when the engine shuts off, but I do not hear the impact. This gives a feeling of the sample being a bit uncomplete. How long does that take? Perhaps too long for including that? - Patrick 11:38 Apr 11, 2003 (UTC)
I don't have a more complete recording but. I think it takes a long time before the impact (several minutes). But size of the file would not be a problem Ogg/vorbis is very good in compressing silence :). Ericd 11:46 Apr 11, 2003 (UTC)
- So the good thing is that you have time to look for cover, the bad thing that you may not hear it coming at all if you are near the place of impact. - Patrick 12:26 Apr 11, 2003 (UTC)
It's great to have the sound recording here, but it's in a format that (it seems reasonable to presume) few people will be able to play. My system (Windows 2000, Media Player 6.0 and RealPlayer both installed) doesn't know what to do with it, and despite a lifetime spent working with computers, Ive never heard of .ogg files. (I don't play with sound much these days, I grant you. Stll, it seems like a reasonable random sample system.) Now sure, I could spend a few minutes and track the format down via a search engine, or ask around at the office and get a pretty fast answer, but I shouldn't have to do that. Wikipedia should make itself as easy to use as possible. Anyone want to add something like this:
- Media Files : V-1 engine sound (Wikipedia:Sound help)
(Linking, of course, to an appropriate page, which would link to a suitable download.)
Well Ogg file are a full free software alternative to MP3, they seems accepted as the standard for Wikipedia. I will start an help page and upload the codec. Ericd 15:09 Apr 11, 2003 (UTC)
- Hi Tannin is the sound OK now ?
- Ericd 15:53 Apr 11, 2003 (UTC)
- Missing image
Ltspkr.png
Image:Ltspkr.png
- hope that helps. [[User:Halibutt|Halibutt]] 00:34, Nov 12, 2004 (UTC)
Added to WP:Brilliant prose
I added this page to Wikipedia:Brilliant prose
Waoooh my visage turns red ! Ericd 15:51 Apr 11, 2003 (UTC)
- Having contributed a fair slab of it myself, I can only completely agree with you that it is indeed "brilliant prose". :) Tannin
V-1 firing video clip pointer
Survival Research Labs (http://www.srl.org) is a performance art group in the San Francisco Bay area that uses a V1 in some of their shows. They have a 24 MB mpg video accessible from their website (http://www.srl.org/machines/v1/) where you can see and hear the engine. The clip ends with an amusing visit from the fire department. Mark Pauline, the leader of SRL, explains in the video how they replaced some broken valves on the V1 by following the original German design, except using nickel valves instead of stainless valves. I was at a show in Berkeley tonight where they fired it. Email me if you want to see any of the video I shot with my little Canon S400 camera. RobertStewart 05:50 Nov 13, 2003 (UTC)
I posted edited versions of the videos I mentioned above on my blog (http://www.wombatnation.com/2004/01/video-from-srl-performance) quite a while ago, but forgot to update this page. Let me know if you want a copy of the original. My email address can be found on my website. RobertStewart 08:11 May 1, 2005 (UTC)
[Ff]lying [Bb]omb capitals?
Shouldn't "V1 flying bomb" be written as "V1 Flying Bomb", since it's used grammatically as a proper noun, like De Havilland Mosquito? Or not? I get confused about this (see my talk page) ( 09:06, 14 Dec 2003 (UTC)
In any case the article title is inconsistent with usage within the article ( 09:06, 14 Dec 2003 (UTC)
- It's ambiguous, since "flying bomb" is a generic term that describes many similar weapons (see flying bomb), but the term was first used in English to describe this particular weapon. Most usually in English, the weapon is simply called the "V-1" (or V1 or V 1...), and in this sense, "flying bomb" is not a proper name. Since the original (German) term for the weapon doesn't even have a name, I think that "flying bomb" is more appropriate --Rlandmann 09:20, 14 Dec 2003 (UTC)
von Braun at Peenemünde
Wasn't Wernher von Braun also involved in some way at Peenemunde ?
-- Kim Bruning
- Indeed, almost all the time, but not at all with the V-1. Rockets proper were von Braun's endeavour; see V-2 rocket. --Wernher 20:15, 22 Jan 2004 (UTC)
Good wiki process example!
This page is a really good example of the wiki process at its best. Lots of contributors, and over time it has turned into a really comprehensive article. It could perhaps use a very gentle copyedit to make it flow more smoothly (this is what always happens to multi-author documents - they get disjointed), but overall ... great work, team! Tannin 14:16, 5 Feb 2004 (UTC)
'V-2' hyphenated, 'V1' not?
I just wonder about the title of this article vs the V-2 one. In the three books on the subject that I possess, the usage seems to be the hyphenated version for both 'Vergeltungs'-weapons. I actually think this is more typical of German language usage as well. Therefore, if no one objects carrying convincing arguments, I will rename this (the V-1) article (by moving it) to 'V-1 flying bomb'. --Wernher 22:37, 10 Aug 2004 (UTC)
- Well, as I've not got heaps of (negative) comments so far, I'll ask an admin to fix the move (renaming) to 'V-1 flying bomb' (couldn't myself due to a redirect already bearing that name). Now's your last chance to speak up... --Wernher 23:31, 14 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Is the description of the guidance system correct?
My great-uncle gave me a set of books about WWII and (being a tech geek even when I was a kid) I was fascinated by the diagrams and description of how the V-1 knew when it was over its target. Here's the way the book explained it:
There was a small propeller on the nose, connected to a long screw thread going back inside the missile. On this thread was a washer, and at the back end of the thread were two electrical contacts.
As the missile flew the airflow turned the prop and hence the threaded shaft; the washer would be wound along the shaft as it turned. When it reached the electrical contacts it would make a circuit, which energized a solenoid attached to a small guillotine. This guillotine would cut through the fuel lines, stopping the engine, and the missile would then dive.
At the launch site the engineers would preset the starting position of the washer on the shaft according to the known distance to the target and an estimate of the headwind. It sounds very rough-and-ready but it was accurate enough.
- The description's pretty accurate - the only error is the often-quoted part about the guillotine cutting the engine's fuel lines to stop the engine. Actually the guillotine was used to cut the elevator control cable (there was only the one cable as the elevator was spring-loaded to the down position, i.e. to give 'up' elevator the cable pulled and to give 'down' the cable was slackened) and when the air-log propeller fired the guillotine it was this control cable that was cut - the sprung-elevator then went into the fully-down position which put the V-1 into a sudden dive. The abrupt negative-G then caused the fuel flow to cease which stopped the engine. Ian Dunster 11:53, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)
