Radar in 1904?

Military Innovation In the Interwar Period

P265

Yet already by 1904, a young German named Christian Hulsmeyer claimed his patented ‘telemobiloscope’ could transmit radio waves and receive their reflections off a passing object. He suggested such a device could prevent collisions at sea or aid navigation. Representatives of shipping lines flocked to various demonstrations in Germany and Holland and were impressed that the device could detect objects up to a range of approximately five kilometres. But there were no buyers.


http://www.radarworld.org/huelsmeyer.html

Huelsmeyer's "telemobiloscope" on display at the Deutsches Museum in Munich. At left is the antenna, in the middle the receiver, and at right the transmitter. After 90 years (1904) the unit was connected to a battery and it still worked flawlessly. Range is 3000 m. A description in English on how his radar system worked is detailed in his US patent 810,150 dated Jan. 16, 1906.

On the 30th April 1904, Christian Huelsmeyer in Duesseldorf, Germany, applied for a patent for his 'telemobiloscope' which was a transmitter-receiver system for detecting distant metallic objects by means of electrical waves. The telemobiloscope was designed as an anti-collision device for ships and it worked well. His interest in collision prevention arose after observing the grief of a mother whose son was killed when two ships collided. After a period teaching in Bremen, where he had the opportunity of repeating Hertz's experiments, he joined Siemens. In 1902 he moved to Duesseldorf to concentrate on his invention. He became acquainted with a merchant from Cologne, was given 5,000 marks and founded the company 'Telemobiloscop-Gesellschaft Huelsmeyer und Mannheim'. The first public demonstration of his 'telemobiloscope' took place on the 18th May 1904 at the Hohenzollern Bridge, Cologne. As a ship on the river approached, one could hear a bell ringing. The ringing ceased only when the ship changed direction and left the beam of his 'telemobiloscope'. All tests carried out gave positive results. The press and public opinion were very favorable. However, neither the naval authorities nor industry showed interest. In June 1904 he was given the opportunity by the director of a Dutch shipping company to display his equipment at various shipping congresses at Rotterdam. His was detecting ships at ranges up to 3,000 m, and he was planning a new 'telemobiloscope' which would function up to 10,000 m. He received a fourth patent on the 11th November 1904 in England. In 1955, he was honored at a congress in Munich on Weather and Astro-Navigation (Flug-Wetter-und Astro Funkortungs-Tagung). His 'telemobiloscope' operated on a wavelength of 40-50 cm. The transmitter used a Righi-type spark gap (part of which was immersed in oil) from an induction coil. The radiated pulses were beamed by a funnel-shaped reflector and tube which could be pointed in any desired direction. The receiver used a coherer detector and a separate vertical antenna, which, because of a semi-cylindrical movable screen, was also directional. Basically, the apparatus was designed to detect the presence of an object in a particular direction. The question of determining distance was later solved, by a modification which aimed at beaming the radiation at any desired angle of elevation. Knowledge of the height of one's own transmitting antenna above the surface of the water and of the angle of vertical elevation at which an object was detected would, by simple calculation, give the range of the object. Perhaps the most ingenious aspect of the inventor's later apparatus was his awareness that the equipment might respond to other than its own transmissions and his safeguarding against it by a time limiting electromechanical mechanism. The receiver responded to a first transmission's signal only if, after a predetermined interval, it received the signal from a second transmission.

Some claims are made that Heulsmeyer had built a second set, a much larger demonstration unit which he is supposed to have build in two month and is claimed did not work! There is no support for this claim. His unit worked and it was in competion with the Marconi spark transmitters. The Marconi Wireless Company had the control of the Naval communication industry in those days and would not tolerate any competition.


What implications would radar in 1904 have?
 
Well, quite a lot, assuming the public and governments are able to realize the potential as more than "collision alarm". Given the ten years to develop before the Great War (if it happens on schedule) you could have fire control ranging radar on dreadnoughts, making naval gunfire much more accurate and ship-spotting and tracking much more reliable. Combat in fog and at night are possible now, though still limited by the primitive radar (I'd assume poor resolution, poor false alarm rate, noisy, etc.). Assuming WWI is on schedule ~as OTL that means the HSF-RN clash gets really deadly, particularly if one side sees radar's potential when the other doesn't. Frex: Assuming the HSF has radar and the RN doesn't that could be game-changing. The Brit Battlecruisers are doubleplus fucked if the HSF has radar.

Tracking subs is possible on the surface only. Still a sonar game there.

Also, tracking icebergs is not possible (RF transparent) so no Butterflies saving the Titanic! :p Well, except maybe just random butterflies, like a different more cautious Captain due to chance.

Air defense radar probably will not develop until late in the war if at all, and may not have the resolution to detect small, mostly wood & canvas planes. Tracking Zeppelins, however, is a different game.

For airborne radar, I don't see it happening unless someone stumbles across the cavity magnetron (possible), but even so, more than 10 years may be needed to develop.

Of course by the mid century air-control and airborne radar are commonplace, including in the Pacific. Any future wars are kicked up a notch. You may even see more advanced ECM.
 
Well, quite a lot, assuming the public and governments are able to realize the potential as more than "collision alarm". Given the ten years to develop before the Great War (if it happens on schedule) you could have fire control ranging radar on dreadnoughts, making naval gunfire much more accurate and ship-spotting and tracking much more reliable. Combat in fog and at night are possible now, though still limited by the primitive radar (I'd assume poor resolution, poor false alarm rate, noisy, etc.). Assuming WWI is on schedule ~as OTL that means the HSF-RN clash gets really deadly, particularly if one side sees radar's potential when the other doesn't. Frex: Assuming the HSF has radar and the RN doesn't that could be game-changing. The Brit Battlecruisers are doubleplus fucked if the HSF has radar.

Airship AEW anyone???
 
Well, quite a lot, assuming the public and governments are able to realize the potential as more than "collision alarm". Given the ten years to develop before the Great War (if it happens on schedule) you could have fire control ranging radar on dreadnoughts, making naval gunfire much more accurate and ship-spotting and tracking much more reliable. Combat in fog and at night are possible now, though still limited by the primitive radar (I'd assume poor resolution, poor false alarm rate, noisy, etc.). Assuming WWI is on schedule ~as OTL that means the HSF-RN clash gets really deadly, particularly if one side sees radar's potential when the other doesn't. Frex: Assuming the HSF has radar and the RN doesn't that could be game-changing. The Brit Battlecruisers are doubleplus fucked if the HSF has radar.

Tracking subs is possible on the surface only. Still a sonar game there.

Also, tracking icebergs is not possible (RF transparent) so no Butterflies saving the Titanic! :p Well, except maybe just random butterflies, like a different more cautious Captain due to chance.

Air defense radar probably will not develop until late in the war if at all, and may not have the resolution to detect small, mostly wood & canvas planes. Tracking Zeppelins, however, is a different game.

For airborne radar, I don't see it happening unless someone stumbles across the cavity magnetron (possible), but even so, more than 10 years may be needed to develop.

Of course by the mid century air-control and airborne radar are commonplace, including in the Pacific. Any future wars are kicked up a notch. You may even see more advanced ECM.

The big problem with this is that governments of that time probably wouldn't realize the implications. The French military for example, in WW1 their plan of attack was literally to outrun the enemy while they reloaded. Completely ignoring the machine-gun even though it had been in production and used in combat since the 1870s. So what I'm saying is that you need some way for the Germans to discover that this thing could give them an edge, especially in naval combat. But Geekhis is right, if the Germans don't go flaunting this then they could totally smash the royal navy. After that the British might even back out of the war all together.

And that means...

Althistory Motication.jpg
 
Could it be possible to prevent the rise of airplanes in this TL? Because if dreadnoughts do well enough with radar whats the point in creating any other weapons?

There will still be a real use for airplanes as scouts and spotters, as OTL, advancing to additional roles as aircraft tech improves. Plus early planes will be virtually indetectable to early radars, most likely (see my original post) making them very useful as scouts and (eventually) as attack aircraft and bombers able to slip past radar. Aircraft development will continue more or less as OTL, but doctrine will change dramatically as all-metal craft and improved radar resolution remove the "stealth" capabilities.

Of course on Dreadnoghts you make a great point. This could give even more ammo to the "Big Gun" admirals than OTL, delaying Carrier development or at least helping to keep them in "escort/spotter" roles.
 
There will still be a real use for airplanes as scouts and spotters, as OTL, advancing to additional roles as aircraft tech improves. Plus early planes will be virtually indetectable to early radars, most likely (see my original post) making them very useful as scouts and (eventually) as attack aircraft and bombers able to slip past radar. Aircraft development will continue more or less as OTL, but doctrine will change dramatically as all-metal craft and improved radar resolution remove the "stealth" capabilities.

Of course on Dreadnoghts you make a great point. This could give even more ammo to the "Big Gun" admirals than OTL, delaying Carrier development or at least helping to keep them in "escort/spotter" roles.

Yeah, maybe those billions of dollars spent on ridiculously large Battleships would actually come to fruition.
 
Page 267 of the book

'...but when the German engineer hans Dominik shared the reports of his tests of a Strahlenzieler ("ray-aimer") with the Imperial Navy in February 1916, the navy responded that the device still needed six months development and therefore would not be useful in the war'
 
I completely forgot something. If it only has a range of five kilometers then it needs some serious development. Ships could engage each other way before the radar came in range.
 
I completely forgot something. If it only has a range of five kilometers then it needs some serious development. Ships could engage each other way before the radar came in range.

Its not the immediate use i'm wondering about, its the potential.
 

Markus

Banned
Well, quite a lot, assuming the public and governments are able to realize the potential as more than "collision alarm".

All it takes is a shipping/insurance company or canal operator that realizes the commercial potential. After all they did loose valuable ships and cargo to collision in poor visibility, didn´t they?
 
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Found this interesting!
Naval gun range in 1914 to be 10 miles.
But if as written an improved model with a range of up to 10 km was projected 1904 or 06 the gunnery range of 1914 should possibly be outranged by radar at that time.

But even with a lesser range radar could be a bonus to gunnery but of course depending on state of the art calculators to give the right adjustment to the guns.
At this early stage there would also be some miscalculations before the new type gunnery would be mastered - think of the problems with gyro stabilizers on tanks WWII.

Radar development is one thing but having radar direct gunnery is quite another. The way to use radar data to compute accurate gunnery and transmit these data to guns.
I don't envision what we had in the Air Force AA with firecontrol radar actually having CONTROL of guns aligned with said firecontrol radar but rather a less sophisticated system of data being computed and transmitted to guns by voice or runner in the shortest possible time. But even then not as sophisticated as the preceding system of oil pressure to control guns.
But the "accurate" readings by this early radar would be an immense improvement of earlier human accessed ranges to target. And yes I know gunnery officers were trained for years to accurate accessement of ranges etc. etc., but it would be an improvement we all agree when taken to state of the art.
Especially as fog or destroyer made smoke (Jutland) is no longer an impediment to gunnery!

You need trained operators handling the radar sets and others to compute readings for relaying to the gunnery control or ready for maintenance/repairs of sets.
 
Good points, Arctic.

Oh, and I never thought for a second there'd be actual radar-controlled gunnery. That takes much better control systems and electronics than will be available until after *WW2. Rather I'd imagine the latter case. The advantage is of earlier detection and ranging, and speaking tubes or a simple hardwire radio/telegraph or even semaphore can quickly pass along range and bearing info (assuming the doctrine recognizes the advantages in doing so ;)). Even in clear weather. You spot and accurately range the enemy fleet beyond visual, or even before they can visually locate you and accurately estimate range, and you have a huge advantage. You'd have a much better chance of getting in the first bracketed salvos.

I'd bet the early skirmishes of *WW1 would greatly under-use radar, but that the advantages would quickly be implemented as the war progressed.
 

The Sandman

Banned
Also, night-fighting would suddenly become a viable tactic for large fleets.

And the other thing the Germans might try to use this for is to attach them to their commerce hunters in order to make finding targets easier.

In fact, here's a POD that could allow for this: Germany decides that it wants to have a more useful naval presence in its colonial possessions, preferably one that could actually deal with the problems they'll be facing in regard to numbers. They don't have time or shipyard capacity to build more ships and thus provide adequate scouting elements to their colonial squadrons. With radar, however, they don't need the same sort of scouting element; a heavy cruiser/battlecruiser with a couple of light cruisers should suffice, as they can use radar to selectively engage targets they know they can kill. If the RN concentrates to prevent that, then they start commerce raiding. Essentially, the Germans realize they have no chance of winning the quantity race with the British and decide to focus to a far greater extent on quality.

The other follow-on effects I could see from using radar as a naval force multiplier are a trend in weapon design to longer-range guns and better German computing (needed to take full advantage of radar), which means better German encryption.
 
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