Patton21 Posted June 25, 2003 Share Posted June 25, 2003 Why are arty observors so slow? They are just carrying a radio and bincoculars, nothing so bad. They tire easily and move very slow. Why is this? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PiggDogg Posted June 25, 2003 Share Posted June 25, 2003 Patty, The radio FOs carried a WWII era radio(transmitter & receiver) plus its battery and/or generator. These were pretty heavy (some grog please come to the rescue on this), probably over 30 or 40 pounds and not at all like today's transistor radios or MP3 players. The wire FOs have to carry a telephone & enough telephone wire to reach back to a connection somewhere probably at the friendly lines. I suspect that this weighed in the 30 to 50 pound range (grog help requested). Also, the telephone wire had to be unrolled somewhat carefully so as not to break it. If the wire breaks, then one of the guys will get to run to the rear with the targeting coordinates. Cheers, Richard 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JonS Posted June 25, 2003 Share Posted June 25, 2003 Originally posted by Patton21: ... They are just carrying a radio and bincoculars, nothing so bad. ... Ha! Shows what you know about artillery. What about the chuffer? And the water for the chuffer? And the fuel to burn under the chuffer? And the bread, bacon, eggs, steak, and coffee? The 11x11 tent and the stretchers to sleep on? And the porn - the stacks and stacks of porn? All that stuff isn't light you know. You should try carrying it someday. Incidentally, I doubt that anyone in their right mind would describe WWII-era radios as 'nothing so bad'. But more to the point, I think in this case you are specifically talking about wire FOs. Take a peak in the manual, and see what you come up with. Regards JonS 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
laxx Posted June 25, 2003 Share Posted June 25, 2003 *** off topic *** JonS: porn in WWII ? you mean girlie paintings ? or just lurid novels ? most fascinating.... 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Dorosh Posted June 25, 2003 Share Posted June 25, 2003 PiggDogg - I think perhaps you assign signal wire a little too much fragility! The big concern was shellfire breaking the wire, but you couldn't really break it just by spooling it out. Weren't you the one in the signals reserves? I thought it was a common thing in the Army in your day to see who could wrap the most comms wire around the drive shaft of their truck? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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