The SCR-658 radar is a
radio direction finding
Direction finding (DF), or radio direction finding (RDF), isin accordance with International Telecommunication Union (ITU)defined as radio location that uses the reception of radio waves to determine the direction in which a radio statio ...
set introduced by the
U. S. Army
The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, c ...
in 1944, was developed in conjunction with the
SCR-268 radar. It was preceded by the SCR-258. Its primary purpose was to track weather balloons. Prior to this it was only possible to track weather balloons with a
theodolite
A theodolite () is a precision optical instrument for measuring angles between designated visible points in the horizontal and vertical planes. The traditional use has been for land surveying, but it is also used extensively for building and ...
, causing difficulty with visual tracking in poor
weather
Weather is the state of the atmosphere, describing for example the degree to which it is hot or cold, wet or dry, calm or stormy, clear or cloudy. On Earth, most weather phenomena occur in the lowest layer of the planet's atmosphere, the ...
conditions. The set is small enough to be portable and carried in a
Ben Hur trailer
Ben Hur trailer was the nickname of the World War II U.S. Army Trailer, 1-ton payload, 2-wheel, cargo, and the Trailer, 1-ton payload, 2-wheel, water tank, 250 gallon ( U.S. Army Ordnance Corps Supply catalogue designations G-518 and G-527 respe ...
.
Surviving examples
There is one known survivor at the Air Force museum in
Dayton Ohio
Dayton () is the sixth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County. A small part of the city extends into Greene County. The 2020 U.S. census estimate put the city population at 137,644, while Greater Dayt ...
.
[ ]
See also
*
Signal Corps Radio
Signal Corps Radios were U.S. Army military communications components that comprised "sets". Under the Army Nomenclature System, the abbreviation SCR initially designated "Set, Complete Radio", but was later misinterpreted as "Signal Corps Radio." ...
*
Radiosonde
A radiosonde is a battery-powered telemetry instrument carried into the atmosphere usually by a weather balloon that measures various atmospheric parameters and transmits them by radio to a ground receiver. Modern radiosondes measure or calcula ...
Notes
References
* TM 11-1158
* TM 11-2409 mobile Meteorological station
* Air Defense Artillery Journal March–April 194
External links
* http://www.photolib.noaa.gov/htmls/wea01200.htm
* https://web.archive.org/web/20100413132056/http://www.gordon.army.mil/ocos/museum/equipment.asp SCR and BC lists
* https://web.archive.org/web/20081121225613/http://6thweathermobile.org/1949_(part%201).htm excellent pics.
* http://www.srh.noaa.gov/ssd/tstm/html/tstorm.htm
{{DEFAULTSORT:SCR-658
Meteorological instrumentation and equipment
Weather radars
Military radars of the United States
World War II radars
World War II American electronics
Military equipment introduced from 1940 to 1944
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