From: Dennis R Starks To: arc5@ix.netcom.com,glphilli@mail.isbe.state.il.us,frw@gvi.net, hasse@mailer.Uni-Marburg.DE,ralph.hogan@vmic.com, Duece6x6@aol.com,tc0654@mesh.net,jh@mhztech.com, wb0aaq@juno.com,carlos@cie-eng.com,OLDRADIOS@aol.com, jim.mahaffey@gtri.gatech.edu,kenscom@juno.com, swheaton@sky.net, gjang@mail.portup.com,smithr8@juno.com, MARK1G@AOL.COM, garandguy@hotmail.com,david.ward@nist.gov, WLHOWARD@GTE.NET, ka0zdd@juno.com,kc5ijd@sprintmail.com, SHILL@onaustralia.com.au, gah@koyote.com, ezeran@concentric.net, carruth@geo-thermal.com, johnkidd@ozemail.com.au, wood_jim@hotmail.com, aa7jv@hypercom.com,yir@scn.org, lhunter@alleg.edu, mack@melbpc.org.au,gbunza@synopsys.com, Mikhael_Brown@hp.com, mblair1@home.net,sarge@nist.gov, bwhiting@oeminc.com, tbryan@nova.org,richard@wizard.com, Rmaruska@juno.com, stimber@lakemartin.net, jim_karlow@takata.com, kb9olm@yahoo.com, lambmd-ce@salem.ge.com, johnmb@mindspring.com,mblom@mitre.org, NBroline@aol.com, n0ntc@train.missouri.org, rmccord@skyblue.ocn.ne.jp, saipan59@juno.com Date: Fri, 3 Dec 1999 07:11:48 -0600 Subject: MILITARY COLLECTOR GROUP POST, Dec.3/99 Message-ID: <19991203.071150.-155113.2.military-radio-guy@juno.com> X-Mailer: Juno 3.0.13 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Full-Name: Dennis R Starks X-Status: Sent X-Juno-Line-Breaks: 0-1,3-7,9-12,16,18-19,24,26-28,31,34,40-45,48-52,55,62-65,70,74,76,78,81-85,89-90,92,94-99,102,105-107,111-115,123-124,126,132,137-140,151,154-234,236-244,246-250,252-258,260-262,264-266,268-273,275-277,279-284,286-288,290-353,355,357-362,369-371 X-Juno-Att: 0 X-Juno-Fcc: Sent Items X-Juno-Size: 16024 X-Juno-RefParts: 0 MILITARY COLLECTOR GROUP POST, Dec.3/99 Index: MANUFACTURING OF RADIO EQUIPMENT IN FRANCE UNDER THE GERMAN OCCUPATION; by Feyssac Jacques MEMBERS WRITE; FSE 38/58 Xtals, HUMOR; *********************************************** MANUFACTURING OF RADIO EQUIPMENT IN FRANCE UNDER THE GERMAN OCCUPATION; by Feyssac Jacques A short story about a complicate period of our French history. If there is a difficult period to describe, this one is; specially if you try to collect data about the production of electronic firms during that period. To all the remaining companies involved during these four years this period has never exist! This short article is based on testimonies of people I met during the past 20 years that were more or less involved in these activities, for this reason it is incomplete and fragmentary. In July 1940 the German occupation forces of the "Zone Nord" put their hands on 90% of the French electronic industrial production that was located in or near Paris. Most of these were manufacturing products for the French Government as it took us many months to realize that our Military Comms equipment were definitively outdate, we were trying desperately to manufacture new and modern equipment. Very quickly they start to control the production of French and German equipment. HOW THE EQUIPMENT WAS PAID FOR. France was imposed during the 8-8-1940 Peace treaty signed with Germany to pai for the housing and expenses of the German occupation Army. The daily amount was extraordinary high, 400 million Francs (1940 Francs), or if you prefer 9. 933 445 million dollars (1940 Dollars). A sum that was in fact much more than necessary, and the exchange rate of the Reichmark very high per comparison to the Franc. The German Buying offices that were installed in Paris had plenty of money available and they did use it to pay for industrial contracts awarded to French companies but also spies, traffickers, nazi militia and a network of blackmarketeer in charge to collect and buy strategic materials ranging from gold & copper to rabbit skins! WHAT WAS THE POSITION OF THE INDUSTRIALS. The position was quite clear : -You accept the contract ,fulfill it , and was paid. -You did not accept the contract; then two solutions , a requisition was issued and you accept it ; if you dont then the plant was considered as a war requisition, dismantled, and the managing staff sent to jails or internment camps in Germany. As you can see they had not much of a choice! Also for some industrials, having contracts with the occupation forces was a means to keep their plants running and keeping his work-force in France, as already a part of them were War prisoners in Germany (having been former French military). The industrials were divided in two categories: the family or private owners and the public companies. In both cases most of them had followed a wait and see policy, slowed down their production in occupied France and create subsidiaries in the Free Zone to continue radar, radio developments and manufacturing of equipment for the "French Army of Armistice" and many of the leaders were involved in "Resistance movements". In fact, happily, few industrials would fully cooperate with the Germans. WHAT FRENCH EQUIPMENT WAS MANUFACTURED FOR THE GERMANS (As you can understand I have not much information on all materials!) The Lufwaffe would order in great quantity a Vhf receiver, Sadir-Carpentier R-87 (more than 1500) they were used to make a Vhf Direction Finder, as at that time this superheterodyne receiver was an excellent and modern type based on 955 tubes in push pull for HF and Mixer oscillator stages. The Kriegmarine had used the METOX R-600 OR 5FuMB 1,Vhf receiver as an early warning receiver for detection of British ASV radar in the centimetric range and the quantities used were quite important (1000 or less) Hf receiver transmitter type Saram 3-10 was also manufactured for use as a ground station by the Lufwaffe. An excellent short wave receiver SFR type RU-93 renamed FU-438 was also delivered in some quantity. Some other French equipment types were used by the Germans, either newly manufactured or captured for operation by the occupation troops in secondary roles. WHAT GERMAN EQUIPMENT WAS MANUFACTURED FOR THE GERMANS Before the war at less two big companies had contacts with German industrials, they were "Compagnie des Compteurs" and "Société Francaise de Radioelectricite" these contacts were mostly in the field of television research and licenses. These contacts were renewed from the German side by the Telefunken Company and these companies given production contracts of German equipment. What generally appears from all these contracts, is that we never manufacture any "Modern" equipment, most of the time it was the generation of 1936 to 1938. SFR did manufacture the 15WSE transmitter receiver ; E-336 peil empfanger (HF -df receiver), battle tank intercoms. Telefunken sub-contracted them the industrial development of the AS-59; 200 watts transmitters ; SFR was producing so slowly that the money was missing to pay the 4000 employees working in the different plants ; Telefunken always came to help and advanced the necessary money! At the liberation the debts of SFR to Telefunken was 50 million francs or $1,241,927; and only 100 technicians were sent to Germany to the "mandatory work service" and all were working in Telefunken plants. [ed) It would appear that SFR through the illusion of cooperation was able to stall the German war effort, drain funds from Telefunken, and spare their valued workers the perils internment camps.] The company named "Le Materiel Telephonique" was an wholly owned ITT company ! Like LORENZ ! they did the "wait and see" politic without too much troubles but they did manufacture SEG portable radio link antennas and accessories, and also had quite a few sub contracts for the Lorenz company who was also an ITT subsidiary. ABOUT "SABOTAGE" One witness of that period who was a young technician at the SFR plant in Cholet; gave a brief description of the German industrial management at that time. German organizations installed "Meisters" (supervisors) in plants. They had all powers; were in charged to control the quality of the works, mechanical and electrical tests. If you have military German equipment and if you look at it in detail, you will see in many places stamps of the inspectors controlling all the steps of the process! They were ISO-9001 long before us! So the problem was : how to botching the job?? It took them some time to find a way, but they found it and it was a smart one. At the end of the manufacturing process and testing of the radio set, it was submited to extreme temperature test in a climatic chamber and rechecked again to see if everything was still operating, at that stage and when the "meister" was away they raise the temperature enough as to damage the paper condensers used in the set(there was no plastic part used at that time !!!), the result was a set passing the test normally but generally the capacitors started to leak in the coming 6 months putting the set out of operation very quickly.! At the same time and under the camouflage of civil contracts for PTT(Poste Telegraphe Telephone) the studies and manufacturing of Radar and Radio equipment was maintain to a small scale and permited to the companies involved to train staff and prepare the future; but many people paid with their lives for this activity. AT THE END When the country was liberated, most of small industry slowly return to peace time works in a devastate country, but some equipment as the transmitter AS-59; 200 watts transmitter remain in manufacture for the needs of the French army. The same technician told me that the factory stopped production for three months beginning in July 44 awaiting an answer from Paris to the question: What we do now? ; they receive the following order, Keep going on with the manufacturing of the 15 watts Transmitter receiver of the German army !! And they did until mid 45 for the French army ! If by chance you pass through Cherbourg and pay a visit to the "Fort du Roule". You will see one of those sitting in the window near an ELSTER made by LMT/ITT !!! From those dark days a group of Frenchmen would make their way to the USA and create the SCR-291 and SCR-502, also the famous "Huff-Duff" but that is another story ! References "Souvenirs de longue Vie " Book written by M. Girardot former General Manager of SFR War souvenirs , testimony by Mr Venet. Feyssac Jacques *********************************************** MEMBERS WRITE; FSE 38/58 Xtals, Dennis, I have learned of late that PRT-4/PRR-9 xtals do work in the FSE. We mostly need to thank new member Harald Hermanns for rounding up these units, testing them out, and packing them up and sending them to us, even in the midst of all the Y2K problems and other equipment breakdowns with which he has had to deal at the hospital where he works. He says it has become a seven day a week job lately. Alan Dennis, I'm sure others will let you know, but the FSE38/58 can use PRR-9 xtals, as you had guessed. Some are already running using these very xtals. I'm going to rob one out of one of my DOA PRR-9's for that express purpose. If we ask nicely, I'm sure we can get 'someone' in the group to outline how to retweak it to 51.0 MHz. Ralph WB4TUR *********************************************** HUMOR; Jesus vs. Satan Jesus and Satan were having an ongoing argument about who was better on his computer. They had been going at it for days, and God was tired of hearing all of the bickering. Finally God said, "Cool it. I am going to set up a test that will run two hours and I will judge who does the better job." So down Satan and Jesus sat at the keyboards and typed away. They moused. They did spreadsheets. They wrote reports. They sent faxes. They sent e-mail. They sent out e-mail with attachments. They downloaded. They did some genealogy reports. They made cards. They did every known job. But ten minutes before their time was up, lightning suddenly flashed across the sky, thunder rolled, the rain poured and, of course, the electricity went off. Satan stared at his blank screen and screamed every curse word known in the underworld. Jesus just sighed. The electricity finally flickered back on, and each of them restartedtheir computers. Satan started searching frantically, screaming "It's gone! It's allgone! I lost everything when the power went out!" Meanwhile, Jesus quietly started printing out all of his files from the past two hours. Satan observed this and became irate. "Wait! He cheated, how did he do it?" God shrugged and said, "Jesus saves." ----------------------------------------------------------------- A man walked into the ladies department of a Macy's, one of the largest department store chains. He shyly walked up to the woman behind the counter and said. "I'd like to buy a bra for my wife." "What type of bra?" asked the clerk. "Type?" inquires the man "There is more than one type?" "Look around," said the saleslady, as she showed a sea of bras in every shape, size color and material. "Actually, even with all of this variety, there are really only three types of bras," she continued. Confused, the man asked what were the types. The saleslady replied "The Catholic Type, The Salvation Army Type, and The Baptist Type. Which one do you need?" Still confused the man asked "What is the difference between them?" The lady responded "It is all really quite simple. The Catholic type supports the masses, the Salvation Army type lifts up the fallen, and the Baptist type makes mountains out of molehills." ----------------------------------------------------------------- Lil' Johnny's mother took her 5 year old son with her to the bank on a busy Friday. They were in line behind a rather obese lady wearing a business suit, complete with a pager. As the mother patiently waited, Lil' Johnny looked at the women in front of him and observed loudly, "Hey, Mom, she's REALLY FAT." The lady looked at Johnny, made eye contact with his mother and gave an understanding smile. Lil' Johnny received a quiet reprimand. After a minute or two, Lil' Johnny spread his hands as far as they will go and loudly said, "I bet her butt is *that* wide." At this the lady glared at Johnny. His embarrassed mother severely scolds her son. Again after a couple of minutes Lil' Johnny stated loudly, "Look how the fat hangs over her belt." The lady turned and told Johnny's mother to control her rude child and his mother threatened him with his very life and existence. Things in the bank are quiet. The lady moved to the front of the line when her pager begins to emit its distinctive tone. Lil' Johnny yelled in a panic at the top of his voice, "RUN FOR YOUR LIFE MOM, SHE'S BACKING UP!!!!" ----------------------------------------------------------------- This is not a joke Starbucks sued over alleged crushed penis NEW YORK, Nov 29 (Reuters) - A Canadian tourist who claims that his penis was crushed by a faulty toilet seat at a Starbucks Corp (NasdaqNM:SBUX - news) restaurant has sued the giant coffee retailer for $1.5 million, his attorney said on Monday. ``Our client, Edward Skwarek, was in a seated position on the toilet when he turned to retrieve the toilet paper in back of the seat when the seat shifted causing his penis to be caught and crushed between the seat and the bowl,'' said Richard Robbins, the lawyer for Skwarek, 37, of Toronto. The suit, filed Nov. 26 in Manhattan Supreme Court, alleges the coffee house was careless in ``allowing a defective toilet seat to remain open ... causing a hazardous and unsafe condition ... in its public restrooms.'' Skwarek, a government financial worker, alleged that the incident took place on Aug. 20, 1999 at a Starbucks in the Chelsea district of Manhattan where he and his wife, Sherrie, 37, dropped in for some coffee. The suit also claims that as a result of Starbucks' carelessness, Skwarek suffered a ``crushed penis, Peyronie's disease, retrograde ejaculation with consequent substantial reduction in sperm count, infertility, severe bruising to his penis and sexual function impairment.'' Peyronie's disease usually causes deviation of the erect penis to one side. Skwarek seeks $1 million in damages and his wife $500,000 because she has been ``deprived of his services.'' Alan Gulick, a spokesman at Starbucks in Seattle, where the company is based, said Starbucks does not comment on pending litigation. ----------------------------------------------------------------- The National Transportation Safety Board recently divulged that they had covertly funded a project with the U. S. auto makers for the past five years, whereby the auto makers were installing black boxes in four-wheel drive pickup trucks in an effort to determine, in fatal accidents, the circumstances in the last 15 seconds before the crash. They were surprised to find in 49 of the 50 states the last words of drivers in 61.2 percent of the fatal crashes were, "Oh, Shit!" Only the state of Alabama was different, where 89.3 percent of the final words were? "Hold my beer and watch this!" *********************************************** The preceding was a product of the"Military Collector Group Post", an international email magazine dedicated to the preservation of history and the equipment that made it. Unlimited circulation of this material is authorized so long as the proper credits to the original authors, and publisher or this group are included. For more information concerning this group or membership contact Dennis Starks at, . A list of selected articles of interest to members can be seen at: http://www.softcom.net/users/buzz/backmail.html ***********************************************