Telebreifing

Anyone fancy shedding any light on this voodo techie stuff? Planning on eventually putting some sort of system together for using on historic aircraft at Brunty! Any help/pictures/circuit diagrams or even memories would be much appriciated!

Ta muchly!

It would help if you explained clearly what you mean by telebriefing.

From my Lightning experience there was a jack socket in the port wheel well into which a jackplug from an electrical (voice) cable anchored to the ground could be inserted. A parallel flexible steel cable took the force between the jack and the ground anchor so that as the aircraft moved forward under pilot demand the jack was pulled out disconnecting the voice signals.

Telebriefing was usually applied to QRA type setups and enabled Operations to talk directly with the pilot using a secure landline and not VHF/UHF radio. The telebrief could be coupled with a hinged ground frame which supported (for the Lighting) the AC and DC electrical power supply cables frmo the ground generating set (Houchin 25 KvA) which 'pulled out' the AC/DC input sockets as the aircraft moved forward.

All this was with the pilot in the cockpit awaiting the signal to launch so that he could be kept up to date on the threat.

I agree with PETERTHEEATER, a little more info would not go amiss.

I could then do an ex RAF Air Trafficker's point of view re telebriefing on Lightnings during Q.

Nothing techie about it, XL565, just as PTE explained. Similar jacks in the Phantom and Tornado port wheel wells. Cable from aircraft to telebrief box in HAS, or RUBB in Stanley's case, then direct to ops. Never worked on the one's on Buccaneer so not sure whether it had a similar set up.

Pete

PTE and cbrjock both explained telebrief, as it was known, really well. Basically it consisted over a rubber plug which when plugged into the aircraft connected the aircrafts intercom system by landline to ops. The telebrief cable was anchored so that as the aircraft taxyed forward the lead pulled out. Both Buccaneers and Hunters had telebrief. Buccs if I recall were in the wheel well. Hunters under the aft fuselage on a spring loaded panel. I remember repairing a few telebrief connectors on Hunters when the electricians forgot to disconnect them when the aft fuselage was removed for an engine change. I don't recall telebrief being used on Buccs or Hunters in my time. We did use it on Jags when operating from HASs in Germany though.

That's the one you've described.. A large rubber plug! Any pictures on it? And no one would have a circuit diagram or AP on it would they?

Regards

TL

In the Hunter era at Wattisham I was told that the telebrief system was terminated on the 20-line key/lamp switchboard in the bottom of the (old) ATC Twr. This switchboard was one of those magnificent mahogany jobs (with brass corner pieces). I was told that on one Ex FABULOUS QRA 'launch' the telebrief plug failed to pull out of the aircraft. The was also a steel cable from plug to ground anchor point. The a/c roared off and the switchboard suddenly disappeared through the window out of the TWR comms room and was last seen bouncing down the taxi-way at a high rate of knots.
I suspect that this was the usual 'New Boy' bullshine that was traditionally fed - but does anyone know if it has a grain of truth??
Resmoroh

Resmoroh;101604 wrote:

The a/c roared off and the switchboard suddenly disappeared through the window out of the TWR comms room and was last seen bouncing down the taxi-way at a high rate of knots.
I suspect that this was the usual 'New Boy' bullshine that was traditionally fed - but does anyone know if it has a grain of truth??
Resmoroh

Sounds unlikely!
The Radar SOC's would initiate Q scrambles. At Boulmer this was done from the Sector Controller's position at the back of the ops room direct to Leuchars, Coningsby and Binbrook. Neatishead and Buchan ditto. I think Staxton Wold could also do a delegated Q scramble for Binbrook but I could be wrong.

Just look at the facts.

The telebrief was multicore electrical cable terminating in a standard jack plug. To take the load off the cable, a small diameter flexible steel (braided) cable was attached to a clamp around the body of the plug and the other end to a ground anchor or frame. As the aircraft moved forward the steel cable pulled taught (no strain on the electrical cable) and the jack plug (male) was pulled out of the aircraft connector (female). The jack plug was a friction fit in the socket only due to the spring pressure of the contacts so the force required to remove it was not more than a couple of pounds.

If the jack was 'frozen' in the socket (how?) then the steel cable would be stretched taut and, as the load increased, the clamp attaching it to the jack , or the plastic of plug body would fail, the load would transfer to the electrical cable which would rip out of the jack and the aircraft would taxi off with the remains of the jack in place.

The Hunter Ejection Seat had exactly the same arrangement on a smaller scale with the comms plugging vertically from below into the seat mounted male. The socket had a restraining steel lanyard attached to the cockpit floor so as the seat went up the rail, the jack was pulled out.

Aaaaahhhh... memories of cold, wet days doing the tekkie DI on telebrief! Not really my job as a ground radar fitter; but a chance to get out of the tower if NCO i/c GRSF was having a 'bad morning'.

I'm not sure how the storage of the cables was done elsewhere, but at Binbrook, they used small, well secured to a post, oil drums with a tight-fitting lid; and if the telebrief cable were coiled neatly, it just fitted in the drum nice and tidily. Unfortunately, some of the lineys were not quite so neat and tidy when it came to putting them back and the plug end could get left out, the rain would get in between the rubber cover and the plug and then it was down to the tekkies to go out and find out which one was causing the problem that affected all of them!

At Binbrook, in the earlier days, the drums were painted in a nice ground equipment yellow and could be seen quite easily. The 'Operation Tone Down' came into force and they all had to be painted camouflage colour. With the usual exhibition of foresight, there was not enough Paint, Olive Drab available to paint all the drums on the ASP and ORPs! The recommended 'temporary' colour was obtained by mixing equal parts of MT Blue/Grey and Ground Equipment Sunshine Yellow. Sounds a grotesque mix - but it was a good 'un; and, in my opinion, better than the olive drab! From the tower, it was almost impossible to discern the cans on the other side of the ASP - they just blended in. And, on a nice day, it was quite nice to be assigned to telebrief can painting duties. A rush to get out there to do the job knowing full well that there was no form of contact back to the office; and done in a discrete manner, it could take quite a while to paint one can!