How To Make 96,000lbs of WWII Machinery Into High-Tech Research Platform

coondoggie writes "The US Naval Research Laboratory is taking a 96,000-pound piece of World War II-era machinery and turning it into a test-bed for leading edge communications and radar applications. The equipment was originally known as a three-axis tilting platform designed to simulate the movements of a large ship at sea. It was built by Westinghouse in 1943 as a gun platform requiring only primitive motion in roll, pitch and yaw, according to the Navy Lab. Specifically it was used as a mechanically operated deck with a heavy machine gun director and a machine gun mount installed. Gun crews and director operators could be trained on the platform under conditions that approximated the movements of a vessel at sea."

Re:I'll bet...

[symes]

Well hello there you little ray of sunshine

Re:WW2 machiny and WW2 units of measurement

[Sockatume]

You need to use measurements people have an intuitive grasp of. Nobody in the US knows how much a kilo "feels like" but 96,000 lb is a readily comprehensible number.

Re: Anonymous Coward - fuck you

[Anonymous Coward]

Just marked your comment as spam.

Also you are a racist. Just because our family has the habit of giving each family member the same name we shouldn't be belittled. We are the Coward family. It all started with Grandpa Anonymous. He liked his name so much he gave the name to his daughter. Now it's a Coward family tradition. Can you imagine 50 family members all named Anonymous? It's stressful enough. Thank you.

I don't know if this mischievous boy of a nephew Anonymous caused trouble again. Sorry on behalf of the Coward family.

Yours Miss Anonymous Coward.

Bitch, bitch, bitch

[Dr. Zim]

I'm one of those Americans that HAS traveled abroad and I cordially invite you to create your own *technical* site with whatever units of measurement you see fit. The fact that you're even able to complain about this 'problem' is due to DARPA. You know them, they're the US agency responsible for the development of the internet.

Everyone wants to bitch about our units of measurement, but nobody seems to have any trouble accepting our units of currency.

In the future

[Dareth]

They should print US currency on soft rolls of paper. Then people can't say it isn't worth a crap!

Re:I'll bet...

[TWX]

We were still using predominately virgin steel in the '40s, so the costs for this material by weight was probably not significantly different than for other forms of steel from the manufacturer. As the raw steel smelter was selling right to the government or to the durable-goods manufacturer, whatever their price was, should be fairly close.

Or in other words, whoever smelt it, dealt it...

Re:Blow up doll.

[Anonymous Coward]

On the days it isn't wet and/or blowing then the simulator might be needed.