OK, this isn't a bomb made out of a flashlight, bu it is a puzzle to me. The drawings are dated April, 1934. I do not have any reference to any bomb called "Flashlight", but what is more unusual to me is the "fuze" used with the bomb. These are the only two drawings I have run across so far and unfortunately the bomb drawing does not show the fuze mounted. Was this hand thrown from an aircraft? Would be difficult with a "bomb" 30 inches long. Perhaps a wire was attached to the pull ring of the fuze and the aircraft. Anybody got any ideas?
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Flashlight Bomb
- Thread starter EODGUY
- Start date
Hi
(sorry for my English)
Flashlight bombs were used for night photographic reconaissance. They contain a fast-burning pyrotechnic composition, that generete short (less than 1 second) but extremely bright (some 50 milions candela or more) flash of light. In the moment of explosion a specially designed photo-camera (driven by photo-cell) take a picture.
Flashlight bombs usually have time fuze and exploded quite high, some thousands meters over the ground.
(sorry for my English)
Flashlight bombs were used for night photographic reconaissance. They contain a fast-burning pyrotechnic composition, that generete short (less than 1 second) but extremely bright (some 50 milions candela or more) flash of light. In the moment of explosion a specially designed photo-camera (driven by photo-cell) take a picture.
Flashlight bombs usually have time fuze and exploded quite high, some thousands meters over the ground.
Thanks Speedy. We call them Photoflash bombs and they are generally used in the same way. It puzzles me though because the term photoflash was used in America during the time period they named this a flashlight bomb. If that is what it is I would have thought they would call kit a photoflash bomb.
Thanks TimG for the information. I have to admit, Popular Mechanics would have been the last place I would have looked for data. Looks like the same thing and the timeframe is a close match. I still find it interesting they used the term Flashlight when we were also using Photoflash. Oh well, you learn something every day in this hobby.