Wireless in two seaters

I am in the middle of reading Under The Guns Of The Red Baton, and there was a mention of a last wireless message from one of his victims. I hadn't ever thought about radios being aloft in observation planes in WWI, but this passage brings it to mind. Radios in WWI were fairly large items from the pictures I have seen. Is this how observation machines directed artillery during the war? If not how did observervation planes communicate with the ground at this time?

[Billy_Bishop]

Artillery Observation planes did indeed carry wireless sets. As I understand it, they were mostly one-way sets. i.e., the airplane crew could not receive, only send. What they did, was directed the artillery by giving them the location, then when the shooting started, they would give corrections until on target, the order in a barrage.

Of course, I could be wrong, but that's how I believe it worked. If I am wrong, I'm CERTAIN someone will correct me. Just look out for the barrage!

VBR,

Al Lowe

Al Lowe is correct, at least as far as I know.
On the Italian front things were more complicated, as the field of battle, with so many high mountains, made radio communications more difficult than usual. The aeroplane had to fly from the target to the gun battery, and vice versa, to let the artillery man receiving the wireless apparatus signal correctly and to observe the results carefully.
The most widely used wireless apparatuses on Italian aeroplanes were:
- the Marconi M.N.M. type of 40-60 W, with a range between 15 and 20 km. It was used until mid 1917;
- the T.Av. of 200 W type built by "F.lli Marzi" of Cornigliano Ligure. With a much wider range, this became the standard type until the end of the war.

All the very best.

[Ginger.]

In his book 'Flying Minnows' Roger Vee relates how his Flight of Bristol Fighters were fitted with radios.This enabled the Flight Commander to talk to them right up to the moment of engaging the enemy.Then the sixty foot arial cable that was dangling behind each aircraft was rewound on to it's drum.They could then dogfight the Hun without the danger of getting one wrapped round the prop.

Flak bursts made radio communications difficult, often broken and noisy. Like driving a car under a highway overpass, the metal in the bridge interferes with the radio signal.....same with flak burst near a plane equiped with a radio.

[Dan_San_Abbott]

Kevin:
Both sides used one way receiving wireless sets (Morse code) in early 1915. sending and receiving sets were in use in 1916. The RAF were experimenting with voice radio at the end on the war. Had the war extended into 1919 voice radio would have been used by at least the RAF.
Blue skies,
Dan-San Abbott

[stephen]

A brief description of RFC two seater training procedures in 1918:

Communication from ground to air was accomplished by physical signals. The spotting plane was required to stay within sight of the artillery battery in order to view various letters of the alphabet, which would signify specific messages from the battery's crew such as their state of readiness, etc. They would reveal what was called a "Panneau" signal to indicate their readiness to begin an operation.

The air to ground communication would then begin, accomplished via a one way wireless set that used Morse code at eight words per minute to a four gun battery. Each gun would fire in succession, observed by the two seat crew, after which they would correct the fire by a clock code. "A2," for example: "A" means the fire landed 50 yds from the target, "2" means that the fire landed at 2 o'clock from the target. This system continued, sometimes for hours, ranging one gun at a time, until the target had been bracketed, after which a "G" morse code signal was sent to instruct the battery to fire at will to destroy the target.

EYE IN THE SKY 1918 by Philip Brereton Townsend is an indispensable book for such studies, though it is extremely difficult to find. Hope that helps.

Thanks for the answers guys.