Re: NEC-LIST: Edmond Bruce questions

Hi everyone,

At 04:48 29.12.2003, J. Mc Laughlin wrote:

> A few quick notes: The Bruce array, a form of which was used by
>Jansky to start radio astronomy, is, as you know, quite a different
>animal from the rhombic. See US 1,910,147 of May 23, 1933 (Filed March
>9, 1927). See also US 1,947,247.

Even though this topic is now one year old, I would like to cite the
following testimony on this matter from the regretted John D. Kraus in [1,
pp. 57-70] which I think could be of interest to NEC-LIST readers.

<< At about this time [1935] Edmond Bruce was developing some long-wire
antennas for beaming short waves and these were called "rhombics" because
of their geometry -- diamond shaped. They soon began to replace the Bruce
antennas for radio telephone circuits. I recall that on a visit to the Bell
Laboratories in those days I discussed this trend with Edmond Bruce who
reflected wryly that although it was nice to have his name associated with
an antenna, it would have been nicer if the type were not one which might
soon have only historical interest. The Bruce's were going out, the
rhombics were coming in. Well, I could add that even though historical,
what a great history, because it was with a Bruce-beam antenna that Jansky
discovered radio waves of extra-terrestrial origin. Actually, Bruce's later
development, the rhombic, would have been less well-suited for Jansky's
purpose because it would have to have been bigger in size, more unwieldy,
and it had horrendously big sidelobes which would have made interpretation
very difficult. >> [1, from page 58 to page 59]

Happy 2005 everyone,

Alexandre

[1] K. Kellermann, B. Sheets (editors) : "Serendipitous Discoveries in
Radio Astronomy -- Honoring the 50th Anniversary Announcing the Discovery
of Cosmic Radio Waves by Karl. G. Jansky on May 5, 1933", Proceedings of a
Workshop held at the NRAO, Green Bank WV on May 4-6, 1983

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