5 Crazy Ideas And Inventions During World War 2: From Bat Bombs To Habakkuk

Unfortunately, Wartime often brings inventions, particularly in the field of military technology. While some of these are brilliant, others never leave the test stage or are quickly abandoned because of their inefficiency or inefficiency. Here are 5 crazy ideas and inventions during world war 2: from bat bombs to Habakkuk:-

1. Bat Bombs

Mexican free-tailed bat

Bat Bombs were an experimental weapon developed by the United States during the Second World War. The bomb consisted of a bomb-shaped case with over a thousand compartments, each containing a hibernating Mexican free-tailed bat with a small, timed incendiary bomb attached to it. But this was a complex system, the researchers needed to figure out how to transport and deploy these bats. So they did it. First, the bats had to be kept in hibernation mode while they were being shipped. Second, they had to figure out how to release them in mid-air. The carrier was planned to be deployed from an airplane, descending to an altitude of 1200 m (4,000 ft) before parachutes were deployed. The sides of the bomb carrier would then fall, allowing the bats to disperse. This was a real effort that cost both science and engineering. Unfortunately, the actual tests did not go as planned, and this bat bomb war was never used in war and the program was canceled.

2. The Schwerer Gustav

The Schwerer Gustav

The Schwerer Gustav or Heavy Gustav was a large-scale piece of siege artillery developed in Germany in the late 1930s. At the time, Adolf Hitler was looking for a solution that could defeat the French Maginot line along the French-German and French-Italian borders. Two years later, in 1941, Friedrich Krupp A.G. The company has completed the Gustav Gun, named after the head of the Krupp family. This rail-mounted weapon was the largest weapon ever built. Schwerer Gustav weighed about 1350 tonnes and was capable of firing 4.8 metric tonnes of heavy projectiles at a distance of 47 km at a muzzle velocity of 820 m / s. The Germans destroyed Gustav near the end of the war in 1945 in order to avoid the capture of the Soviet Red Army. Schwerer Gustav was the largest rifled weapon ever used in combat and, in terms of overall weight, the heaviest mobile artillery piece ever built.

3. Panjandrum

Panjandrum

Panjandrum, also known as The Great Panjandrum, was a massive, rocket-propelled, explosive-charged cart designed by the British Army during World War II. The Panjandrum consisted of two wheels, 10 feet in diameter. These two wheels were connected by an axle packed with two tonnes of explosives, and the Rockets attached to the wheels would drive the Panjandrum at high speeds. There was a really serious problem with the Panjandrum. There were nine rockets on each wheel. At least one rocket failed to fire or misfire during each test run. Various attempts have been made to correct this, including increasing the number of rockets, adding a third wheel, and adding steel cables, but the problem is not solved. The Panjandrum has never been used in battle.

4. The V-3 cannon

The V-3 cannon

The V-3 cannon was a large-scale German weapon of the Second World War working on the multi-charge principle by which secondary propellant charges are fired to add velocity to the projectile. The V-3 was also known as the Hochdruckpump (High-Pressure Pump, HDP for short) which was a code name intended to hide the actual purpose of the project. The V3 was not a rocket-like V2 or a pilot-less aircraft like the V1. It was a dart-shaped shell nine feet long and a gun barrel of 416 feet, capable of firing 300 of these shells every hour (Projected). The weapon was planned to be used to bombard London from two large bunkers in northern France's Pas-de-Calais region, but the Allied bombed and destroyed the weapon.

5. Habakkuk

Habakkuk

Project Habakkuk was a British plan during the Second World War to build an aircraft carrier out of pykrete (a mixture of wood pulp and ice) for use against German U-boats in the mid-Atlantic, which at that time were beyond the flight range of land-based aircraft. A scientist named Geoffrey Pyke suggested the construction of an ice carrier; the material could withstand a torpedo fire and was available at a much lower cost. In addition, it was naturally buoyant and durable at cold temperatures. Ice was too fragile on its own, but when a small amount of wood pulp was embedded in the ice, it became quite bulletproof. Active work and testing began with the support of Winston Churchill. They soon determined that refrigerant would be necessary to maintain sufficiently cold temperatures to keep the pykrete stable. And they found a solution that would allow a very small engine to cool the pykrete properly. A small test model was produced and installed in the waters of Lake Alberta, Canada. The tests did not go as planned, they had a few distinct drawbacks. It's more like a floating island than a ship. Work on the project was eventually abandoned, but it took three full years for the test ship to completely melt down in Lake Alberta.

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