The Kerrison Predictor was one of the first fully-automated anti-aircraft predictors, fire control systems which would attempt to predict the correct aim at a plane based on simple inputs like the observed speed and angle to the target. It was considered effective against the targets following a straight path. Such devices had been used on ships for gunnery control for some time, and versions were also available for larger guns, but the electromechanical Kerrison was the first to be fast enough to be used in the demanding high-speed low-altitude anti-aircraft role. American troops man an anti-aircraft gun near the Algerian coastline in 1943 Anti-aircraft, or air defense, is any method of combating military aircraft from the ground. ... A fire-control system is a computer, often mechanical, which is designed to assist a weapon system in hitting its target. ... Prediction of future events is an ancient human wish. ... In engineering, electromechanics combines electromagnetism and mechanics. ...

The Kerrison Predictor was developed after it had been realized that modern aircraft on the attack flew too quickly for existing traversal systems on medium-sized guns to work. Smaller guns could be aimed by hand due to the short ranges at which they operated, and larger guns shot at targets so far away that the speed that the angle changed at was low enough to calculate the required "lead" using a simple slide rule device in the gunsight. The slide rule is an analog computer, usually consisting of three interlocking calibrated strips and a sliding window, called the cursor. ...

However there was a middle range, served by the British Army's 37mm and 40mm Bofors guns, where the range was too far to "guess" the required lead, but at the same time short enough that the angle changed fast enough that the gunners were hard pressed simply turning the traversal handles, let alone trying to operate a calculating gunsight at the same time. Making matters worse was that these ranges were exactly where the Luftwaffe's dive bombers were attacking from, which were quickly proving to be a decisive weapon in the Blitzkrieg. The British Army is the land armed forces branch of the British military. ... The Bofors 37 mm was a very common anti-tank gun used by all Allied forces during WW2. ... 40mm gun of the French swift patrol boat Glaive 40 mm Bofors Polish-made Bofors gun after the Battle of Bzura The Bofors 40 mm gun is a famous autocannon designed by the Swedish firm of Bofors. ... Bofors was an iron works, cannon maker, and defence industry located in Sweden. ... The Luftwaffe (literally, air weapon, pronounced looft-vaaf-feh) is the air force of Germany. ... A dive bomber is a bomber aircraft that dives directly at its targets in order to provide greater accuracy. ... Blitzkrieg relied on close cooperation between infantry and panzers (tanks). ...

The Predictor solved the problem by doing all of the calculations mechanically through a complex system of gears. Inputs included wind speed, gravity, ballistics of the gun and the rounds it fired, angle to the target in azimuth and altitude, and a user-input estimated speed. All of these inputs were fed in via dials, which turned gearing inside the Predictor to calculate the range (from the change in angle and estimated speed) and direction of motion, generate the correct lead needed based on that calculation, and the "output" the result by moving a small pointer mounted on the gun. The gunners simply kept the pointer in the middle of the gunsight and loaded, while the gunnery operators simply had to point the Predictor, mounted on a large tripod, at the target. Ballistics (gr. ... Azimuth is the horizontal component of a direction (compass direction), measured around the horizon from the North point, toward the East, i. ... Altitude is the elevation of an object from a known level or datum, called zero level. ... Camera Tripod A tripod refers to any three-legged structure. ...

The Predictor proved to be able to hit practically anything that flew in a straight line, and it was particularly effective against dive bombers. However it was also very complex, including over 1,000 precision parts and weighing over 500 pounds even though much of it was aluminum. With the demands of the RAF for almost all light metals and machinists, the Predictor was far too difficult for the Army to produce in any number. General Name, Symbol, Number aluminium, Al, 13 Chemical series poor metals Group, Period, Block 13 (IIIA), 3, p Density, Hardness 2700 kg/m3, 2. ... The Royal Air Force (often abbreviated to RAF) is the air force branch of the UK Armed Forces. ...

Meanwhile in September 1940 the US Army's Coast Artillery Corps had become unhappy with their existing 37mm guns, and General Marshall asked the British to loan him four of their Bofors guns and Predictors for testing. They were more than impressed with both, and started plans to produce them in the USA. They obtained Imperial measurement engineering diagrams of the gun and Predictor from the British, passing the gun plans to Chrysler, and the Predictor to Sperry. Sperry was just starting production of their own horribly complex high-altitude system, the Sight, Computing, M7, and had no excess capacity to produce the new design as well, however, they completed the engineering work and sent the plans back to the Army for production elsewhere. The Army is the branch of the United States armed forces which has primary responsibility for land-based military operations. ... The Chrysler Corporation is a United States-based automobile manufacturer, since 1998 merged with Daimler_Benz into DaimlerChrysler. ... Sperry Corporation was a major American equipment and electronics company whose existence spanned more than seven decades of the twentieth century. ...

To produce the Predictor, Singer Corporation was contracted in December 1940 to produce 1,500 a month to equip the Army's existing 37mm guns while production of the Bofors ramped up. Singer required massive changes in the company in order to ramp up production, including building new factories and the switching of a foundry from steel to aluminum. Production didn't start until January 1943, but the production line proved to be sound, and the entire order was filled for their Director, Antiaircraft, M5 by the middle of 1944. For a brief time some of the Army's Bofors guns were equipped with the Sperry M7, but these were replaced in the field as soon as M5's became available. Singer Corporation was established as I.M. Singer & Co. ...

With aircraft speeds increasing dramatically during the war, even the speed of the Kerrison Predictor proved lacking by the end. Nevertheless the Predictor demonstrated that effective gunnery required some sort of reasonably powerful computing support, and in 1944 Bell Labs started delivery of a new system based around an analog computer. The timing proved excellent. Late in the summer the Germans started attacking London with the V-1 flying bomb, which flew at high speeds at low altitudes. After a month of limited success against them, every available anti-aircraft gun was moved to the stripe of land on the approach to London, and the new sights proved to be more than capable against them. Daytime attacks were soon abandoned. Bell Telephone Laboratories or Bell Labs was originally the research and development arm of the United States Bell System, and was the premier corporate facility of its type, developing a range of revolutionary technologies from telephone switches to specialized coverings for telephone cables, to the transistor. ... An analog/analogue computer is a form of computer that uses electronic or mechanical phenomena to model the problem being solved by using one kind of physical quantity to represent another. ... St Stevens Tower - The Clock Tower of the Palace of Westminster which contains Big Ben London (see also different names) is the capital city of the United Kingdom and of England. ... The Vergeltungswaffe 1 Fi 103 / FZG-76 (V-1), known as the Flying bomb, Buzz bomb or Doodlebug, was the first modern guided missile used in wartime and the first cruise missile. ...

Long after the war, US M5's started appearing in surplus shops in the late 1950s. John Whitney purchased one (and later a Sperry M7) and connected the mechanical outputs to servos controlling the positioning small lit targets and light bulbs. He then modified the "mathematics" of the system to move the targets in various mathematically controlled ways, a technique he referred to as incremental drift. As the power of the systems grew they eventually evolved into what is today known as motion control photography, a widely used technique in special effects filming. The term Servo can refer to, Servomechanism - usually just shortened to servo, is a device used to effect mechanical motion for a specified distance. ... Motion control photography is a special effects technique used in film that creates the illusion of size from small models by moving a small camera by the model at very slow speeds. ... Special effects (abbreviated SPFX or SFX) are used in the film, television, and entertainment industry to create effects that cannot be achieved by normal means, such as depicting travel to other star systems. ...