1 62 



ORGANIZING SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH FOR WAR 



Later that spring NDRC launched its hypervelocity program independ- 

 ently of the Services by setting up a new unit in Division A, known as 

 Section A, which later became Division i. Its first task was to tackle the 

 problem of gun erosion. Although the Ordnance Department opposed the 

 participation of NDRC in an investigation of the general subject of hyper- 

 velocity, it did give some support to the erosion studies, especially by making 

 available its files of information on this subject. Also it sponsored a confer- 

 ence on erosion, held at Watertown Arsenal on October 15, 1941, for the 

 purpose of obtaining the comment of Army and Navy representatives on 

 the section's proposed program. 



It was not until the next year, however, that even acquiescence in NDRC's 

 work on hypervelocity guns could be obtained. Although relations were 

 cordial with individuals in the Ordnance Department, that branch of the 

 Service did not officially support this work with enthusiasm until almost 

 the close of the war. 



Even the application of Division I's findings in the field of gun erosion 

 was retarded by an attitude of indifference on the part of some individuals 

 in the Ordnance Department. In this case the fault was in a lack of realiza- 

 tion of how much abuse our .50-caliber machine-gun barrels would receive 

 in combat. The division's representatives were told repeatedly for about 

 two years by persons in a position to know that there was no need to 

 improve this barrel. The steel barrels then in use, it was said, were so in- 

 expensive that it was not worth spending effort on trying to increase their 

 life by some small amount, such as 25 per cent. This attitude eventually 

 changed when reports from the Army Air Forces and the Navy Bureau of 

 Aeronautics showed that the barrels could not always last a long bombing 

 mission or a ground strafing operation. 



By the time the need for improvement of this barrel was realized, the 

 division's general erosion program was sufficiently far advanced so that it 

 was able to offer two means of increasing severalfold the life of this barrel 

 when used under the most severe conditions. The improved barrels were 

 flown to the Pacific, where they proved outstandingly useful. The division's 

 hypervelocity program also paid dividends, for by the end of hostilities it 

 had developed several different methods of increasing muzzle velocity to the 

 point where they were taken over by the Services for final application to 

 new weapons. It is plain to see from the record, however, that this stage 

 would have been reached earlier with some of them had Service support 

 been wholehearted from the beginning. 



Electronic Antiaircraft Director 



One of the successes of OSRD was its sponsorship and active participa- 

 tion in the development of the electronic antiaircraft director called the M9. 



