Airborne Magnetometer
name: label: maker
content: Gulf Research & Development Corp.
notes: label: Description
content: The central element of this instrument is a fluxgate magnetometer, a magnetically sensitive element that has no moving parts and is thus not affected by acceleration. Victor Vacquier developed the fluxgate in 1940, while working for the Gulf Research and Development Company. Tests of the Gulf instrument were conducted in early 1941, in collaboration with the Sperry Gyroscope Co., and attracted the attention of the U.S. military establishment. By 1942, using funds provided by the National Defense Research Committee, Gulf had produced 14 magnetic airborne detectors (MADs) which the Navy used to detect enemy submarines. Although Soviet scientists had built an airborne magnetometer in the mid-1930s, these Gulf instruments were the first airborne magnetometers built in the U.S. The end of the War brought declassification of the project, a patent for Vacquier (#2,407,202), the use of the instrument for geophysical prospecting, and enormous publicity. This example is marked "MADE BY G.R. & D.C. PITTSBURGH, PA." The Gulf Research and Development Company donated it to the Smithsonian in 1964,
label: Description
content: In operation, the electronic unit, the control box, the power unit, and the graphic recorder were mounted in an airplane, while the sensing element of the instrument was enclosed in a plastic "bird" (shown in the photograph) and towed behind.
label: Description
content: Ref: Gary Muffly, "The Airborne Magnetometer," <i>Geophysics</i> 11 (1946): 321-334.
label: Description
content: E. A. Eckhardt, "Airborne Magnetometer," <i>The Oil and Gas Journal</i> 45 (1946): 78-79, 91-92.
label: Description
content: Homer Jensen and Eugene Peterson, "Prospecting from the Air," <i>Scientific American</i> 178 (January 1948): 24-26.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: Place Made
content: United States: Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh
topic: label: Subject
content: Science & Scientific Instruments
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Physical Sciences
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content: Science & Mathematics
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content: Measuring & Mapping
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gulf Research & Development Company
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: PH.MHI-P-8744
label: accession number
content: 272511
label: catalog number
content: MHI-P-8744
objectType: label: Object Name
content: airborne magnetometer
label: Object Name
content: Airborne Magnetometer
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: "bird": 56 in; x 142.24 cm