Weapons Testing
In 1939 the company of Hellmuth Walter KG Kiel acquired land by the Plön lake and built their factory's test site in Stadtbek. Here torpedoes and launch systems (Schlitzrohrschleuder, lit. "slotted tube catapult") were tested. This Walter Schlitzrohrschleuder system was a chemical steam catapult that was used until the end of the war. The Fi 103 flying bomb, later called a Vergeltungswaffe ("revenge weapon") or V1, was fired into the air at a speed of 350 km/h from the Walter launch system (catapult) using a steam piston. The piston was released and the Fi-103 flew on under its own pulsating jet engine. The buildings of the test site, constructed on piles in the lake, were blown up after the war by the Allies.
Read more about this topic: Bosau
Famous quotes containing the words weapons and/or testing:
“I have always been of the mind that in a democracy manners are the only effective weapons against the bowie-knife.”
—James Russell Lowell (1819–91)
“Now I see that going out into the testing ground of men it is the tongue and not the deed that wins the day.”
—Sophocles (497–406/5 B.C.)