I have a question regarding the Bendix Loop Antenna.
All of the photos I have seen where the loop antenna antenna is installed the loop is "facing" fore/aft. This would appear to be a high drag orientation. It would seem like a lower drag orientaion would have been to rotate it by 90°.
My guess is that Kelly Johnson's range/performance calculations were for an aircraft in the factory "clean" condition. That loop antenna is always seen in what appears to be the draggiest orientation. It is also necessarily installed way forward on the fuselage (as opposed to further back where it would be somewhat submerged in the boundry layer where it would have casued less drag).
In my experience accidents are always caused by multiple, seemingly related, details. Take an aircraft that may have been "bent", not flying straight, with a draggy repair (the patch), throw in some winds aloft that were stronger and in directions that were unanticipated and some poor visibilty and/or a few clouds and things suddenly don't turn out as they would have liked.
So, does anyone know if the orientation we see is the recommended orientation for the antenna to be positioned in when not in use?
This does not help us find the aircraft, but, it may help explain the loss in the first place.