A 10a cockpit skin#

Dealing with the airspeed indicator it’s interesting to hear that typically and depending on the payload, the A-10 takes off at 135-145 knots, starting rotation to pull the stick 10 knots prior to the calculated rotation speed. From there you get a glimpse at the consoles (including U/VHF and FM secure radios, some emergency system, such as the backup speedbrakes and trim actuators), the various buttons of the master arm, gun, laser designator, Targeting Pod the RWR (Radar Warning Receiver). Not bad.Īt 28:00 you can enter the cockpit and seat on the ACES II ejection seat. According to “Shiv” the way the MLG was designed means an A-10 that performs a belly landing is able to return to flight in about one week. We explained how this feature may become extremly handy during a belly landing because, depending on the stores carried by the aircraft, the wheels that partially protrude from their nacelles can provide a cushion to absorb the impact with the runway while continuing to guarantee the braking action (allowing the pilot to control the aircraft through differential use of the wheel brakes), reduce the risk of fire, and generally speaking, the overall damage to the fuselage.

“It’s not negatively affecting the characteristics of the airplane at all, the airplane is already draggy enough, this isn’t gonna do anything different ot it.”Īnother interesting detail deals with the Thunderbolt II’s main landing gear, whose wheels remain partly exposed. However, usually, such dents and damages don’t affect the aircraft’s ability to fly and fight, hence they are left there until the next major maintenance work.

A 10a cockpit skin#

The Warthogs refuel quite frequently both during normal training sorties and when deployed, and the skin in that area is done of sheet metal: the repeated impacts always tear part of the skin creating some pretty evident holes on the upper nose area right before the canopy. The area around the nose features the usual damage around the receptacle where the “boomer” inserts the “flying boom” of the tanker (either a KC-10 or a KC-135). The gun is extremely accurate (07:38): a 5-mil precision means that 80% of rounds will hit within a 5-mil circle with mils being milliradiants (at 1,000 feet five mils would be 5 m hence 80% of rounds would hit within a 5-m circle and that’s a 70 rounds a second!) Without the rounds, you would actually have to put ballast in the nose on an empty gun to balance the airplace.Īnother interesting thing is the fact (05:06) that the gun is surrounded by titanium, so that if the gun were to blow up it does not penetrate the cockpit that is located just above it.Īt 07:18 we learn that there are basically two ways of operating the gun: the training schedule means the gun does not fire more than 100 rounds per minute (so that you can save the life of the barrels), and a combat schedule, when the pilot can shoot at more than 100 round per minute (that will drop the lifespan of the barrels, meaning that they will need to be replaced earlier). It’s also interesting to hear about the weight of the 1,150 30-mm rounds of bullets, that equals about 4,000 pounds (each is about three pounds) and the need to consider the weight of the rounds and their shells, that are stored in the drum, to help with the position of the center of gravity of the aircraft. Everything is built around the gun (03:00), even the offset nose landing gear. There’s also a wind fence that, when the gun is shooting, diverts the gas down the fuselage. The slat on each wing also helps diverting the gun gas underneath the wing so it doesn’t suffocate the engine (as the gun gas does not have oxygen) when the aircraft uses the gun. It’s really impressive.Īlthough there are tons of things I didn’t know about the A-10 before watching this video I found some details about the iconic GAU-8/A Avenger 30mm hydraulically driven seven- barrel Gatling gun and the cockpit worth of remark.įor instance, it’s interesting that the aircraft is equipped with slats that are not slats in the traditional airplane sense as they do not generate lift nor help the pilot land any slower it, but they smooth the airflow off the wing in the engine and prevent stalls when the aircraft flies at high AOA (Angle Of Attack). You rarely have a chance to get such a detailed description of all the aircraft parts, systems, sensors.