Dial and wire overload: old English bomber control panels

Posted by Cory Doctorow, April 28, 2008 8:48 PM | permalink

Devin sez, "I believe this was the navigation system for several old English bombers (Victor, Vulcan, and Valiant). Very wire-y and cool. Many, many plugs and things all over the place." Link (Thanks, Devin!)

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#1 posted by snowraver1 , April 28, 2008 9:25 PM

Man, I want to unplug some of those plugs and plug them back in. Feel the tension, the slight grind. Then I would gently flick the toggle swithes. *UP* *DOWN* *UP* *DOWN* *UPDOWNUPDOWNUPDOWN*. Then last, and I save the best for last, I would play with the knob till it came off.

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#2 posted by mramsey , April 28, 2008 10:24 PM

The original source of the photos is the Tatjana van Vark web site. I'm sure it's been linked here in the past, the whole thing is worth viewing. You can find the above equipment in Navigation and Bombing System NBS.

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#3 posted by padster123 , April 29, 2008 4:23 AM

Beautiful.

I remember, as a child, being taken to air shows, where the star turn would be taken by the nuclear-capable Vulcan bomber. INCREDIBLY noisy! But what a beautiful design.

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#4 posted by padster123 , April 29, 2008 4:27 AM

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/allen.conquest/gallery/vulcan1.jpg

... if yer interested.

Tell me that's not one incredible-looking bit of military hardware.

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#5 posted by Torchwood , April 29, 2008 4:56 AM

i would buy that.
T

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#6 posted by sweep , April 29, 2008 5:00 AM

Cory, for calling something English rather than British you shall henceforth be known as American.

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#7 posted by theducks , April 29, 2008 5:54 AM

Original source - http://www.tatjavanvark.nl/tvve/dduck0.html

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#8 posted by daniel etc , April 29, 2008 6:03 AM

My neighbour used to be the commander of a Vulcan bomber fleet. I once asked him what they felt like to fly and he replied "Like thunder under my glove"

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#9 posted by strider_mt2k

, April 29, 2008 10:54 AM

Dial and indicator pron!

(I'll be in the basement.)

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#10 posted by Caroline , April 29, 2008 12:47 PM

I worked one summer in a nuclear physics research lab, with a 10 MV tandem accelerator (along with a few lower-energy accelerators). The control room -- yes, they called it that -- looked, and probably still looks, much like this, except industrial green instead of black. It was so fantastically Cold War -- and this was in 2002.

One of the physicists was hankering to replace all the knobs and dials and gauges with one big Labview console. I would cry if that ever happened.

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#11 posted by Kaleberg

, April 29, 2008 8:36 PM

I believe Luftwaffe General Goring said, “My pilots do not need a cinema on board!” What an oaf! No wonder the RAF and US Army Air Corps kicked his ass.

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#12 posted by joejoejoe , April 29, 2008 11:20 PM

Cool stuff. Check out this video with "B. Going" as part of the bomber controls. A little bit of video magic could tranform it into a very cool "B. Boing" control.

http://www.tatjavanvark.nl/tvve/nbs9s.mpg