bent metal
Airman
- 57
- Jun 16, 2014
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Seat adjustment is all...Hi, I am wondering if the Japanese Zero plane had an ejection mechanism? Not rocket, but maybe some kind of spring operated thing? I'm looking at models and pictures of the seat. Some of which actually refer to the seat as "ejection", while others say there was no ejection. ...The seat is mounted to four arms that would pivot up and down. If not for ejection, then for what purpose are those arms?
No ejection at all huh? See, that's another fact that passed by me throughout all my readings and films...
Most WW2 aircraft had no ejection seats. Its not something unusual...
Shinpachi is building his A6M from factory blueprints...Thanks for the quick and clear response! I did look at the Spinpachi link. Not all of it, but a few pages, very nice. I'm only familiar with the seat, I see he has taken a few liberties in changing the design, as we have. Very cool stuff!
If you were in a fighter that had a canopy that could be jettisoned, ( most did) and you still had enough control left to do so, a lot of pilots seemed to prefer to roll inverted, or begin a outside loop, pull their knees up to their chest, (or get their legs out from under the instrument panel) release the seat belt/shoulder harness, and drop out.
That was faster and got you better separation from the aircraft than climbing out on the wing and hoping you missed the tail surfaces as you dove off the back of the wing.