What is this thing on the wing good for?

[Donivanp]

Many test aircraft will have a over sized long boom pitot on then for the test (this is normally on the jet aircraft) and int he Century series fighter jets many have extremely long booms ( the F-100's folds up for ground operations), mainly this is to get clean undisturbed air. In today's aircraft the information feeds a lot of different systems but the main function is as stated before to get airspeed.

 

[pbehn]

Funny, but not very helpful...

Well the real reason had been well covered it is a pitot tube

 

[gumbyk]

Wasn't a small propeller device used at one time?

Many different devices have been used:

1940's era Tigermoth:

WW1 anemometer type airspeed indicator:

 

[Wurger]

 

[N4521U]

That top one is cool. I take it 45 is stall speed eh?
Put one on the hood of a car and call it HUD.................

 

[gumbyk]

Yeah, stalls about 44mph.
Its actually located on the interplane struts, so you have to turn your head sideways to see it.

Oh, I almost forgot, the pitot head also makes a great home for various small bugs.