The Insane Engineering of the A-10 Warthog

[Music] the fairchild republic a-10 lightning-bolt or simply the hog is one of the most iconic planes in the US Air Force a plane developed in the middle of the Cold War with a specific type of warfare in mind if the Cold War turned hot one area was destined to become a battleground a 50 kilometer corridor of lowland Valley's called the Fulda gap where any invading troops would be channeled on their march from East Germany to West Germany it was the shortest route to France Frankfurt and the strategically important Rhine River if war broke out this corridor would be a vital region to secure and each side of the Fulda gap was defended by armoured divisions to cope with this threat environment the u.s. developed an operational doctrine called air land battle and the a-10 was developed as a vital component of this strategy a low-flying tank killer which would work closely with the troops on the ground to break up enemy formations at the front while high-flying bombers harassed the supply lines at the rear the a-10 was a plane designed specifically for the role of close air support close air support is exactly that close close to friendly forces and close to unfriendly forces it requires a plane to be capable of absorbing a great deal of damage as they come under fire and to be incredibly accurate where its weapons to avoid friendly fire a plane with this role needs some unique qualities it needs to be available at a moment's notice in an ever-evolving battlefield troops could need support without warning and because of this the plane needs to be nearby and ready to go this means working from forward bases that may not necessarily have all the infrastructure and equipment that other planes need to operate it's survivability needs to be in class flying this close to the ground is going to result in every man with weapon taking potshots at the plane as a result the plane needs to be capable of dealing with small arms machine guns anti-aircraft guns and even missiles a tense frequently limp back to their base would damage so severe that they would have downed another plane with parts of their wings ripped off with an engine taken out and hydraulics on operational and coming with this the plane needs to be simple and cheap to manufacture the air force made it clear from the beginning in a battle of cost versus performance cost would be prioritized in an all-out war with the Soviets quantity and ease of manufacturing was going to be a huge factor like the Sherman and the t-34 tanks which were so influential in world war ii a future war between the Soviets and the US was expected to be won by whoever could out manufacture and maintain their equipment this plane was intended to be a cheap and rugged warhorse it needed to be made with readily available off-the-shelf parts so maintenance crews could easily interchange parts to repair damage quickly and at a low cost contractors bidding for the manufacturing contract needed to consider all of these factors and designed the entire plane around the primary urnament which was chosen before the design process started the General Electric gau-8/a a gun whose sound is so recognizable it has become a meme the gun takes up a significant portion of the plane's internal volume at nearly 6 metres long fitting snugly below the pilot the largest part of the gun is the ammo drum which typically holds 1,150 30 millimeter rounds the rounds are delivered to the 7 rotating barrels along a linkless shoot system which also pulls the shell casings back into the ammo drum after firing to prevent the expanded shells from damaging the plane the belt system and the rotating cam firing system of the barrels are both driven by a hydraulic motor which is powered by two independent hydraulic systems onboard there are two separate hydraulic systems to ensure redundant see in operation and both run the gun the left and right hydraulic systems are pressurized by two identical engine driven pumps on the left and right engine if an engine is lost or one of the hydraulic lines is broken than the controls powered by those hydraulics ceased to work however the plane has been designed to allow it to continue flying on only one hydraulic system as both elevators both ailerons and one rudder have hydraulic power after loss of either hydraulic lines ensuring powered control of pitch roll and yaw even after the loss of a single hydraulic system if both are lost the plane can switch to a manual reversion flight control system where the controls can be operated without power assists which is difficult to say the least but it can allow the pilot to land the plane safely or at the very least allow them to get into safe airspace to eject this kind of redundancy can be found in every component of the a10 to increase survivability the landing gear is retracted by the LES system only but it can be extended by both and in the event neither system is available the wing mounted landing gear doesn't actually retract all the way into the pharynx which allows the plane to land with landing gear retracted with only moderate damage to the plane protecting the control mechanisms through redundancy is just one component of increasing survivability the fuel tanks are self-sealing on the lower portions and are filled with foam to prevent explosions the a-10 like all planes can fly with significant armor covering every portion of the plane so they just protect the most vital component on the plane the stick operator otherwise known as the pilot who sits inside a titanium tub which is reported to be capable of absorbing direct hits from armor-piercing rounds up to 23 millimeters the canopy is also made from ballistic glass capable of taking hits from small-arms but this isn't the type of plane to be flying upside down over the battlefield this is more for shrapnel from anti-aircraft fire and missiles the a-10 also carries more chaff and flares than any US air legacy fighter chaff is radar reflective material which confuses radar controlled missiles while flares confuse heat-seeking missiles with four dispensers located in the landing gear pods and another four on the outer wing tips for a total of sixteen across both wings which can be triggered automatically by radar and laser detection systems on the nose and wingtips of the plane or simply fired manually by the pilot one of the most striking features of the a-10 is its strange engine placement and tail configuration and this too was a design feature to thwart enemies with heat-seeking missiles the engines and tail were arranged like this to mask the infrared signature of the hot exhaust of the plane which could be used to lock on to the plane by IR missiles on the ground the tail would look more at home on a world war two bomber which were designed to be stable stability was an important part of the a tense design the large vertical stabilizers helped keep the plane on target as it fires its insanely powerful gun the gun is mounted directly on the centerline of the plane to minimize the effect of the recoil pushing the plane off target the recoil force at 40 4.5 kilonewtons is so powerful that it effectively halves the planes for thrust as each of the eight ends General Electric t-34 engines produces just 41 kilonewtons of thrust but the plane fires in such short bursts typically one to two seconds that the pilot doesn't need to worry about Salling the high engines mounted behind the wings also reduced the amount of dirt and dust that can enter the engines from forward-operating base runways which can be just dirt runways a lot of design choices were made to allow the plane to operate from remote airfields like this smaller military planes like this don't typically have auxilary power units which are small secondary engines that large planes like airliners have you can see the exhaust of these little hidden engines in the tails of airliners these engines allow the plane to start its main engines without external help and help run functions like electricity generation and hydraulic fluid pumps but it's a necessary weight for most small aircraft and they usually use some other way to get the engine spinning sometimes this results in the plane relying on ground equipment which the a-10 cannot depend on and so an AP was installed between the two potted engines you can see the exhaust of the APU just underneath the nacelle x' here some of the most interesting design challenges arose from the sheer power of the aircraft's gun the gun spits out so much burnt anon burnt propellant that they actually lost an early model in 1978 after exhaust gas from the gun ignited and starved the engines of oxygen to deal with this some design changes were made first a small gas scoop was placed underneath the barrels to suck in some of that exhaust the chemical mixture of the round propellant was changed to increase the flashes of present levels this in turn caused secondary problems as the new chemical mixture caused residue to build up on the cockpit windows and a canopy washer was needed which simply sprayed the washing fluid onto the canopy and the slipstream did the rest of the work circuitry was also added to force the engine ignition system to continually fire while the gun trigger was being pulled so that in the event a flame out occurred the engine could rekindle its flame immediately the gau-8 avenger is a monstrous machine designed to wreak havoc on those Soviet tanks attempting to push through allied lines to do this they need heavy armor-piercing rounds the rounds are truly massive at 30 millimetres and sprinkled throughout these rounds are rounds made of aluminium with a depleted uranium core uranium is insanely dense at nineteen point one g/cm^3 lead in comparison is eleven point three grams per centimeter cubed and iron is 7.9 this density gives the round more kinetic energy for armor-piercing the depleted uranium also ablates material in a way that self sharpens the projector while tungsten which is slightly denser than uranium tends to mushroom out and doles itself upon impact there is currently 700 thousand metric tons of depleted uranium stored as uranium hexafluoride in huge storage cylinders across America costing uranium enrichment facilities a great amount in maintenance they are simply delighted when someone gets it off their hands and fires it at high speed into a country thousands of miles away it's a cheap and freely available resource and has the perfect material properties for armor-piercing but the efficacy of using depleted uranium is obviously not good many war-torn regions have blamed its use for elevated cases of cancer the a-10 has been under constant threat of retirement detractors have pushed from the very start that the plane is not needed first it was the f-16 which should take over its job and now it's the f-35 and both sides of the argument have valid points the f-16 and a10 can carry similar amounts of ordnance into the battlefield if needed both have 11 hard points where the carrying capacity over 7.2 tonnes but attaching heavy equipments to its wings negates the biggest advantage of the f-16 its maneuverability and ability to conserve kinetic energy in dogfights the f-16 was designed to be a multi-role fighter while the a-10 was designed for one job and one job only getting down and dirty and taken some punches like Rocky while modern planes like the f-35 were designed to be more like Muhammad Ali bobbing weaving illusive striking and moving out of the enemy's range before they can react the two planes were designed in completely different eras with completely different military doctrine in mind and trying to compare the two without acknowledging that is silly the f-35 is designed to carry a small payload of weapons in its internal weapons Bay while stealth is a high priority but it can carry just as much as the f-16 when air superiority is established it's a multi-role fighter designed for the modern battlefield ultimately the a-10 found a role in wars like Iraq and Afghanistan where the threat level and sophistication of enemy weaponry was relatively low like the battles expected in the folder gap in the 1980s the a-10 persists today because it excels in its role as a close air support vehicle and it's low cost of running compared to other military planes has kept it competitive allowing us to be in the vanguard for military operations today he planed the infantry can see coming over the horizon like Gandalf arriving into helms deep to lift the siege it's become an iconic aircraft among the soldiers on the ground a bond has formed between us and the infantry it protects but just as the a-10 was created in preparation for an anticipated next-generation war the f-35 was created with future Wars in mind where the threat environment will be so dense that simply being able to take a punch won't save us the nature of close air support has continually evolved over the past century in world war ii tactical air forces were created specifically for providing close air support to the troops landing in Normandy on d-day range for these fighters was a major tactical issue and within 24 hours of the first men landing in Normandy three new emergency landing strips had been created off the beaches which would allow the Allies to extend their fighter bomber range and prevent a fierce counter-attack by the Germans from overwhelming the small toehold the Allies managed to carve out in Normandy I explored these vital logistical challenges in a future episode of the logistics of d-day that will be out next month these airfields were primarily built to extend the reach of Allied aerial support as ground troops push forward however as the front line progressed many were converted to supply depots emergency evacuation posts and heavy bomber airfields others were simply abandoned and allowed to return to farmland over time there are hidden traces of these remains littered all over Normandy you can learn more about them and get access to the entire logistics of d-day series by signing up to curiosity stream for just $19.99 for the entire year here you can watch the hidden traces documentary about modern archaeological digs uncovering remnants of the eighth decade old battlefield and you will get free access to nebula the home of the logistics of d-day series and many more original series from some of YouTube's best educational creators like Tom Scott went over production sentirse 1999 for an entire year of access to curiosity stream with thousands of award-winning documentaries and access to nebula is a fantastic price and will help educational creators to continue creating their content without the constraints of the YouTube algorithm as always thanks for watching and thank you to all my patreon supporters if you'd like to see more from me the links to my Instagram Twitter subreddit and discord server are below you

Channel: Real Engineering

Views: 6,479,419

Rating: 4.921586 out of 5

Keywords: engineering, science, technology, education, history, real

Id: wk6Qr6OO5Xo

Length: 16min 27sec (987 seconds)

Published: Sat May 23 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/MrValdemar]

Congress: It's time to retire the A-

A-10: BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRT

Congress: ...to retire the-

A-10: BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRT

Congress: ...reti-

A-10: BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRT

Congress: <votes to increase funding for the A-10>

A-10: Brt.