
Dark spot under cockpit of A-10s - mholt
http://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/2078/dark-spot-under-cockpit-on-a-10s
======
jug6ernaut
While off topic, i found this interesting bit of information on the a10's gun
wiki page.

"The recoil force of the GAU-8/A[16] is 10,000 pounds-force (45 kN),[3] which
is slightly more than the output of one of the A-10's two TF34 engines (9,065
lbf / 40.3 kN each).[17] While this recoil force is significant, in practice
cannon fire only slows the aircraft a few miles per hour in level flight."

The gun firing produces more force through recoil on the plane then is
produced by one of the plane's engines. That is simply amazing.

Edit: The guns wiki page(it has a wiki page).

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GAU-8_Avenger](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GAU-8_Avenger)

~~~
Avenger42
It's also mentioned in an XKCD "what if":

[https://what-if.xkcd.com/21/](https://what-if.xkcd.com/21/)

> The GAU-8 Avenger fires up to sixty one-pound bullets a second. It produces
> almost five tons of recoil force, which is crazy considering that it’s
> mounted in a type of plane (the A-10 “Warthog”) whose two engines produce
> only four tons of thrust each. If you put two of them in one aircraft, and
> fired both guns forward while opening up the throttle, the guns would win
> and you’d accelerate backward.

> To put it another way: If I mounted a GAU-8 on my car, put the car in
> neutral, and started firing backward from a standstill, I would be breaking
> the interstate speed limit in less than _three seconds._

~~~
tomp
> To put it another way: If I mounted a GAU-8 on my car, put the car in
> neutral, and started firing backward from a standstill, I would be breaking
> the interstate speed limit in less than three seconds.

More likely, you would have a cabrio in 1.62 seconds.

~~~
nunb
you mean you'd have to cut off the roof to mount it?

[http://i.imgur.com/CFtOzAD.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/CFtOzAD.jpg)

;)

~~~
dylanrw
And make sure everyone was clear of the 'exhaust' for a few miles.

------
ericcumbee
My dad has always said that the A-10 is an infantryman's best friend. an F-16
or F-18 will straff over the battle field and is gone. an A-10 will just hang
around.

When I was younger we went to a nature preserve that is adjacent to the
gunnery range at Moody Air Force base. We went up in an observation tower
overlooking the preserve and watched A-10s do strafing practice. The sound of
the GAU-8 main gun is something you have to hear to believe. If bad intentions
have a sound it's that gun.

~~~
Pxtl
It really demonstrates the problem with the American military bureaucratic
structure - all the best attempts they made with rotary combat aircraft
couldn't really measure up to the A-10 in that role, but the army wasn't
allowed to operate fixed-wing combat aircraft so they had to rely on the air-
force to do that... and the air-force infrastructure and culture doesn't
really properly "map" to the kind of work the A-10 did.

Regardless, the A-10 is an anachronism now. Its chief advantage was its
ruggedness and ability to properly explore the battlefield when attacking
unlike faster, more fragile aircraft... and now they have drones that fill
that role of "slow enough to look around before opening fire and we don't care
quite so much if it gets shot".

~~~
redthrowaway
>Regardless, the A-10 is an anachronism now

True

>Its chief advantage was its ruggedness and ability to properly explore the
battlefield when attacking

Well, not really. While those are both big advantages it enjoys, its _chief_
advantage and the mission is was designed for was that it carries enough
ordinance to stop a Soviet tank column rolling into Germany in its tracks.

The A-10 is absolutely overkill for any modern CAS mission, and the airframes
are simply 40 years old. Extending their life is only a temporary solution;
they'll have to be replaced sooner or later. When they are replaced, there
really isn't much of an argument for building a direct replacement instead of
farming its various roles out to other platforms {hang and wait: predator,
strike: f-35, CAS: Apache}

~~~
Pxtl
Well, I meant in recent engagements. I mean, how many times was the A-10
actually used to attack a Soviet tank-column vs. gunning down a bunch of poor
guys with AKs hiding in light cover?

~~~
dylanrw
Maybe not soviet, but it sure racked up an insane count & ratio on Iraqi
columns:

Destroying: \- more than 1,000 tanks \- 1,200 artillery pieces \- 2,000 other
military vehicles Confirmed kills include: \- 967 tanks \- 926 artillery
pieces \- 1,306 trucks \- 501 armored personnel carriers \- 28 command posts
\- Successfully hunted and destroyed SCUD missiles \- Suppressed enemy air
defenses \- Attacked early warning radars

Those numbers to 5 losses in Desert Storm alone...

------
larrydag
The A-10 is one on of the aircraft that is on the list for retirement from the
US Air Force.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairchild_Republic_A-10_Thunder...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairchild_Republic_A-10_Thunderbolt_II#Proposed_retirement)

The A-10 is a cold war designed attack jet to be used to take out Soviet
tanks. Its really good at slow (relatively) , guided, precise air-to-ground
strikes. I think it would make a good candidate for a new class of a drones
fleet.

~~~
jfb
Yeah, possibly. What is indisputable is that the mooted replacement (the F-35)
is as useless as tits on a boar for close ground support.

~~~
mcv
It truly baffles me just how many very effective and specialized planes are
supposed to be replaced by the F-35, which, it seems, can't really do any of
those tasks right.

There's a very good reason why there were so many specialized aircraft in the
first place.

~~~
ezy
All this reminds me of when bozos start talking about "convergence" in the
technology sphere. The US: doomed by middle management.

~~~
mcv
Not just the US. Netherland stupidly insists on following the US in this,
despite it being abundantly clear that the F-35 (or JSF, as it's usually
called here) is a fiasco. But it's American, therefore it must be superior to
anything else.

Our airforce is usually a bit more than 100 fighters. Always has been. Now
we're going to get about 30 F-35s, and they're going to be slower and less
maneuverable than our old F-16s. But they have stealth, and some other
fighters that we don't have can take off and land vertically, so it's all good
I guess.

I seriously think this is going to be the end of western air supremacy.

------
jmount
A-10 was a Boyd sponsored aircraft, a fun topic: [http://www.win-
vector.com/blog/2010/04/deming-wald-and-boyd-...](http://www.win-
vector.com/blog/2010/04/deming-wald-and-boyd-cutting-through-the-fog-of-
analytics/)

------
dba7dba
A joke I heard is that if Air Force was allowed to buy whatever plane it
wanted, every single one of them would be a single seat jet fighter that goes
very fast. No cargo plane, no helicopter, no tanker, no CAS plane.

Air Force should just hand over A-10 to Army, the ones who really know how
valuable A-10 is.

~~~
dylanrw
Except the a10 pilots, there is a love affair there...

~~~
dba7dba
Except the 'love affair' between a10 pilots and a10 is kinda like one in an
arranged marriage. There was NO love at first but it kinds grew after they
were forced to be together...

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davidedicillo
The most fascinating thing about this for me is that it's nothing more than
what many fishes do.

~~~
dwd
What they didn't mention was that it relies on the idea that turns are made
using a pull back as you can handle a higher number of positive Gs than
negative.

------
beebs93
I was really expecting something 10x more complex (e.g. A special WiFi-
reflecting paint that prevents missiles from stealing the A-10s bandwidth or
some such).

I love how simple yet effective it is. A very "just-use-a-pencil-in-outer-
space"-type solution.

~~~
Sharlin
Note that what you seem to be referring to is an urban legend [1]. Initially
both NASA and the Russians used pencils, but they were quickly deemed
potentially hazardous because they shed graphite flakes that in microgravity
may end up in places where you don't want them - being electrically conductive
they may even cause short-circuits. Simple ball-point pens work fine in
microgravity because they rely on the capillary effect, not gravity, to work.

[1]
[http://www.snopes.com/business/genius/spacepen.asp](http://www.snopes.com/business/genius/spacepen.asp)

~~~
vonmoltke
Also, not mentioned in the Snopes article, is that the refill cartridge and
ink used in the pen weren't even developed specifically with NASA in mind.
Fisher wanted to create a ballpoint pen that would work in all manner of
extreme environments, write on wet surfaces, and work upside down.
Microgravity was just one of those extreme environments.

------
thearn4
Pretty clever.

False cockpit aside, the A-10 is my favorite plane of all time. It has a sound
that's really unmistakable.

(well, technically I guess it's the GAU-8 making the sound...)

~~~
arethuza
Slightly off topic...

The village where I grew up in Scotland is on a headland on the coast and was
near a couple of RAF bases - it seemed a popular route point so my childhood
had a lot of _very_ low flying military aircraft about so I guess we were all
used to the noise.

Then came the day when there was a Vulcan bomber doing apparently doing
aerobatics at a fairly low level over the village - it's probably close to 40
years but I don't think I will ever forget that utterly glorious sound....

[Edit: the _sight_ of a Vulcan being thrown around the sky isn't something
I'll forget either!]

~~~
arethuza
Here is a video of a Vulcan taking off - that "howl" is pretty distinctive!

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzdtYU7i_jY](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzdtYU7i_jY)

I have to assume that the secret UK war plan wasn't to drop H-bombs on the
Soviets but to deafen them into submission.

~~~
amorphid
At an airshow, I saw a US Harrier do a vertical take off. It was really loud!
At a different airshow, I saw an SR-71 take off and fly around. That was
pretty damn loud, too. It set off every car alarm in the parking lot.

------
beat
I figured that dark spot was just the result of pilots doing dangerous
maneuvers while getting shot at by tanks and AA. I'd leave a dark spot, too.

------
evanm
Bigger question -- who knew there was an aviation Stack Exchange??!? I always
went to quora to read kind of stuff.

~~~
TeMPOraL
Stack Exchange is evolving towards Reddit, which has subreddits for every
conceivable topic and then some.

------
Warhawg01
The amount of silly garbage in this thread is astounding. I thought you HN
folks were supposed to be smart. Anyone here actually fly A-10s? Or been on
the ground and had one support you?

No, the plane does not slow down when you shoot the gun.

Source: I have almost 3000 hours in this plane. Flew today, actually.

------
cushychicken
Interesting answer. My offhand guess would have been discoloration in the
metal due to heat put off by this monster:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GAU-8_Avenger](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GAU-8_Avenger)

~~~
lake_rogue
My guess was a variation: as a warning to ground personnel not to touch that
area of the fuselage, as after any recent firing of the GAU-8 that area would
be "HOT PLATE".

------
dkrich
When I was a kid I saw this demo tape and was blown away by how lethal and
intimidating the A-10 looked. Ever since I've been fascinated with it. The
video quality is very poor because this was shot in the late seventies or
early eighties but it demonstrates the ferocity of the plane pretty well.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVvAQHz5jGs](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVvAQHz5jGs)

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frou_dh
I don't know how accurate it is, but I remember this entertaining video of
A-10 designer Pierre Sprey talking about how the new F-35 is garbage:

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxDSiwqM2nw](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxDSiwqM2nw)

Themes of bloat and unwarranted complexity are perhaps universal.

------
WalterBright
For those interested in the unusual development of the A-10, see the book
"Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War".

------
xbryanx
Ships in WWII used to use techniques like this as well. I saw a great exhibit
on camouflage at the Imperial War Museum that featured quite a few examples of
this:

[http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/30019323](http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/30019323)

~~~
hcarvalhoalves
I think it deserves a little more explanation:

This camouflage was effective not at hiding the ship, but denying the U-Boat
captains the ability to see in which direction it's moving to properly launch
torpedoes. The patterned painting makes it harder to find where the bow is
pointing to.

~~~
colomon
Thank you, because I was just imagining painting the bottom of the ship to
look like the top, to confuse subs into thinking it had capsized or something.

------
tehwebguy
I was more surprised to read that it was patented. Not that it doesn't make
sense, but I had never considered that governments might not use a particular
military tool because of a licensing issue.

------
arethuza
Reminds me of eye mimicry in animal camouflage:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eyespot_%28mimicry%29](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eyespot_%28mimicry%29)

~~~
Shivetya
my favorite on the art of camoflage

[http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/episode-65-razzle-
dazz...](http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/episode-65-razzle-dazzle/)

------
rplnt
Is there air-air combat happening somewhere in the world? If not, when was the
last time this could have been used?

~~~
kenrikm
I don't think there has been really Air - Air combat in a very long time.
(Vietnam?) - though using this on a A10 makes a lot of sense, tricking ground
forces yo think you're banking in their direction when your not and tricking
enemy aircraft of the same can give an advantage.

~~~
snits
The Bekaa Valley in the 80s the Israelis hammered the Syrian Air Force
without, I believe, any losses of their own.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mole_Cricket_19](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mole_Cricket_19)

------
BrownBuffalo
Equally as interesting is the Naval efforts of many countries to camo their
ships. -
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dazzle_camouflage](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dazzle_camouflage)
\- Jazz Hands, anyone?

------
userbinator
"I have an A-10 with this stain under the cockpit. I've tried scrubbing it
with soap and water, jet fuel, and degreaser, but it stays there. Does anyone
know a better solvent?"

I was expecting something like that from the title...

------
yawz
I like it! Very much like mimicking the nature. That type of naturally evolved
patterns are common in nature (fish, birds, insects, etc.) to confuse
predators.

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JabavuAdams
I wonder how badly that would mess up combat drones' vision systems?

Welcome to a world of anti-machine-vision camouflage.

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ilovecookies
That plane has to be quite sturdy to fire that gun. 10 tonnes from the front
and four from the back.

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ilovecookies
This is seriously turning more and more into reddit.

------
kackontent
Boys with toys. Toys for killing people.

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tomphoolery
Octopus-driven security.

------
gdonelli
old school technology borrowed from nature!

------
kjs3
Before this, the armchair generals were all "stupid military, retiring the A-1
Skyraider with a _jet_! How can a jet loiter on target long enough to do close
air support worth a shit!".

~~~
rangibaby
What is old is new again:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embraer_EMB_314_Super_Tucano](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embraer_EMB_314_Super_Tucano)

~~~
kjs3
Sorta. Same mission and all, but the A-29 is a turboprop because it's a)
cheaper and b) simpler to fly and maintain than a military jet intended for
militaries that are primarily concerned about such things. The A-1 was a prop
because it was part of the last generation of military prop planes. I don't
think the designers of the A-29 were looking to recreate the success of the
A-1. Looks like an effective platform, tho.

