OCR Text |
Show INSTRUMENTS NEEDED FOR FIGHTING PLANES. Before an airplane can be put into in-to military service it must be equipped equip-ped with at least nine delicate aeronautic aero-nautic instruments, some of which are absolutely essential to exact flying, fly-ing, and all contribute to the successful suc-cessful operation of a plane. One gives the pilot his location as to the height and direction; others tell his speed through the air, the speed of his propeller, the amount of gasoline carried, water temperature, operation of the oiling system, and guide his "banking" on turns. Another necessary nec-essary article is the oxygen-supply apparatus, without which an aviator could not climb to any great height. For operation of actual combat planes, such as observing, photographing, photo-graphing, bombing and fighting planes, other complicated and expensive ex-pensive instruments and sets of apparatus ap-paratus are necessary. Among them are machine guns, gun mounts, bomb racks, bomb-dropping devices, bomb sights, radio and photographic apparatus, electrically heated clothing, cloth-ing, lights and flares. These bring the total cost of equipment for an airplane to several thousand dollars each, depending upon the type of plane. |