Jim Carriere wrote:

Gord Beaman wrote:
They didn't need to pay any attention to all the 'housekeeping
chores' inherent in the operation of four highly tuned and
critical piston engines and aircraft systems. They'd just say
"Engineer maintain 180 knots" (or whatever) then forget about the
a/c and concentrate on what was going on outside... worked good.

I have over 6,000 hours logged on them and I've never seen either
pilot touch the throttles. The left seat did reverse the engines
with the reversing throttles on the landing roll though.

That makes sense. About the only time I can see a pilot moving the
throttles in that kind of cockpit, other than a very urgent
emergency, is on the runway when timing is important.


The aircraft had very powerful nosewheel steering and a goodly
amount of rudder so differential engine power was never needed on
the ground, even for the takeoff roll.

Most of our pilots learned early to keep their knuckles well
clear of their quite long throttles when they (if they) called
"Aborting, power off" on the takeoff roll because those throttles
were capable of breaking fingers as they smashed back to idle at
the speed of light...there was no minimum time allowance for
throttle travel in that direction and we all took delight in
making them 'klang' on the idle stops...

It's nice when a crew can work like what you describe- everyone doing
there jobs and doing them well.

Yes, it was indeed a joy, and was helped by our system of
'crewing up'...it wasn't unusual to have the same flight crew for
a year or two...however poor 'that' was for standardization...
but we worked hard to keep standard with bull sessions and lots
of flight simulator time.

I certainly enjoyed my 8 years on them, they were by far the best
aircraft for the engineer that the Canadian Forces ever had, or
is likely to have.

--

-Gord.
(use gordon in email)