FC,

The 'Magical' 4th position is 35 Wg, Basically the 'Bast@rd' child of 45 Wing. It has the most stringent g and speed restrictions, but is very ecconomical in cruise. My spies tell me that the reason for the limitations are that it doesn't report fatigue values to the mother ship.......:ooh: Hmmmmm

Advo

45 Wg tanking makes the jet adopt about a 20 deg attitude - dead funny to watch!

The best trick was to sit on the left hose and watch your wingman attempt tank in 45Wg on the right hose, then, just as he plugs in, tell him he's in 45Wg and hope that he panics and selects 25Wg, thus promptly dropping out!!

Oh, the fun we had. That, and JTIDS text messages !!

wingsweep
 

Indeed the fatigues are only recorded in 25/45 and 67 wings (hence the 3 banks on the fatigue meter). This is one reason why the g limits are much lower in other sweeps. In addition to 35 wing, 58 wing is good for high speed climbs as it is a high lift wing (compared to 67 at least), although it is subsonic.

"Jimmy Macintosh "Slight aside, but with regards to the detent sytem to limit movement, if I recall correctly when Cottesmore was the TTTE back in the late 80's the tensions of the detent on one tornado were set incorrectly (I think not enough shim in place) and someone managed to sweep the wings while the flaps were down http://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/sr...milies/eek.gif ""

The bit of kit that controls the interaction between wing sweep angle and flap/slat position is the "High Lift Wing Sweep Control Unit - HLWSCU" It's basically a mechanical computer with detent drums, driven by the position of the wings and flaps/ slats to either permit or block the selection of things. If the wings are back, and manoeuvre is selected on the throttle top, then the flaps/ slats should not deploy until after the wings have moved forward. Also, the throttle quadrant has mechanical interlocks, preventing the inadvertent selection of flaps with wings back, or wings back with flaps selected.

This can happen when a feedback shaft has been physically removed from the airframe during maintenance and somebody then does a wingsweep (function test). Because the High Lift Wing Sweep Control Unit will not know when the wings have reached the selection made in the cockpit and the wings will keep on motoring back and back and back. Then the flaps go through the side of the airframe.

Agreed...., Sometimes creative solutions are required, to overcome 'foolproof' systems....