Removable Pylons

[zinhawk]

I haven't seen it talked about so maybe its one of those no brainers or too trivial to matter. In which case maybe that could be a reason to do it anyway!

 

1. The biggest is deletion of the Pave Penny pylon. I don't know if this is factored into the drag model, but no unit has had the pylon on in some years. It is as about as useful as man nipples dangling there with the TGP. Plus removing it is proof you can put lipstick on a pig.

 

2. If ED wanted to make the Pave Penny functional with the A10C 2 (don't see why) and retain the pylon, at least make it removable and/or with the other 11 stations a la Hornet. Are the pylons removed normally? No. Can they be? Yes. It would be neat to see and "feel" what a clean A-10 would do.

[AeriaGloria]

The A-10Cs did keep the Pave Penny for a while, and that’s the time frame of ours. Maybe with A-10C 2 we will see it gone

[Snoopy]

2. If ED wanted to make the Pave Penny functional with the A10C 2 (don't see why) and retain the pylon, at least make it removable and/or with the other 11 stations a la Hornet. Are the pylons removed normally? No. Can they be? Yes. It would be neat to see and "feel" what a clean A-10 would do.

 

For clarification all weapon stations on the wings are not removable on the A-10. And the pave penny, although removed since around 2013, was not something we removed even for demo birds back in the day. So if we don't get an upgraded suite in A-10C 2 the pylon should stay.

[zinhawk]

I've only been around the aircraft a few years so I don't know all the innerworkings of why. I do see our structures guys take them off all the time for maintenance purposes, and it would certainly red X it for combat capability, hence the not normally part. I'll let structures argue whether or not it can be made flight worthy with caps. Not my area of expertise. I could help with engine function though :thumbup:

 

I was looking at it from a physically possible vs normal combat behavior standpoint.

 

Ditto Pave Penny, I get the suite argument, but it is pointless lugging around a non functioning portion of the module.

 

All this is operating without any knowledge of the planned A-10C 2. So wait and see. I just wanted to mention this while it is more or less in the development segment. Upon further reading of older posts I did see the Pave Penny aspect talked about that I missed so sorry for that.

[Snoopy]

I've only been around the aircraft a few years so I don't know all the innerworkings of why.

 

I've been around them for over 16 years ;)