Too cool Scott. I never would have thought of torquemeter. I have seen torque measured as brake mean effective pressure or BMEP but not as straight torque. How interesting. Thanks for the additional close ups.
It looks like they have installed two different tachometers as well. These were an early WWII style individual unit that are a lot easier to read accurately. The needle will do a full sweep around the dial for 1000 RPM (as opposed to 1000 RPM per 50 degrees of arc in the standard instrument) and has a small counter for thousands of RPM. This is very similar to the turbine tach. It makes sense that they would use this type of tach for accuracy while testing engines.
These instruments had integral mounting nuts on the back of the flange so it could only be mounted behind the panel unlike the rest of the instruments. It also looks like all of the special instruments have markings on the face of the glass. I wonder if there is any significance to the B-29 marking on the torquemeter or is that an 8-29. Maybe it's a date?
As for the K model; I am under the impression that they didn't use the glass noses in combat. The column on the copilots side would not break away like it could in the AT-11. Although it had the full instrument panel and rudder pedals with complete with brakes I believe the panel on the copilots side was hinged toward the center. I would certainly think that this panel and column configuration would make it real hard to get into the nose in flight. Anyone else have any real experience with this?
I have an A-26 glass nose and the guy I got it from said it was used in testing for the K. All I have was his word and no documentation to back it up but it did still have Viet Nam camouflage on it.
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