How do you bail out of a LA type fighter?

[ACG_KaiLae]

As title says. After the recent patch, the canopy on the LaGG or LA won't open unless you're going quite slow. This means if something unfortunate happens, like, oh, your wing falling off, the canopy won't open and there seems to be no way to get out of the plane. I had assumed there was a canopy jettison/eject, but if it exists, I must have missed it. Anyone know?

[216th_Lucas_From_Hell]

Short answer - you don't.

 

To my best knowledge there was no jettisoning mechanism in place for it, and this was a common problem in multiple Soviet aircraft dating back to the MiG-3. For this very reason many pilots would have the hoods removed or would fly with them open, which decreased the aircraft's top speed.

 

On the good side, the LaGG-3 and La-5 are sturdy aircraft so more often than not you can at least bring the plane down on its belly or at worst manage an ugly crash-landing with bits and pieces falling off. When that's not an option, there isn't much you can do about it. Once things go sour, open the hood as soon as you can and you might have a chance. If you've lost control of the aircraft, you can try to get the hood to open by aggravating the spin and thus reducing the airflow over the cockpit. That saved me on the MiG-3 once.

[-TBC-AeroAce]

This is historically correct. I have read that lagg pilots against orders not to, often flew with the canopy open because it was impossible to open at high speed.

Just to add all aircraft even with canopy open were very hard to bail from at high speed due to airflow hence the drive towards ejector seats at the end of the war

Edited May 25, 2016 by AeroACE

[seafireliv]

The reality of WW2 aerial warfare. I`d have it no other way, even in a sim.

Edited May 25, 2016 by seafireliv

[-TBC-AeroAce]

Id quite like to know technically why these slide canopies were so hard to open IRL as common sense would say the airflow would help them to slide backwards making them easy to open.

 

Any ideas?

Edited May 25, 2016 by AeroACE

[taffy2jeffmorgan]

As title says. After the recent patch, the canopy on the LaGG or LA won't open unless you're going quite slow. This means if something unfortunate happens, like, oh, your wing falling off, the canopy won't open and there seems to be no way to get out of the plane. I had assumed there was a canopy jettison/eject, but if it exists, I must have missed it. Anyone know?

Cut your speed back to zero, lift the nose, cockpit will slide back at 150 km/h

[ShamrockOneFive]

Id quite like to know technically why these slide canopies were so hard to open IRL as common sense would say the airflow would help them to slide backwards making them easy to open.

 

Any ideas?

 

Probably some issues with how the design works in terms of the sliding mechanism and negative pressure at higher airspeeds.

[PatrickAWlson]

Id quite like to know technically why these slide canopies were so hard to open IRL as common sense would say the airflow would help them to slide backwards making them easy to open.

 

Any ideas?

 

One real issue was that battle damage made them impossible to open.  Any damage to the rails an you were hosed.  Canopies that popped off in one piece were much less susceptible.

 

Short of battle damage, i guess it comes down to the fact that the air flow is hindering instead of helping you.  On a pop canopy the airflow will rip the canopy away from the plane.  I suspect that on a slide canopy the airflow is working to keep the canopy in place to some degree.  To what degree airflow prevents the canopy from opening is a mth problem that is beyond my ability to solve .

[LukeFF]

 

 

One real issue was that battle damage made them impossible to open.  Any damage to the rails an you were hosed.

 

Yep, and that was the reason why the Fw 190's canopy was fitted with explosive bolts which would blow it off the plane.