In this column, Cecil gives a rather flippant answer to the question “Do you need a key to start an F-16”? [Short answer: no]. Personally, I would have preferred a little more information, such as exactly how you do start an F-16, if you don’t use a key, but that’s neither here nor there.
Any Dopers with experience with any of these other vehicles I’m about to mention are encouraged to chime in.
Do you need a key to start a…
[ul]
[li]747?[/li][li]A NASCAR stock car?[/li][li]Hi Opal![/li][li]A Formula One racecar?[/li][li]A locomotive?[/li][li]A nuclear sub, Nimitz-class destroyer, or any other motorized sailing vessel?[/li][/ul]
Or, to simplify this, what vehicles besides road vehicles, pleasure boats and private planes require keys (to start the ignition, not just to gain entry)? (I think you need a key to start a private plane. Or at least, you need one to gain entry to the magneto switch or something.)
Well, I’ve been on a few Coast Guard cutters and a whole bunch of the small boats, and you don’t need a key to start cutters or the larger small boats. The smaller boats do have keys to 'em.
NASCAR stock cars (and, I believe, F1 race cars) start via a button on the dash or steering wheel.
Locomotives, at least the 1200HP switchers that I ran occasionally when I worked for a railroad, started via a button in the engine compartment. That was all that was necessary because it’s generally considered best to let diesel locomotives run all the time, especially during winter, as their cooling systems are not compatible with the use of antifreeze. The reverser levers are removed when locomotive are left to idle without a crew on board, to prevent someone from taking a joyride.
747s do, I think, have keys; I seem to recall a recent television documentary which showed the involved ceremony associated with handover of ownership of a new airliner, involving much signing of documents and checks for very large amounts, and the handing over of keys. Maybe someone else can verify this.
Large vessels: don’t know about ships but I’ve worked on a number of mobile offshore drilling barges and there is no key system to start the engines. The power supply system is much like that of a locomotive, with diesels driving electric generators and DC electric motors powering all the moveable bits.
As to what starts Opal up, I would not presume to comment.
I’ve seen the TLC show. The ceremony exists, and a key exists, but it is just that, ceremonial.
Private planes have keys, both for entry and starting the engine. To my knowledge, very few aircraft larger than high-performance singles have keys, including piston twins, turboprops, private jets, and airliners. The idea is that even if you could gain entry to an aircraft on the ramp, you’d really have to know what you’re doing to get it moving.
My understanding is that Formula 1 cars need a laptop to start the engine. I’ve often seen drivers wait in frustration while the technicians come out with the laptop to start a stalled engine.
Whether they have alternate or back-up methods to start-up, I’m not too sure.
On large cargo carriers and merchant marine ships, there is no key.
In fact, there’s no way to start the engine from the control cabin- the captain or pilot (not airplane pilot, for merchant marine, the “pilot” is usually an expert captain who guides the ship in through navigational hazards, etc- usually a local who knows the area) gets on the intercom and calls down to the engine room.
The chiefs and mates down there then start the warmup processes, check everything, then either have to start the main engine with compressed air, or they have to start an auxilliary power supply- a smaller, but still huge diesel engine- which in turn starts the main engine.
On the F1 cars, I’m not sure it’s a laptop they’re carrying out- I seem to recall they didn’t actually have a starter on board, and the crew fires it up with a “clip on” starter and remote battery cart.
IIRC, the laptop is used to read telemetry from on-board diagnostic sensors, to try and pin down whether the engine stalled because of an internal problem.
Doc Nickel is right – F1 cars don’t have starters. The formula (i.e. the set of specs that all cars must obey) specifies a minimum total weight (including driver) of 600 kg (1320 lbs). Having a starter would add a kg or three to the car’s weight, which the teams don’t consider worthwhile; since the regs (esp. article 5.6) allow external starters, the teams will use them.
This is a hijack so if anyone thinks I should start a new thread just say so…
Do large merchant and naval ships control the engines from the bridge or are the engines still controlled from the engine room. I don’t know the proper term but you used to see the ‘throttle’ on the bridge of the ship with a half-dozen settings that they’d yank to indicate a new speed. This would ring a bell and would be relayed to the engine room where someone would push their lever to the new indicated position letting the bridge know that the message was received. It is my understanding that none of this in any way affected the engines. Once the people in the engine room got the message from the bridge they’d go and throw more coal on the fire or whatever they had to do in order to achieve the new speed. Does stuff like this still happen? You still see those old style ‘throttles’ aboard some ships but I don’t know if they actually now directly control the operation of the engine.
The EOT - Engine Order Telegraph is what you’re referring to, and while you may still see a few, they are largely for appearance only. The pilothouse does have direct control of the ships propulsion these days. As does the engineroom if needed.
I figured the bridge probably had direct control but then I thought those are some pretty serious engines. So if, say, a nuclear aircraft carrier wanted more speed it might require more power from the nuclear plant and that might be a bit more complicated a process than could be controlled from the bridge (i.e. engine room staff would need to take care of it). Sort of:
“We need more speed!”
“Hang on…we need to throw some more uranium on the fire. Give us a sec so we don’t blow-up!”
Actually, to clarify a little, I was just checking SOLAS (1997 consolidated), and the Engine Room Telegraph (as the IMO calls it - pshaw, what do they know) is still required on ships subject to SOLAS. (Military ships are not subject to SOLAS, but they’ll be very similiar in arrangements, I’d wager) The requirement to have them is just a quick visual reference in the engine room as to what the bridge is ordering up.
Of course, they look more like this and this nowadays.
I’ve worked on Boeings and Airbus commercial passenger aircraft and there is no “start” key. If you know the procedure, and the aircraft has the required services e.g. electrics and air you can start it up. The aircraft batteries supply the electrics to start the APU (Auxiliary Power Unit), which can then supply the air.
I have worked on and crewed on several types (SCCA, SCORE mainly) of race cars.
All of them had two switches. A two position toggle for off and on, and a momentary contact switch for the starter.
Although most small planes require a key to start during normal operations, there are some exceptions.
First of all, it is possible to start many smaller airplanes by hand-propping. I actually had to do this once with a Piper 4 seater with a dead alternator and a drained battery - no juice to power the starter. Although straightforward in theory, it’s a little sobering to contemplate starting by hand a metal blade over five feet long intended to spin at 1000-2500 revolutions per minute. You do not want to screw this up, which is a major reason why electric starters became so popular.
Some small planes - usually “antique” models that never had an electrical system installed such as some Piper Cubs, Taylorcrafts, and Aeronca Champs (to name just a few) are normally started by handpropping and thus require no key to start. Other planes, such as kitplanes, homebuilts, and some banner towing planes where weight is of great concern may also lack electrical starters and thus starting keys.
I have also flown an ultralight that started with a push-button electric starter - again, no key - and another using a “pull start”. You know those pull-ropes used to start things like lawnmower motors? Like those. Exactly like those. Again, no key required.
However, virtually all factory-built, FAA-certified small planes built in the last 50 years have used keys for starting purposes.
It’s been a looooong time and I might misremember but I don’t think that Army vehicles, jeeps, 2-1/2 ton trucks etc, needed keys. The logistic problems of lost keys at critical times etc. were probably why.
To keep your vehicle from being stolen you took out the distributor rotor or the coil to distributor wire. So all prospective vehicle thieves carried those items.
In Formula 1 the cars have an external starter.The starter looks like something of a dipstick in our road cars but it is insetred horzontally at the rear of the car(think rectal thermometers.I know its ewwwww.).The starters have an inbuilt battery pack but I am not that clear over the working of one.
Military aircraft for sure, and almost certainly commercial aircraft, do not sit on the tarmac fueled. They are typically only fueled a few hours before flight, when they are certified to fly. Very rarely does a plane sit unattended with fuel on it.
So even if you knew how to start the plane, you’d have to have an accomplice with access to the fuel trucks, and arrange ahead of time for it to be filled.(and of course you’d have to know how to fuel, large planes aren’t like cars when it comes to gas)
This is something that often bugs me in movies, where people will often just hop into a plane a take off with it. They wouldn’t get very far on an empty tank.
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