Ejection Seats

Aviation and Binoculars grew out of my personal interest in aviation and engineering, a special hook for me has always been ejection seats. As with all great ideas the inspiration to do something about it came from a conversation over a drink or two at a back garden BBQ.  A good friend worked for BAE systems, which is a British multinational aerospace, defence and information security company based in London England.  We jokingly discussed the work being carried out on the Eurofighter and the opportunity to buy an ejection seat that had been tested to the point of near destruction. He said no, I said yes…..of course you cannot buy these state of the art pieces. But…. at that time you could buy older ejection seats made by Martin Baker. After a short road trip, I came home with one and a new hobby (obsession) was born. The first seat purchased was a Martin Baker 2CA seat as used in the RAF Canberra – shown in the picture (sadly not the actual seat).

Martin Baker Ejection Seats

Here at Aviation and Binoculars we specialise in early seats that we think show case British engineering at its absolute best. The early seats dating from 1950’s – 1990’ were hand made works of art designed to work as an integrated part of the aircraft, being used as a last resort pilot safety escape device.

The worldwide leading supplier of the ejection seat is the British company called  Martin Baker that was formed during the second World War. During the war it was apparent that with the ever-increasing speed of aircraft, and the use of Jet propulsion systems, pilots needed assistance to safely exit an aircraft in times of emergency.  The first live, non-test ejection took place on 30th May 1949 by Jo Lancaster. Jo was flying an Armstrong Whitworth AW52 aircraft and was forced to eject using a pre-Mk1 ejection seat over Southam, Warwickshire. 

From that day until now, Martin-Baker has delivered over 70,000 ejection seats to 93 air forces and has saved the lives of more than 7,700 aircrew members. Although difficult to standardise costs it is estimated that each seat costs between £100,000-£200,000 to manufacture and supply.

The design and complexity of the seats has obviously changed over the years, however the basic premiss is that the pilot can activate the seat by pulling one of two yellow and black actuators (See  pic – Head box and actuator handle for a Martin Baker Fleet Air Arm Buccaneer Ejection seat).

Coding for Martin Baker Seats

Once pulled a series of automatic process kick in to propel the whole seat through the top of the aircraft, when it senses it is at a safe height it automatically deploys a drogue chute to stabilise the seat. This allows the pilot to be thrown forward where the main parachute is then deployed. From beginning to end the whole process takes between 2.5 – 4 seconds and should see the pilot safely parachuting to earth.

Martin Baker seats are designed to be aircraft specific and have a code number for the Mark (seat development) and Aircraft used in. The coding of each is shown below and helped the RAF in the installation and servicing of the seats. This is the most complete list we have found and covers everything from the early Meteor Aircraft through to the Harrier jump Jet.

1 Meteor

1CA Canberra

1E Meteor

1F Venom

2A Attacker

2B Wyvern

2CA Canberra

2CB Canberra B(l)8

2D Sea Hawk

2E Meteor

2F Venom

2H Hunter

2HAN Hunter

3A Valiant

3B Vampire T11

3CA Canberra

3CS Canberra PR9 Pilot

3CT1 & 2 Canberra T4

3CT3 Canberra T4

3H

3J Javelin

3K Vulcan

3L Victor

4A Sea Venom

4BSB & 4BSC Lightning

4DSA Sea Vixen

4HA Hunter T7

4MSA Buccaneer S2

4P Jet Provost

4QS Canberra PR9 Nav

5A Phantom

6MSA Buccaneer S2

6MSB Buccaneer S2

7A Phantom

9 &9A Harrier

9B Jaguar

9D Harner7a

10A Tornado

10B Hawk

10H Sea Harrier

12 Harrier GR7

Our favourite seats have to be from the iconic V bomber series – Victor, Vulcan and Valiant. These were designed in the 1950’s and 1960’s as the RAF’s nuclear bomber fleet. This was an incredible era in British aviation and we will be writing a separate article on them. Here at Aviation and Binoculars we have managed to source a seat from each to complete the set – see the main website for details. The picture below shows a Vulcan Bomber ejection seat (note armrests for pilot comfort on longer missions).

Each seat we purchase goes through a labour-intensive professional process to take it from a functional RAF escape (slightly uncomfortable) seat into a piece of art that could grace any home or office environment. Each seat is finished in best quality upholstered leather to make them a true talking point. We offer seats finished in either chrome or hand polished, and mounted on a bespoke aviation inspired base.

After many years of collecting, we have a larger stock of seats than is shown on the website so if there is a Plane that was always your child hood dream, who knows we may have a seat from it – Please contact us to find out.

david

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