Utility Systems

Oxygen System

The F-14 carries one or two 10-liter liquid oxygen bottles providing oxygen to the crew when needed.

  • Control: The oxygen supply is controlled on the pilot Oxygen-Vent Airflow Control Panel and RIO Oxygen-Vent Airflow Control Panel respectively. Both panels contain an OXYGEN switch that sets oxygen supply to ON or OFF.

  • Indicator: Liquid oxygen remaining is shown on the Liquid Oxygen Quantity Indicator on the pilot’s right side console. The gauge shows remaining liters of liquid oxygen up to 20 liters (if two bottles are installed). The indicator is electrically driven, and if it receives no power, an OFF flag will be visible, and it will display 0 liters remaining.

  • Caution light: The RIO Caution-Advisory Panel has the OXY LOW caution light which illuminates when the liquid oxygen quantity is below 2 liters.

    During the INST test on the ref:MTPanel, the liquid oxygen meter shows 2 liters, and the OXY LOW caution light illuminates.

Canopy

The rear-hinged F-14 canopy is operated hydraulically and pneumatically. Controls are present in both the pilot and RIO cockpits.

See Canopy Control Handle or Canopy Control Handle for the controls.

The CANOPY caution light on both the pilot Caution - Advisory Indicator and the RIO Caution-Advisory Panel illuminates if the canopy is not in the down and locked, secured position.

Ejection System

The F-14 Tomcat is equipped with dual Martin-Baker GRU-7A rocket-assisted ejection seats, one for the pilot and one for the RIO. The ejection system is a zero/zero system, capable of successfully ejecting the crewmembers at zero airspeed, stationary, on the ground.

  • Ejection command lever: This lever, located in the RIO cockpit, selects if the RIO ejects the pilot as well when he ejects. The lever is situated beside the sensor control panel, see Eject Command Lever. When set to PILOT, the pilot ejects both crewmembers, while the RIO ejects only himself. When set to MCO, both crewmembers eject both crewmembers.

    The system does not allow pilot-only ejection because it would be undesirable for the RIO to remain in the aircraft alone.

  • Indicator: The pilot has an indication of what position the ejection command lever is at on the Landing Gear Control Panel, the EJECT CMD flip-flop indicator showing PILOT when the lever is in the pilot and MCO when in MCO.

  • Canopy jettison: If the canopy does not jettison when initiating the ejection sequence, it’s possible to manually jettison it using the Canopy Jettison Handle in the pilot cockpit or the Canopy Jettison Handle in the RIO cockpit. If the canopy inhibited ejection after ejection initiation, jettisoning the canopy will most likely restart it. If ejection is needed during a flat spin, it’s also recommended to manually jettison the canopy and allow it to clear before initiating the ejection sequence as the canopy might need longer to clear during a flat spin.

Jettison System

The Jettison system has four modes of operation: emergency, ACM, selective, and auxiliary.

Emergency Jettison

The emergency jettison is selected via the EMERG STORES JETT on the Landing Gear Control Panel. Selection causes the EMERG JETT caution light to illuminate on the pilot Caution - Advisory Indicator.

  • Requirement: The emergency jettison requires only no weight on wheels indicated (no master arm) and ejects all stores except for Sidewinders.

ACM Jettison

The ACM jettison is selected via the ACM JETT button under the ACM cover/switch on the Air Combat Maneuver Panel.

  • Requirement: The ACM jettison, like the emergency jettison, requires no master arm but instead requires that the landing gear lever is up. Unlike the emergency jettison, the ACM jettison only ejects those stations selected by the RIO on the Armament Panel (set to SEL or B for stations 1 and 8).

Selective Jettison

The selective jettison is set and executed by the RIO on the Armament Panel. This mode of jettisoning requires the landing gear handle to be in the up position and the master arm to be on.

  • Procedure: To jettison in selective mode, set the desired station switches to SEL and hold the SEL JETT switch to JETT.

Auxiliary Jettison

The auxiliary jettison mode is a backup mode to use when the other modes have failed. Like the selective jettison mode, it requires the landing gear handle to be up and the master arm to be on.

  • Limitation: This mode can only eject air-to-ground stores and ejects them by actuating the normal release hooks. This means that the aircraft needs to fly straight and level as the stores are not ejected forcefully but instead just released and cleared using gravity.

Note: No jettison mode can jettison ITERs or stores loaded on those; they need to be dropped like normal, with or without the fuzes armed.