What happens to the wire after launching a fly-by-wire missile?
In: Engineering
TOW missiles have two capstan blocks in the front of the missile tube. The wires run from the rear of the missile, through the capstan blocks (very tricky to rewire when servicing the missile into the electrical connectors that link the missile’s tube to the firing post. When you unload a fired TOW missile two squibs (very small explosive charges), one in each capstan block, fire. This cuts the wires so when you unload the tube the wires just fall out, usually on top of the vehicle you fired it from.
Operationally you normally wrap the fired wires around a stake near the firing point and pull them in at the end of the day. When not firing from a static point the wire just gets discarded. If you do pull it in, make sure the missile on the other end went boom.
Source: tripped over a lot of guidance wires.
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