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The throttle levers for the Comet's outboard (#1 and #4) engines are weirdly shaped, with flanges that extend up and partially over the throttle levers for the inboard (#2 and #3) engines:

Comet throttle levers

(Image cropped and annotated by me; original by Geni at Wikimedia Commons)

Why are the Comet's outboard throttle levers shaped like this?

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Sean, this will probably surprise you as much as it did me, but the answer is that it is intended to help keep the hand of the pilot operating the throttles on them and not have it slip off. In my opinion, it's a nifty little design detail.

Close up from video of a simulator built from a restored Comet cockpit section.

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  • $\begingroup$ Which Comet/Nimrod-series aircraft is that photo from? $\endgroup$
    – Vikki
    Commented Jan 12, 2019 at 23:11
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    $\begingroup$ A Comet 4 built in 1958. The photo is a screen capture from this very interesting video on YouTube. youtube.com/watch?v=nuOpFjxmP4c. I am not sure the panel is completely original but the throttle quadrant appears to be the original and the design of the throttle quadrant appears to be identical on all Comets. $\endgroup$
    – Juan Jimenez
    Commented Jan 12, 2019 at 23:20
  • $\begingroup$ Huh. The instrument layout of that Comet 4 looks considerably different from that of the Comet 4 in the image from which I cropped the image in my question... EDIT: I see you edited your comment while I was writing mine! :-P $\endgroup$
    – Vikki
    Commented Jan 12, 2019 at 23:24
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    $\begingroup$ The video shows portions of the instrument panel and instruments restoration. $\endgroup$
    – Juan Jimenez
    Commented Jan 12, 2019 at 23:29

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