Strange controls – watch the pic!

I’m a fan of classic propliners, and I am always looking for some of the less well-known types. I mean, I’ve seen enough pictures of Douglases, Boeings, Lockheeds and the like. I know there are a lot of other, lesser well-known types, which are also very interesting and I search the web for facts, data and pictures. One of those almost unknown types was a French built, very big ‘quadrimoteur’, the SNCASE SE.2010 Armagnac. Only 8 of them were built, and it first flew in 1949. Not many people know it was the biggest aircraft ever -for a short time only, until the Bristol Brabazon appeared a few months later. It carried up to 160 pax and it had a payload of some 20 tonnes, which was quite something in those days. It was not successful however, as Air France considered the type too costly to operate and cancelled their orders. After being operated commercially for just 8 months from 1952 by TAI (predecessor of UTA) they were all WFU and stored. In the years 1953-1955 they were put back into service on a Toulouse-Saigon shuttle by SAGETA to transport troops and supplies to the war in Indo-China, in which France was involved. In 1954 they were retired and broken up in 1955.
So much for a little bit of the history from this unknown, but graceful airliner.

I found a photograph of the cockpit of the Armagnac, and what struck me was the strange cockpit lay-out. It seems there were no conventional control columns. As you can see in the picture, it looks like it had, for both the captain’s position as well as the co-pilot’s position each, two huge bars sticking up into the cockpit. Obviously these bars replaced the control columns you usually see in aircraft cockpits and which control the ailerons and the horizontal stabilizer. This cockpit looks more like the way a tank or a bulldozer is steered.

My question: does anyone how the bars work the control surfaces, has any of you seen these kind of controls before, or after in any other type of a/c? Must have been quite a challenge to take-off or land this huge airliner with these kind of control bars!

I found the pictures here: http://www.eads.net/frame/lang/en/1024/content/OF00000000400004/5/62/542625.html

Tillerman.