The VG-14A Vertical Gyro contains a gyro that spins about a vertical axis and provides pitch and roll attitude reference information for use in the automatic flight control, flight instrument, flight director and radar stabilization systems. The VG-14A consists of two major components: a vertical gyro (VG-401) and a base. The gyro is mounted on top of the base with two resilient mounts which prevent external vibrations from being transmitted to the gyro. The gyro houses the gyro motor, gimbals, torquer motors, synchros, and liquid level switches. The base assembly contains all the electronics required to control and monitor the gyro. The VG-14A is 9.38 inches in length, 6.75 inches in width, 5.89 inches in height and weighs 7.3 pounds maximum. The VG-14A requires 155 volts, 400 Hz, 80 VA for starting power but operates on 115 volts, 400 Hz, 40 VA power.

The attitude reference has a gyro motor which spins on a vertical axis. The vertical axis is supported by two gimbals which allow ± 85 degree freedom of pitch and 360 degree freedom of roll. Two transmitting synchros provide the displacement information of the gimbals with respect to the gyro vertical axis. Two torquer motors and additional circuitry in the base assembly maintain the vertical axis perpendicular to the earth's surface. Liquid level switches provide references for the torquer motor circuits. The VG-14A has a gyro rotor speed of 22,000 rpm. Pitch synchro and roll synchro provide three-wire outputs with gimbal displacement information to the automatic flight control system and the instruments. The pitch and roll data transformers convert pitch and roll displacement information for use in the flight director and for radar antenna stabilization. On -902 units, an additional 205 mV ac/degree, three-wire pitch and roll output is provided which is of opposite polarity to the normal three-wire synchro outputs. This additional output gives pitch and roll angles that are 180 degrees from the angles provided by the normal outputs.