John,

I've flown a few Landing Modes in the TRAM, but even then they were a bit
squirrelly without good offsets and a good Az- and El-Lock. All Whidbey BNs
had local offsets down pat, but it could get interesting at an unfamiliar
field on a dark night.

Good offsets and LOTS of updates were even more important with the very
primitive "A" systems. Unfortunately I never had the comparative pleasure
of operating the "E" system. "Es" were still wet dreams for the West Coast
B/Ns when I left the Rock in 1974.

--
Mike Kanze

"The enemy should be in no doubt that we are his Nemesis and that we are
bringing about his rightful destruction."

- Lieutenant-Colonel Tim Collins, Royal Irish Battle Group, to his troops on
the eve of Operation Iraqi Freedom


"John R Weiss" wrote in message
news:hyFfc.48722$rg5.109496@attbi_s52...
"Mike Kanze" wrote...

Flying the needles reminds me of the A-6A's AN/ASQ-61 Landing Mode
program.
Think of an ILS-type approach displayed through VDI symbology and driven
by
ever-meandering velocities from the "A's" squirrelly AN/ASN-31 inertial,
and
you'll get the idea.

We tried it one VMC night while approaching runway 24 at Whidbey. Until
that experience I never knew that the Earth rotated about Dugualla Bay.
g

I've flown a few Landing Modes in the TRAM, but even then they were a bit
squirrelly without good offsets and a good Az- and El-Lock. All Whidbey
BNs had
local offsets down pat, but it could get interesting at an unfamiliar
field on a
dark night. Some BNs would use the Laser, but that was a no-no in many
places... ;-)