"Kingfish" wrote in message
oups.com...
It was back in the days of the F-4 and I saw the smoky exhaust trail
before I spotted
the airplane, so it must have been Air Force.

Coulda been Navy(?) The USAF didn't own the only smoke-emitting
Phantoms.

Nope, the J-79 engines used by the USAF were notorious for smoking.
It's one reason their F-4s were called Olde Smokey. During my stint with
Uncle Sam's Misguided Children (USMC), we always knew one of ours from one
of theirs. IIRC, it had something to do with the Navy's (and Marine's)
engines coming from a different source that used some different parts... or
maybe teflon somethingies.

I could be wrong, of course.

Care to weigh in on this Dudley?