On Sat, 20 Sep 2003 15:09:37 GMT, Ed Rasimus
wrote:

If I cut out something a little too much I apologize..

Snip..

between "blowing" the pod--an intentional act and ripping it off
through exceeding the design limits. Kapish?

Does that mean I don't get an A on my final term paper? Darn.G
Point taken..

I will make it a point to ask General Olds. I see him regularly and
we're on a first name basis---he calls me Raz and I call him Sir!

While your're at if you would please ask him if he was in the front
seat when an ECM troop came out to the arming area and tried to
install the pod control box. The airman that had never been near a
running engine and all he could think about was having to climb up on
the intake of that giant vacuum cleaner sucking lots of air..

Depending upon the level of maintenance being signed off, it took
either a five or seven level to release a red-diagonal, and a seven
level to release a red-X. A new attachment to the airframe that
required carting, but was not yet carted, put the airplane on a red-X.
If you were signing off with three-stripers in '67 you were looking
for trouble.

Three stripers were five levels. They were carted or uncarted ahead of
time by MMS. The extra racks if there were usually loaded with bombs
by the time we got to them.

Snip...

You can spot the difference between a TER and MER from a long way
off--the MER is the great big rack that carries six weapons, the TER
is the short stubby one that has three stations. Hard to believe you
could have missed such a basic distinction.

Not hard to believe after all these years for me. I probably loaded
pods a thousand times in a short period. Just one of many things I
did. Pod goes on a clean pylon or goes between a couple bombs. Just
another load. I don't remember if there were bombs behind the pod or
not. My guess because of the length of the pod it was a TER.

You might have noticed that C/L MERs (that's the big long one with six
weapons), have the bottom stations "just a few inches off the
concrete" regardless of what is hung there.

I don't remember centerline loads at all. There could have been at
Ubon in 1967, but I don't remember any. Just not in the old memory
banks. First time I saw a picture of a load like that I thought wow
that is amazing. I didn't know they could do that.

You might have noticed a considerable reduction in missions flown to
areas needing a lot of ECM from October of '68 until May of '72. It
relates.

I stuck to the shop as much as I could at Korat from Nov 68-Sep 70. I
stayed away from debriefing and any crew involvement. I had no idea
where they were flying or what they were doing and that was fine by
me..

Suspension gear is "standard"--doesn't matter to the metal whether it
goes on an F-4 or a 105. The wiring changes, but the suspension is
either 16" or 30" lugs and it's all the same on 781 gear.

http://www.afa.org/magazine/Nov1998/1198mig.asp
"It had required a massive Air Force*wide effort to bring Bolo into
being. The entire 8th TFW's energy was thrown into overcoming last
minute problems, with the support troops working all night long. (A
typical glitch involved the sway braces on the F-4C. They were located
differently than on the F-105, and the shell of the QRC-160 pod had to
be reinforced in order to fit well.)"

"support troops working all night long." I don't remember the number
of people with me that night in the nose dock, but maybe 2 or 3 and I
think a civilian tech rep. You know that "only a select few" for a
secret mission stuff.G And no air driven tools in those days for
some reason. Speed handles and torque wrenches..

I reiterate, that in 1970, there wasn't a high probabiliy of MiG
encounters.

Basically bring the F-4E over in Nov 1968 and shut the area down
where they would have been usefull? In 1968 the F-4E squadron from
Eglin was originally scheduled to go into Vietnam and for some reason
changed to Korat. That is the way my orders changed anyway from
Vietnam to Korat.