Vietnam era F-4s Q

I could well have been mistaken and some of those log pages are pretty hard to
read at times. What I mostly remember was that we had Tree birds for some time
at Misawa in the 475th which went to Kinsan to the 3rd TFW, later to become the
8th TFW. I was in the 391st in Misawa and reported into the 80th at Kinsan in
Feb 72. I left in Feb 72 and reported in to the 8th TFS at Holloman, departing
there TDY to Tahkli under Constant Guard inApr 72 Most of what I "know" about
when the Tree birds were transferred to SEA came from Dean Gushwa who followed
me to HAFB a month after I did. He told me how much the 80th guys were wining
about not getting to go and how one of the birds was shot down shortly after
arriving.

When I saw 550 on the post guarding Area A/C and AFMC HQ I recalled the tail
number, looked it up, and saw that I had flown it.

I make no pretenses about being a historian and I don't track tail numbers.
There are plenty of other guys out there doing that for me. You guys willhave
to figure it all out. NOr do I know much at all about the Tree program except
we flew them and input performance report at debrief. You guys gotta give me a
break, I was a Lt then LOL


Smartace 11's comment about the a/c being transferred in April '72 is most
confusing
as at least the 8 initial Combat Tree birds were transferred earlier, because
kills
were scored by Combat Tree-equipped a/c in February (Lodge/Locher's first
kill, at
night) and March, and the first combat incident involving a Tree-equipped a/c
that's
mentioned in Red Baron occurred on 15 January 1972, with another on 17
January.
There were two Red Baron incidents in Dec. 1971 involving USAF F-4s; in
neither of
them are the a/c credited with having Combat Tree. FWIW, Thornborough says
the
transfers took place in Dec. '71/January '72, so the timing works out.
Michel in
"Clashes" says early in December, but doesn't specifically cite a source for
that.

Guy

(Smartace11) wrote:



Only used Combat Skyspot on the Koon-Ni range and then mostly during ORIs.
Never used it in SEA. The antenna seemed to be mostly a good thing for the
boomer to try to knock off on a bad day.

Steve

A bit of confusion here, I suspect. The "towel rack" antenna on D's
that was a target for errant boomers related to LORAN. The Skyspot
beacon was initially a little hand held gadget about the size of a
pack of cigarettes.

When we did Skyspot (ptuiii!) in 105D's we were deemed incapable of
holding the little gizmo for the length of the run, and always had to
rendezvous with a "pathfinder" (ptuiiii!) such as a F-100F, B-66, or
(R)F-4.

Later, the tiny gadget was put in the R/C/P of the F-4--right console
forward. Had a toggle switch to turn it on or off.

Nomenclature is beyond my recollection.


Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (ret)
***"When Thunder Rolled:
*** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
*** from Smithsonian Books
ISBN: 1588341038

(Smartace11) wrote:

A slip of the flying fingers typing lexicon. Yes, we interrogated the
tanker transponder, not the tanker's radar.

Senior moment Ed??? LOL

CRS, CRAFT, all those maladies.


Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (ret)
***"When Thunder Rolled:
*** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
*** from Smithsonian Books
ISBN: 1588341038

Be happy to; could you give me an intro and/or his email, or ask him for me?

I lost contact with him years back and have no idea where he is but I will
look
him up in my 80th Headhunters roster - think I saw his name there. He and I
were in F-4 RTU, the 391st at Misawa and 80th at Kunsan together then he went
to Udorn and I went to Tahkli via Holloman.








I have a number for him but it is a 2001. I can pass it on along with his
address if you email me privately.

No Ed, he was right about the antenna on the F-4. It was a round cylinder
about 11/4 inch dia. and about 3 1/2 tall on the spine near the refueling
receptacle. I never lost one, but have heard of them being smacked.

Better that than having the boom in your lap in the back seat. Happened to
a friend of mine, halfway between Korea and Alaska, the boomer popped the
boom right into his lap in the backseat. Had to ride the rest of the way
home below 10K and reeking of fuel that dripped on him.
--
Les
F-4C(WW),D,E,G(WW)/AC-130A/MC-130E EWO (ret)


"Ed Rasimus" wrote in message
...
(Smartace11) wrote:



Only used Combat Skyspot on the Koon-Ni range and then mostly during
ORIs.
Never used it in SEA. The antenna seemed to be mostly a good thing for
the
boomer to try to knock off on a bad day.

Steve

A bit of confusion here, I suspect. The "towel rack" antenna on D's
that was a target for errant boomers related to LORAN. The Skyspot
beacon was initially a little hand held gadget about the size of a
pack of cigarettes.

When we did Skyspot (ptuiii!) in 105D's we were deemed incapable of
holding the little gizmo for the length of the run, and always had to
rendezvous with a "pathfinder" (ptuiiii!) such as a F-100F, B-66, or
(R)F-4.

Later, the tiny gadget was put in the R/C/P of the F-4--right console
forward. Had a toggle switch to turn it on or off.

Nomenclature is beyond my recollection.


Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (ret)
***"When Thunder Rolled:
*** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
*** from Smithsonian Books
ISBN: 1588341038

On Wed, 3 Sep 2003 13:19:38 -0500, "Les Matheson"
wrote:

Had to ride the rest of the way
home below 10K and reeking of fuel that dripped on him.


Surprised he wasnt reeking of something else lol.



greg

--
$ReplyAddress =~ s#\@.*$##; # Delete everything after the '@'
Alley Gator. With those hypnotic big green eyes
Alley Gator. She'll make you 'fraid 'em
She'll chew you up, ain't no lie

"Scott R. Wilson" wrote in There were four sets of
knobs on the face of the KY-532 to dial in Mode 2. All military
transponders have the Mode 2 selection on the transponder itself.

I screwed that one up, there were four knobs, not sets of knobs.
Scott W.

Guy Alcala wrote in message ...
Buzzer wrote:

On Sat, 09 Aug 2003 16:12:58 GMT, Ed Rasimus
wrote:

Buzzer wrote:

Center going out as you got closer to source.If I remember right on
the APR-25 a really strong signal would cause the signal to go to the
outer edge of the scope and curl back in a loop. Lots of strong
signals - lots of loops..

See my previous regarding proximity vs signal strength. Sure, as you
get closer, you get a stronger signal, but the parameter was strength.

Probably why I set the sensitivity of each freq band to x db that
would give y deflection. Instead of x number of yds from sam site
would give a certain deflection since not all sam sites put out the
same exact power?G

No looping. The strobe went out to the limit of the display, that's
all.

Must have looped on the bench due to the loopy technician.

I have a vague memory of seeing a photo or film of an APR-25 display
somewhere, which IIRR did loop. Maybe this was film of a bench test, and
you'd never get close enough to a site in flight for the signal strength to
be great enough for that to happen?

And now I have confirmation of APR-25 looping. I finally got my hands
on a copy of Thornborough's "Iron Hand", which is indeed chock full of
good stuff as Ed said. In it there's an account by an F-4CWW guy of a
mission on Night Four of LB II, which I had previously read in the 2nd
edition of Thornborough's "The Phantom Story", by Bill McLeod (and
which have been the vague memory that was nagging me, rather than a
photo or film):

"The EC-121 called us about a minute before the last B-52 was clear
and told us that we were the last a/c remaining in the target area,
and made it plain that they thought that we should get out of there.
As soon as I answered the EC-121, Red Crown came up on Guard and
announced 'SAM, SAM, SAM!', which was followed by Don's calm voice
from the rear cockpit saying 'We're the target'.

"The APR-25/-26 lit up with a classic full-system launch with a strobe
that went clear to the edge of the scope and part way back to the
center, the launch audio started screaming and two SAMs lifted off at
our eleven o'clock. I kicked my left rudder to put hte strobe and
missiles at twelve o'clock and fired both Shrikes at the guy, then
rolled into an inverted slice and pulled the a/c towards the ground
with at least 4-5g. As soon as the nose was well down, I rolled out
part of the bank and reacquired the two SAMs over the canopy rail."
rest of account snipped

I don't know if the APR-25 was adjusted incorrectly so that it was
oversensitive, or if it was operating correctly and they were really
that close/the signal was that strong. McLeod mentions that they'd
been orbiting at about 18,000 feet, and his account implies that they
were offset several miles from the site at the time the SA-2s were
fired.

Guy

(Guy alcala) wrote:

And now I have confirmation of APR-25 looping. I finally got my hands
on a copy of Thornborough's "Iron Hand", which is indeed chock full of
good stuff as Ed said. In it there's an account by an F-4CWW guy of a
mission on Night Four of LB II, which I had previously read in the 2nd
edition of Thornborough's "The Phantom Story", by Bill McLeod (and
which have been the vague memory that was nagging me, rather than a
photo or film):

"The EC-121 called us about a minute before the last B-52 was clear
and told us that we were the last a/c remaining in the target area,
and made it plain that they thought that we should get out of there.
As soon as I answered the EC-121, Red Crown came up on Guard and
announced 'SAM, SAM, SAM!', which was followed by Don's calm voice
from the rear cockpit saying 'We're the target'.

"The APR-25/-26 lit up with a classic full-system launch with a strobe
that went clear to the edge of the scope and part way back to the
center, the launch audio started screaming and two SAMs lifted off at
our eleven o'clock. I kicked my left rudder to put hte strobe and
missiles at twelve o'clock and fired both Shrikes at the guy, then
rolled into an inverted slice and pulled the a/c towards the ground
with at least 4-5g. As soon as the nose was well down, I rolled out
part of the bank and reacquired the two SAMs over the canopy rail."
rest of account snipped

I don't know if the APR-25 was adjusted incorrectly so that it was
oversensitive, or if it was operating correctly and they were really
that close/the signal was that strong. McLeod mentions that they'd
been orbiting at about 18,000 feet, and his account implies that they
were offset several miles from the site at the time the SA-2s were
fired.

Had to look it up in Larry Davis' book "Wild Weasel" (Squadron Signal)
to check. It doesn't seem logical that the F-4C WW would still be
carrying APR-25/26 when the supported aircraft were all equipped with
APR 36/37 by Linebacker II. But, that's what the book says.

It wasn't till after the war was over that the birds got digital RWR.




Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (ret)
***"When Thunder Rolled:
*** An F-105 Pilot Over N. Vietnam"
*** from Smithsonian Books
ISBN: 1588341038

Ed Rasimus wrote:

snip

Had to look it up in Larry Davis' book "Wild Weasel" (Squadron Signal)
to check. It doesn't seem logical that the F-4C WW would still be
carrying APR-25/26 when the supported aircraft were all equipped with
APR 36/37 by Linebacker II. But, that's what the book says.

It wasn't till after the war was over that the birds got digital RWR.

Also mentioned in Thornborough. He says the F-4CWWs had APR-25/-26 plus
ER-142 during the war (the latter giving a considerable boost in
information over the base RWR/LWR), then ALR-46 (1973), and ALR-53 replaced
the ER-142 (chronology on pg. 146).

Guy