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#11
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"Bob" wrote in message oups.com... Hi John, I had the pleasure of flying most all the F4 models made for the Navy at Pax River. Also had one squadron tour in the F4J block 46 and a couple hundred landings. Had many traps in the F8E with more than a few "wet flight suit" traps in the dark. Also had traps in props. I believe I can say without fear of argument from any Phantom that the F4 was the easiest airplane ever built to land, carrier or shore based. For starters, the F-4s were all assigned to the "big" decks. Having grown up on 27 Charlies, the "big" decks were like cheating. Secondly the F-4 dirtied up was ultra-stable. Squeeze a hair of power and the ball went up a hair. First time in my career I ever saw a ball go out the side of the lens. In F-8s you left the ball nearing the ramp and gave it a little high dip to set the hook or it could easily bounce and hook skip the whole speghetti pile. The Phantom just hit the deck and planted itself dowm. Tail hook the size of a plow shear, never heard of one parting. If you did bolt, a rarity, you had enough power to bend it around in a VFR pattern and get back to the groove in about 60 seconds. About the only gripe we had around the boat was fuel consumption was high. Almost as bad as present day F-18s. But our boarding rates were in the 90% range and bolts were uncommon. By far the best carrier plane I personally ever flew. Now in the air in ACM it was a dog and took both hands to pull max G's. Pretty good vertical with it's power and gave you a real edge over guys who didn't like to get their nose up. Nasty and unrecoverable flat spin mode, not as bad as the F-14 but usually resulted in either a punch out or a mort. So you didn't spin it, simple enough. The guy who told you the F-4 was scary dirty must have been a helo pilot or an USAF guy. Not all that analytical for sure. SNIP Can't disagree with most of your commentary. The Phantom got better with the slotted stab, never needed more than one hand to pull max G. It was challenging to exploit in ACM. For my first 500 hours, my thought was "No wonder we beat up on these guys!" (F-8 driver perspective.) Around the 500 hour mark it changed, "How did we ever beat up these guys?" The F-8 "high dip" cost us a jet for a whole cruise. Broke the nose strut trunions. 27C, night, pitching deck was an F-8 mishap waiting to happen. Certainly having a left or right runway, a 3 1/2 degree glideslope, and a wee more hook-to-ramp made the big decks much more accommodating. OTOH, they all look pretty small in the dark. Yes, the Phantom was very solid around the blunt end of the boat. Went through a whole cruise without a bolt ... until I mentioned that fact to my RO on the last flight (mid translant). BOING!!! Oh well .... 99% I found the F-14 a revelation. Not rock steady like the Phantom, but significantly slower and tons more gas. It took some flying (as did the Gator), but it was safe as houses. I've always maintained that all the hogwash about shipboard flying qualities, hard-to-get-aboard, etc is just that: hogwash. Show me the carrier landing mishap rate. Cause there's the jets that'll kill you or jets that'll take care of you. Nobody TRIES to hit the ramp. Nor do they put plumbers in unforgiving airplanes. R / John |
#12
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"José Herculano" wrote in message ... If you get an opportunity to get checked out in the F-8, I recommend you go for it. THAT was an airplane that could enthrall you ... and then bite you on the ass. Not a single one flying anymore... sad... Isn't there a F-8K or two privately held? Nothing quite like an F-8 in the break oil cooler door open. R / John |
#13
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Ed Rasimus wrote:
On 26 Mar 2005 14:19:03 -0800, "Bob" wrote: Hi John, . Now in the air in ACM it was a dog and took both hands to pull max G's. Pretty good vertical with it's power and gave you a real edge over guys who didn't like to get their nose up. Nasty and unrecoverable flat spin mode, not as bad as the F-14 but usually resulted in either a punch out or a mort. So you didn't spin it, simple enough. The guy who told you the F-4 was scary dirty must have been a helo pilot or an USAF guy. Not all that analytical for sure. That's low. Really low. And, notice how I resist saying that USAF guys could pull max G with out using two hands. I just wouldn't say something like that. Of course, if you didn't have to hover on the CAP at "max conserve" orbiting at 250 KIAS to meet cycle time it was a lot easier. Just run around the alloted area a bit above corner velocity and you can grab all the G you want with one hand. Ed Rasimus Fighter Pilot (USAF-Ret) "When Thunder Rolled" www.thunderchief.org www.thundertales.blogspot.com Two hands to pull 'max 'G'? Hogwash. I could overstress the thing w/o problem. As for everything else, pretty close. I did love it but never heard of one in a flat spin. Lots of OOC, spin stuff but nothing flat. Even when the stab horns were breaking, 1976.7, we lost a F-4J(VF-33) when it broke. The plane spun but when the airloads allowed the stab to fall full leading edge up, it recovered. |
#14
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José Herculano wrote:
If you get an opportunity to get checked out in the F-8, I recommend you go for it. THAT was an airplane that could enthrall you ... and then bite you on the ass. Not a single one flying anymore... sad... _____________ José Herculano Doesn't Thunderbird aviation still have one? Last I saw it was at Bug Roache's memorial service, flown by Hoss Pearson |
#15
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Hi John,
I guess my "hi dip" remark wasn't quite that. In the days of paddles, the LSO would give you a high dip signal and expect you to just drop the nose a hair and then return to level. This just worked off about ten feet or so from your flat groove altitude. In the F-8 if I wanted to get aboard without chancing a hook skip or a BAR (flat at the ramp) bolter I'd pull up the nose a hair just before touchdown to set the hook. As long as you weren't fast this tecnique kept you from a flat bounce and usually got you a one wire. On a really dark night if the deck was moving I had to depend upon the LSO to tell me when to go for it, like, "OK, fly it on down". Landing an F-8 on a black night with the deck moving was high risk no matter how you did it. I always calculated, the fewer passes over the ramp per night, the better chance I'd make it down to the ready room dry. Back to the Phantom and using two hands for max G's. Figure of speech, please forgive. Yes you could usually get max G with one hand. Getting 9 G's (max) below ten grand at 600 kts took me both hands. But I was a weak-assed pilot who was used to pulling an F-8 around with half the effort. Agree, a savvy F-4 pilot could whip an F-8 everywhere but prior to 1968 the number of ACM savvy F-4 pilots was low. Later F-8's, like the F8J, were dogs and the F-4 guys routinely beat up on them. We had a couple of guys who went through an entire cruise (100-120 traps) without a bolter in the F-4. I had two of my three F-4 cruises bolterless, not all greenies but bolterless. Wire average probably around two. Different strokes........... Sorry if I offended the USAF guys. What I meant to say, was carrier pilots were used to landing at slower speeds and felt comfortable dirty. We spent more time with a donut than any blue suiter given all the FCLP's and constant speed approach patterns. Not necessarily better, just different. I spent time with a number of USAF exchange guys and they caught on just fine to our different way of doing things. |
#16
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OK, you are strong. Stick force to get 9 Gs at 600 kts at 1000 ft was
over 50 pounds. Not many good reasons to be doing that in ACM since the vertical was best for the F-4. The F-4 had a rare but unrecoverable flat spin mode. In this mode we tried everything including special anti-spin chutes and still never recovered one. Most of these flat spins were entered from very nose high, slow speed high yaw maneuvers, like trying to kick the nose down from a very high yo with the rudders. Drag chutes, even anti-spin chutes just streamed above you. very gentle spin rate and low altitude loss per turn but just plain unrecoverable. We lost at least four F-4s at Pax learning about this mode. MacD denied it even existed. |
#17
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"Bob" wrote in message oups.com... Hi John, I guess my "hi dip" remark wasn't quite that. In the days of paddles, the LSO would give you a high dip signal and expect you to just drop the nose a hair and then return to level. This just worked off about ten feet or so from your flat groove altitude. In the F-8 if I wanted to get aboard without chancing a hook skip or a BAR (flat at the ramp) bolter I'd pull up the nose a hair just before touchdown to set the hook. As long as you weren't fast this tecnique kept you from a flat bounce and usually got you a one wire. On a really dark night if the deck was moving I had to depend upon the LSO to tell me when to go for it, like, "OK, fly it on down". Landing an F-8 on a black night with the deck moving was high risk no matter how you did it. I always calculated, the fewer passes over the ramp per night, the better chance I'd make it down to the ready room dry. Perhaps the best way to communicate "go for it" is "Fly the ball." A little nose up could scoop up an early wire, but of course a little too much could ding a tail pipe and maybe even permanently damage the nozzle. By comparison, the F-14 could REALLY troll for a wire. More than a few bolters were saved by a bit of attitude in the wires ... certainly a varsity correction. During my initial F-14 CQ I decided to learn to take auto throttles all the way to touchdown. A nose-up at the ramp (to get the power up for the burble) invariably resulted in a one on the fly. Took a while to master the "jiggle the stick a bit" to get the stab input to bump the power w/o changing the attitude of the jet. .. Back to the Phantom and using two hands for max G's. Figure of speech, please forgive. Yes you could usually get max G with one hand. Getting 9 G's (max) below ten grand at 600 kts took me both hands. But I was a weak-assed pilot who was used to pulling an F-8 around with half the effort. Agree, a savvy F-4 pilot could whip an F-8 everywhere but prior to 1968 the number of ACM savvy F-4 pilots was low. Later F-8's, like the F8J, were dogs and the F-4 guys routinely beat up on them. The J wasn't too bad with the P-420 engine (19,500 in A/B). We were never "routinely beat up on" in it, though I tapped a couple of the better Phantom drivers that WERE beating up on me. The J still couldn't match the D (never got to fly it, but it was light, had the lighter nose and the P-20 engine). The P-420 H was the hot rod. R / John We had a couple of guys who went through an entire cruise (100-120 traps) without a bolter in the F-4. I had two of my three F-4 cruises bolterless, not all greenies but bolterless. Wire average probably around two. Different strokes........... .... Not all greenies. I can relate. My first cruise, the air wing average was 3.06 (I was an LSO until they found out my parents were married to each other). Nowadays, it's around 3.5, almost exactly what CVW-19's top hook (one of the best ball flyers I've EVER seen) had for the cruise. Another trend is to the 1/2 ball high pass as "centered." There are several generations of LSO's now that will grade you as LOBAW for a genuine rails pass. A pity. R / John |
#18
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"Bob" wrote in message oups.com... Hi John, I had the pleasure of flying most all the F4 models made for the Navy [snip] Nasty and unrecoverable flat spin mode, not as bad as the F-14 but usually resulted in either a punch out or a mort. So you didn't spin it, simple enough. Newby question here - I've always been curious as to why any aircraft in the 1 to 1 thrust to weight ratio class (F/A-18? F4? F14? etc) would have trouble being able to "simply" power out flat spins / falling leafs etc. Can anyone give me a bit on an insight? Many thanks, CC |
#19
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On 3/27/05 6:21 PM, in article ,
"Cockpit Colin" wrote: "Bob" wrote in message oups.com... Hi John, I had the pleasure of flying most all the F4 models made for the Navy [snip] Nasty and unrecoverable flat spin mode, not as bad as the F-14 but usually resulted in either a punch out or a mort. So you didn't spin it, simple enough. Newby question here - I've always been curious as to why any aircraft in the 1 to 1 thrust to weight ratio class (F/A-18? F4? F14? etc) would have trouble being able to "simply" power out flat spins / falling leafs etc. Can anyone give me a bit on an insight? That 1:1 thing is a sort of fallacy in many cases. It assumes a combat loaded aircraft (air-to-air load) at half fuel with the motor being run at sea level--large amount of static sea-level rated thrust on a relatively light aircraft... Hence the 1:1 ratio. Most spins and departures occur at much higher altitudes where the thrust of the motor is quite a bit lower. At higher altitudes, the T:W may be less than 1:1. Also keep in mind that if you're spinning, the thrust is spinning with you. Adding full power (providing your jet isn't susceptible to compressor stalls at slow speed and high alpha) simply adds a thrust vector that rotates with the jet. It's not effective in "powering the jet out" of a spin. A falling leaf is essentially a spin with no established rotation. The aircraft establishes itself in a coupled departure mode. Thrust MAY help power you out depending on aircraft configuration and altitude... I think there were some Marines that claimed to have powered out of the falling leaf in the Hornet, but most folks don't have a lot of success with it. IIRC, adding power in the falling leaf INCREASES time to recover. This is all without reviewing the NATOPS notes on falling leaf recoveries. Any TPS dudes want to sing out here? --Woody |
#20
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John Carrier wrote:
Yes, the Phantom was very solid around the blunt end of the boat. Went through a whole cruise without a bolt ... until I mentioned that fact to my RO on the last flight (mid translant). BOING!!! Oh well .... 99% I made the mistake of listing my "100% boarding rate for the cruise" on my fitrep brag sheet prior to a night go as we prepped to cross the pond. Duh... |
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