The F-102 Delta Dagger (Was GWB as a Nat'l Guard Fighter Pilot threads.)

(Jack Linthicum) wrote in message . com...
"David E. Powell" wrote in message ws.com...
OK. I have seen the debate over GWB as an F-102 pilot, so I was wondering
about a couple of things.

First, was the F-102 taken out of service in the early 1970s? I have to ask
because as a kid I remember the Guard around here flying F-106s up to around
1990 or 1991 or so, and they were closely related to the F-102. Though I
recall them being (much) faster. Mach 1.8 vs. Mach 2.32 IIRC.

Second, if GWB was trained on the F-102, and had asked about other planes,
would he have been assigned to the -106 or was Texas going to a different
fighter? The program wher Guard piolts were flying in Vietnam was mentioned,
and the USAF turning him down because the USAF was phasing out the -102. I
guess the time needed to retrain the guy on another type would have
prohibited him making the cutoff date? Makes sense, though, and the USAF
forces in the area could have been phasing out the -102 (which was more
suited as a bomber interceptor for CONUS defense than dogfighting) earlier
than counterparts in the US or Europe.

Third. did the F-102 have a gun or just internal missiles in a weapon bay?
The F-106, as I recall, carried Falcon missiles (Or GENIEs*) and later had a
20mm Vulcan cannon installed as well.

Fourth, the F-102 and F-106 just look cool. Had to say that. Good designs,
and you can see the evolution in fuselage flow in the later design. (Though
the previous one had those cool mini-cones at the tail.)


DEP

*There was a massive "Was GENIE a rocket or a missile" debate on another
group, which I won't get into here. I think the verdict was a rocket, which
it was, guided missile or not.

I have a question: what was/is the policy on use of ANG airplanes? I
have seen several bios that stated George Bush used an F-102 to fly to
Florida for a plant business he was involved in. I presume he did the
usual flight plan and landed at a military installation. What would
be the policy, local or ANG, to a Guard pilot using one of the unit's
planes for something not demonstrably Guard duty? And does/did it
happen as a regular thing?

If the plant buiness is primarily involved in US Government buiness,
it's perfectly legal.
The Navy and Air Force do it all the time.
Since it's perfectly legal today for Bush to land on
disengaged US Aircraft Carrier he wants to,
with any available US Miltary personal helicopter he wants to.
And it's also perfectly legal for him to have the
National Guard invade Yale, and the Naval Academy, if they get
to be moronic with their protest marching.

"Kevin Brooks" wrote in message
...

"Jack Linthicum" wrote in message
om...
I have a question: what was/is the policy on use of ANG airplanes? I
have seen several bios that stated George Bush used an F-102 to fly to
Florida for a plant business he was involved in. I presume he did the
usual flight plan and landed at a military installation. What would
be the policy, local or ANG, to a Guard pilot using one of the unit's
planes for something not demonstrably Guard duty? And does/did it
happen as a regular thing?

It was demonstrably Guard duty, in all likelihood. Pilots had to fly
certain
hours, and often the destinations were left up to them. My brother
returned
from Vietnam and flew Hueys for the ARNG; he flew down to the airport near
our house on one flight so we could come out and meet his crew and look
over
the helo. On another occasion he flew a few orbits over a Little League
baseball game I was playing in. Hours were hours, unless they were
scheduled
to participate in some kind of collective training event. I believe AC
pilots sometimes do the same thing, even today--there was a case a few
years
back where an F-14 pilot flew back to his hometown, landed and met his
family, then departed and tragically piled it in.

Sure, last summer there was an Apache pilot who apparently had
friends/family/business in the local area and flew down once a
week for a month or more.
There are frequently various military aircraft in the transient area
of the airport: fighters, trainers and more often Prowlers than you
might guess.
When you training requires you rack up those miles going *some
where*, you might as well make it a worth while trip.

For that matter, I once had a meeting in Portland, ME, with a fellow
from Bango who'd used his "Company Car" to get to the meeting - An ANG
F-101B.

When I was in the army, I regularly went out to the nearest military
airport with a three-day pass or two-week furlough and hitched a ride
home or to a tourist destination, wherever the lads were going. More
often than not, it was three guys in a C-119 who themselves were on a
joy-ride for the weekend or two weeks. Training missions.

At this moment, there's a company in Texas cutting up the world's only
XC-99 transport and "palletizing" it. It will be taken in bits &
pieces to Wright-Patt by C-5A as planes & crews are available. Those
are training missions, too.

all the best -- Dan Ford
email:

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

"David E. Powell" wrote in message ws.com...
"Guy Alcala" wrote in message
. ..
"Paul J. Adam" wrote:

In message m, David
E. Powell writes
Third. did the F-102 have a gun or just internal missiles in a weapon
bay?

Falcon missiles (six IIRC) in the bay, plus 24 x 2.75" rockets (launch
tubes in the bay doors). From memory there were twelve tubes each with
two rockets nose-to-tail: this was sometimes downloaded to twelve, and
F-102s in Vietnam did some very light ground attack (using their IR
sensor to find targets like campfires and the rockets to engage). My
recollections may be at variance with the facts, so check before using


Thanks! I hadn't known about the 2.75 rockets, sounds like the F-94
Scorpion. The Falcon must have been a decent missile, the -106s and other
fighters used them into the 80s and early 90s.

The Northrop Scorpion was the F-89; the F-94 was the Lockheed Starfire.
Both carried 2.75 inch unguided rockets: the Scorpion in wingtip pods
that also carried jet fuel, and the Starfire in the aircraft's nose
and in small pods halfway out on the wings.

Peter Wezeman
anti-social Darwinist
Suddenly, Jacques found himself looking down the barrel
of George's Hyper-Power.

Cub Driver wrote:


Dan, I've got an electronic Copy of the F-102S Standard Aircraft
Characteristics Chart. Would that be useful to you?
Among other things, it includes graphical representations of the
flight enveloped adn stuff like speed/range tradeoffs.

Pete, that would be great. Send email to and
I'll reply with my home address. Thanks!


For those interested in Flight Manuals, -1 (Dash Ones) Technical
Instructions and AOI's (Aircraft Operating Instructions) and
others try www.flight-manuals-on-cd.com they look quite complete,
are on CD's for around 20 bucks US. I have the Dash One for the
Argus coming. Only place I've ever seen it offered.
--

-Gord.

FWIW the 102 could be fired automatically (by the computer) or
manually - pilot squeezed the trigger. In either case he had to use
the trigger. In auto mode he kept the steering dot centred and at 20
seconds to go the timing circle tarted collapsing, he touched up the
steering, and the computer sent the firing signal through the trigger
switch to the selected armament. Best Pk for missiels was about a 70
degree crossing angle - unless the target was dropping chaff. Then it
was down the nose or up the tail. The best automatic rocket pass was a
crossing angle of 90 to about 110 degrees. The higher the speed ratio
between interceptor and target the lesser the miss distance on a
rocket pass. On a 0 or 180 crossing angle the miss distance was about
the distance the rockets dropped due to gravity during their flight
time of about 1.5 seconds. IE not much.
Also FWIW there was no speed limit on firing ordnance. The Deuces
converted to carry the Fat Falcon (AIM26) lost the rockets normally
carried in the two inner doors because of the increased girth of the
nuke missile(s), which were only carried on the inner launchers.
Cross- countrys - we were supposed to take at least 4 XCs every six
months. Of course you could take more if nobody wanted to go (rare!).
IN ADC we stopped at our war-time recovery bases to exercise the
trooops in turning around a Deuce. We also went almost anywhere we
could get 3000 psi air for a start. One wingco nitcied 'his' aircraft
scattered all over the US on a weekend and promptly put out an edict
that we could go no more than two hops from home (KC, MO). Much
grousing until one troop idly scanning our wall-sized map commented
"Two hops? With tanks we can get to Puerto Rico or Alaska in two
hops!" Grousing stopped.
Nellis (Las Vegas) was a favorite stop - just one hop even with a
clean bird from RG AFB. Deuce was a good XC bird - autopilot, altitude
hold, heading hold; could cruise clean at .93 and 46000 if you weren't
interested in getting max range out of it. Back then only the 106 and
the Navy F8 (2000 pounds more fuel) could outcruise it. Nice aircraft,
nice radar, wimpy missiles, no gun. (Although my bird did hit a
Firebee with a single obsolete Gar1 radar Falcon. Killed the mother
even though the warhead fuzing had been disabled. Hit it squarely in
the middle.)
Walt BJ

Nice post, thanks.

all the best -- Dan Ford
email:

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

(WaltBJ) wrote in message . com...
snip

Nellis (Las Vegas) was a favorite stop - just one hop even with a
clean bird from RG AFB. Deuce was a good XC bird - autopilot, altitude
hold, heading hold; could cruise clean at .93 and 46000 if you weren't
interested in getting max range out of it. Back then only the 106 and
the Navy F8 (2000 pounds more fuel) could outcruise it. Nice aircraft,
nice radar, wimpy missiles, no gun. (Although my bird did hit a
Firebee with a single obsolete Gar1 radar Falcon. Killed the mother
even though the warhead fuzing had been disabled. Hit it squarely in
the middle.)


I was told c1962 that the A-6 had a slightly longer range (2300 vs
2200 ferry range) and used to **** off the tower at the Las Vegas
civilian airport by asking to land on an extended taxi strip and after
being told to use one of the regular runways would land in something
short of its 'listed' landing distance of 2700 feet and taxi the
distance to the terminal.

On Sat, 14 Feb 2004 18:11:59 GMT, "David E. Powell"
wrote:

The Falcon must have been a decent missile, the -106s and other
fighters used them into the 80s and early 90s.

The book "Sidewinder" is rather scathing about "competition" from the
Falcon development team. An interesting contrast.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1557509514/codesmiths

It's an excellent read BTW - especially if you're a project manager in
any sort of technology company.

"peter wezeman" wrote in message
m...
"David E. Powell" wrote in message
ws.com...
"Guy Alcala" wrote in message
. ..
"Paul J. Adam" wrote:

In message m,
David
E. Powell writes
Third. did the F-102 have a gun or just internal missiles in a
weapon
bay?

Falcon missiles (six IIRC) in the bay, plus 24 x 2.75" rockets
(launch
tubes in the bay doors). From memory there were twelve tubes each
with
two rockets nose-to-tail: this was sometimes downloaded to twelve,
and
F-102s in Vietnam did some very light ground attack (using their IR
sensor to find targets like campfires and the rockets to engage). My
recollections may be at variance with the facts, so check before
using


Thanks! I hadn't known about the 2.75 rockets, sounds like the F-94
Scorpion. The Falcon must have been a decent missile, the -106s and
other
fighters used them into the 80s and early 90s.

The Northrop Scorpion was the F-89; the F-94 was the Lockheed Starfire.
Both carried 2.75 inch unguided rockets: the Scorpion in wingtip pods
that also carried jet fuel, and the Starfire in the aircraft's nose
and in small pods halfway out on the wings.

if you will check, the 89 carried various armament, depending on the model,
including .50 cal, AIM 4s and 2.75s and the Genie Rocket(AIR2A).