GW8345

C-2's were never assigned to the Nimitz and the Nimitz didn't have an S-2 squadron onboard so she would not deploy with a C-1. (The E-2 squadron would not host the C-1 since there was no ADR's assigned to the squadron) Besides, C-1's did not deploy with the carriers after Vietnam, they were only onboard while the ship was part of the 2nd Fleet. If you want to do a C-1 assigned to the Nimitz then it would not be accurate for a Med Cruise, those would have been left on the beach, probably with VRC-40 out of Norfolk, when the ship went to the Med. ADR= Aviation Machinist's Mate Reciprocating Engine Mechanic

From my experience; We never put blank-off panels on when chaff buckets weren't installed (A-7's and F-14's), also, the only time we would fly empty buckets is when we were going somewhere (saved us from having to pack them up in a cruise box). The only time we would blank-off panels on when the housing wasn't installed, other than that most of the time we couldn't even find half of the blank-off panels. This was common practice through out NAVAIR until the Hornet's came around (they just had to be special). The A-4E's and F's that were used for aggressor's were heavily modified from their war time configuration, most had their avionics hump removed along with the aft chaff bucket, guns, some avionics, etc so using them as an example for a war time aircraft is not advised.

I was on the Nimitz from 84 to 87 (VA-82) but here is how the COD's worked while I was aboard; While we were doing work ups and operating off the East Coast of the states the COD's (both C-1 and C-2's) were from VRC-40 based out of Norfolk, once we got to the Med (6th Fleet) we would C-2's from VR-24. The COD's didn't stay onboard (unless they broke down), they would come out, drop off the mail/cargo and the launch out on the next go. For the VQ-2 birds, we would get one bird once we in-chopped (cross the Straits of Gibraltar) and the squadron would regularly change out birds during the cruise. All of VQ-2 birds looked the same except for the modex so if you see a picture of one bird on a different carrier the chances of all of their birds looking the same are extremely high. As for the Whale (EA-3B), it would be a late variant.

The document you need is A4-AFC-418-I and A4-AFC-418-II, that was the technical directive for the installation of the ALE-29/39 System, it would give the location and all BUNO affected. IAW the A-4E/F NATOPS, A-4M NATOPS, and the A-4 Weapons Loading Manual, the aircraft only had two chaff dispensers, not three.

The AIM-7 Sparrow is a semi-active guided missile.

From what was told to me from guys that were in the squadron at the time; The VF-74 aircrew involved were not supposed to be part of the exercise, they were standing alert 5 when word was passed to launch the alert against an intruder, that is why they had live missiles. The aircrew intercepted the RF-4 and decided to "play" with the Phantom, the Tomcat pilot switched his master arm switch to "ON" instead of "Training" which allowed firing voltage to be sent to the selected station. In training mode, the AWG-15 prevented firing voltage from being sent but would "record" the shot on the HUD. That is why the RIO was telling him to shoot, so they could record the "kill" and that was supposed to make the RF-4 leave the area. So, when the front seater pulled the trigger, that Winder worked as advertised and came off the rail surprising the RIO who thought the front seater had placed the Master Arm in Training. A helo from the Sara picked up RF-4 crew and brought them back to the ship, both walked off the helo and down to medical under their own power. They had thought they either had a major engine malfunction or had collided with the Tomcat which caused the tail of their aircraft to explode and disintegrate. As stated, the front seater never took responsibility and supposedly made up a cover story as to the reason why he fired on the RF-4 but he did lose his wings.

I started in Tomcats in 87 and ended in 01. VF-101 Framp - 87 VF-101 Hardcore 88-90, Ord shop shift Sup and LPO VF-103 90-93, Ord shop Shift Sup, Full Systems QAR and Troubleshooter/Final Checker qualified VF-101 Framp/NAMTRA Instructor 93-96, Arm Sys and Plane Captain Course Instructor VF-143 96-00, Ord shop LPO, QA LPO, Full System QAR and Troubleshooter/Final Checker/PC qualifier VX-23 01-02 Bomb Shop LPO (F-14A and D's and F-18A-E's) Before I was in Tomcats I was in VA-82 (A-7E's) and was a CAGARM Team Leader for a NATO Cruise and Med Cruise. Currently supporting NAVAIR in an ordnance and F-18A-G technical/software certification role. Not bragging, just letting you know my background/experience with the Tomcat and Hornet. I'm sure we both have shed blood on the same aircraft and pounded the same flight line.

What's the date on that NATOPS? Remember, there's a difference between designed and roles being filled, back in the mid to late 60's Fleet Defense Fighters were the thing in the Navy. Hell, the F-4 was designed as a Fleet Defense Fighter (FDF), that's why it didn't have a gun, it was suppose to be a missile platform for BVR engagements, the Tomcat was designed to replace the F-4 but the Navy learn from Vietnam that even a FDF needed a gun.

I too have shed blood on both and to compare MMH/FH shows lack of knowledge and simplistic thinking when it comes to Naval Aviation and Naval Aviation Maintenance. Of course the Hornet/Super Hornet are going to have less MMH/FH than a Tomcat; they were newer and more simplistic than a Tomcat. In addition, most of the F-18 maintenance is basically outsourced to the intermediate level (AIMD/FRC) maintenance activities so the reporting is different. Case in point, the gun system. In the F-14 community, the squadron was responsible for all maintenance on the gun system and all maintenance on the gun is report against the aircraft. In the F-18 community, the squadron was only allowed to remove and install the gun, any maintenance like changing breech bolts, repairing chutes, unjamming, etc was done by AIMD and reported against the gun itself. Also, the Tomcat was a much more complex and sophisticated aircraft compared to the F-18, just look at the wing sweep system, the air inlet ramps, the radar. So if you want to compare MMH/FH than yes, the F-18 will win but that is just looking at one segment of the whole picture. Think about the age difference between the aircraft, hell, at the end of its career most Tomcats had over 8,000 flight hours on their airframe, the Hornet had about 6,000 flight hours. Today, there are a lot of Hornets with over 8,000 flight hours and let me tell you, they are sucking up a lot of maintenance man hours and money just trying to keep them in the air. Yes the AIM-54 Phoenix System was maintenance intensive, if you didn’t maintain it properly. I’ve seen squadrons neglect the system and when it came time to use it (example: hang Phoenix’s on the wing) they had to jump through hoops getting the system back up to where it was supposed to be, that resulted in an extraordinary number of man hours being spent on one system (the Phoenix System) because they gaff’ed off the system until they needed it. A prime example is a week before a missile shoot they would do the required flush n fill and low and behold, the system leaked like a sieve because they didn’t maintain the QD’s (quick disconnects). Also, the system would be contaminated because they didn’t do the flush n fill every 56 days like they were supposed to, that is how one Tomcat squadron (IIRC it was VF-103 back in the mid 90’s) contaminated over half of all the AIM-54’s at Oceana one day. Funny how people blame the aircraft when the aircraft isn’t at fault, it’s the lack of proper maintenance and the lack of parts that directly inflated the MMH/FH figures, not the design of the aircraft. Also, let’s talk about spare parts; the F-18 community never had to deal with the shortage of spare parts but thanks to good ole Dick Chaney who decided that the Navy had enough F-14 spare parts he destroyed the ability to produce more. Too bad he miss read the reports and instead of the Tomcat community having 15 years’ worth of parts, it only had about 5 so for the last ten years of the Tomcat’s career they had to deal with constantly robbing parts to keep aircraft flying. My last Tomcat squadron had to change 8 rudder actuators just to get one to work properly because you can only rebuild hydraulic actuators so many times before they are crap. We had to go out to the static display bird at the front gate and rob parts off of that because there were no parts in the supply system. I had parts on order for over 18 months and then had them finally cancelled because no one made them. And let’s touch on one item that no one really thinks of, knowledge, specifically, maintainer knowledge. In the Tomcat community you had knowledgeable maintainers, guys (and gals) who knew that aircraft like the back of their hand, maintainers who knew how to work on the aircraft and knew how to fix its components. In the F-18 community, you have maintainers who know how to remove/install components, that’s it. They don’t know how to work on the components because they are not allowed to, everything is sent over to AIMD/FRC. We will use the gun again as an example, for the F-14, if the gun system jammed, the squadron ordies would unjam it and rebuild it, for the F-18, they would drop the gun onto a skid and send it to AIMD for repair. There’s an old joke when it comes to F-18 maintainers, “how do you confuse an F-18 maintainer, give him a multi-meter and tell him to read wires”. I could teach a bunch of 6th graders to work on the F-18, for the F-14, they had better be at the top of their graduation high school class. Basically, the Navy has dumbed down the F-18 so anyone can work on it unlike the Tomcat. As far as the Tomcat being an “air superiority fighter”, it was designed as a Fleet Defense Fighter; the Navy did not have “air superiority fighters” at the time, that was an Air Force thing. I know someone posted an “official Navy document”, well, that document was not written by the Navy, the Navy commissioned it to be written by a private contracting agency and trust me, those documents always contain errors (I read those kinds of documents daily). The problem with using a private contracting agency is that most of the time, they don’t have the technical and hands on knowledge of what they are analyzing, they are experts with no practical knowledge of the subject. Also bear in mind that you are using today’s terminology and definitions on an aircraft that was designed almost 50 years ago, that’s like comparing today’s heavy metal to the heavy metal of the early 80’s. Now I know that there will be some who say I don’t know what I’m talking about, that they have studied the subject and have read countless books on it but one thing you have to ask those so called “internet experts”…………….how much hands on experience do they have? Have they ever put hands to steel, have they ever tore into the aircraft, have they ever launched one off the deck? This thread was about why the Tomcat was so popular but it seems like some want to turn it into a “who’s dick is bigger” contest, if you want to do that then fine, at least use the same species as a comparison. The F-14 and F-18 are two different species, both were designed using different criteria and built to fulfill a different mission and to try to compare the two to determine which is better displays a complete lack of knowledge and understand of Naval Aviation.

It is true, how do you think VFA-81 got their Mig kills, the Migs were running from VF-74 and VF-103 Tomcats and ran right into the strike package. The Migs were so worried about the Tomcats that as soon as the Tomcat's turned to engage them they hi-tailed it and flew right into the strike package, all the time looking over their shoulder worrying about the Tomcats that were chasing them. How do I know, I was in VF-103 at the time and was told first hand what happened by my Div O who happened to be on that mission. As for the maintenance record, don't believe everything you read/hear about it, I worked on the bird for 14 years, the maintenance record was overblown in order to justify the super Hornet.

The Pukin Dog name came around in the late 50's (58 to be exact) thanks to an officer's wife who commented that the tail marking looked like a "puking dog".

Thank you kind sirs.

Why is the F-14 so popular, simple, there are two types of aircraft in the world, Tomcat's and targets, which one do you want to build a model of. Had the pleasure of working on the aircraft for 14+ years and working around it for 3 year. Having worked on the Hornet and Super Hornet, I'd take a Tomcat any day over those glorified Lego kits.

With all the talk of the 2020 convention, where is the 2018 and 2019 convention going to be held?

You obviously misunderstood my posts. If the Navy wanted to release the info that was their choice but to go digging and trying to use your "hook ups" to release the info before the USN did was wrong. Also, allowing a picture to be posted and one interview is not parading the pilot around. Funny how people ask those "who are in the know" for info and when one of them says you are barking up the wrong tree you get all butt-hurt. Don't like what I post, I'm sure this site has an ignore function, use it.