Aigore Posted August 17, 2012 Share Posted August 17, 2012 I´m wondering if a cat has the two forward Phoenix pallets installed, was there always a cover for the first of the center sparrow cradles? with cover.. without... Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Andrew Maverick Taylor Posted August 18, 2012 Share Posted August 18, 2012 The answer to your question is no. However in the early years when the cat was used solely in the Air Defense fighter role, the cover would possibly only be used if the jet was carrying two Phoenix missles and one Sparrow under the belly. If you look at the rear end of that cover, it is recessed which means that the nose of the Sparrow would sit in there. The purpose of the cover being to create less air distrubance to the sparrow. However in the later years of the tomcat and the multi role mission, the hassle of installing and removing the cover would be not worth it given the amount of changes to weapon layout. The tomcat although could carry a heavy load, once two LGB bombs were mounted, it would be pretty much up to weight capacity and the likelihood of carry a sparrow on that centre mount would be pretty low unless it was only carrying a couple of JDAMS or GBU-12 bombs and even then the cover would not have been installed. So your answer is that cover would have only been used in the tomcats really early years. Hope this helps. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
PlasticWeapons Posted August 18, 2012 Share Posted August 18, 2012 http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/0a/F-14A_VF-33_DSCAP.JPEG/981px-F-14A_VF-33_DSCAP.JPEG Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Daniel_B Posted August 18, 2012 Share Posted August 18, 2012 Use that piece only if you're building an F-14A or B that was TARPS-capable. Otherwise, leave it off. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
graves_09 Posted August 18, 2012 Share Posted August 18, 2012 (edited) More info here: http://www.anft.net/f-14/f14-detail-tarps.htm Daniel is correct. Only the TARPS capable A/B's had it. The Sparrow station 5 was filled with ballast. The loadout didn't matter, only the fact that is was TARPS capable meant it was installed. Edited August 18, 2012 by graves_09 Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Aigore Posted August 18, 2012 Author Share Posted August 18, 2012 (edited) Thanx for the info guys! I'm making a persian cat with exactly the load out shown in the picture in plasticweapon´s post :-D Edited August 18, 2012 by Aigore Quote Link to post Share on other sites
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