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Another F-4 Weapons Load Question


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Greetings folks. I have another question for the F-4 experts out there. Sometime in the near future I am looking to do a dual build of a Vietnam era Wild Weasel Hunter Killer team out of Korat RTAFB. For those that don't know, the F-105F/G Wild Weasels typically flew in a 4 ship of two F-105s with a two ship of F-4E's. According to Ed Rasimus in his book Palace Cobra, the F-4's typically carried 4 CBU-52s/SUU-30 canisters. Unfortunately that's about all he says about the weapons load. I've done quite a bit of online research and found some options but I don't know if any are of the "killers". To complicate things, the F-4's at Korat were rotated through each mission so who knows if the photos are of a bomb load or a SAM site killer. Anyway - here's what I've found (pictures are from a google search and not mine, they are posted here for discussion):

 

F-4E2520Korat.JPG

 

tumblr_n85eh0u5g71rcoy9ro1_1280.jpg

 

Both are cool looking load outs, but I have no idea if these are accurate for what I am trying to do. Its the Mk82s. They were not mentioned in the book, my only source of reference here.

 

I also found this one, which is a photo of the hunter/killer team refueling, but I can't really make out the load out at all.

 

0dc2c3c595d25e0a931c60c283986d8e.jpg

 

If anyone has any thoughts I'm happy to hear them. In the end I would like to be accurate but its not going to make or break the end result.

 

BTW - the book, Palace Cobra is excellent. Mr. Rasimus also wrote the book When Thunder Rolled which is about his time flying F-105s in Vietnam. Both are recommended reads for anyone into that.

 

Thanks for the help guys!

Mike

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Here is a higher res pic:

 

090605-F-1234P-090.JPG

 

you can make out the CBUs, SUU-52/58, on the i/b pylons, a c/l ext fuel tank, ECM pod in a forward Sparrow well and 2 AIM-7s in the aft wells. Of course that doesn't mean it was the only load they went with, Mk-82s with fuze extenders worked just as well to do more damage to the radar, launchers, etc so a mix of 82s and CBUs would be okay.

 

Jari

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Thanks Finn! That version of the picture is much better! I knew about the sparrows and the ECM pods, it was the air to ground ordnance I was trying to figure out.

 

I think in the end I'm going to do a mix of the CBUs and Mk82s.I'll just need to figure out where...

 

Thanks

Mike 

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I have a pic that Barry Miller took showing a JJ & JV F-4E 'killers' loaded with three fuel tanks, AIM-7E-2s in the aft wells, AN/ALQ-87s in the front wells, and flat-twos of SUU-30B/Bs with FMU-56 proximity nose fuzes on inboard TERs. 

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7 hours ago, mrvark said:

I have a pic that Barry Miller took showing a JJ & JV F-4E 'killers' loaded with three fuel tanks, AIM-7E-2s in the aft wells, AN/ALQ-87s in the front wells, and flat-twos of SUU-30B/Bs with FMU-56 proximity nose fuzes on inboard TERs. 

 

 

Thanks Jim!  I suspected that that was the most common of the loads since it was all that was mentioned.

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Most likely the 3 tanks were so they can hang around waiting for a SAM site to show itself. However if they were doing a pre-emptive strike at a known site then additional weapons would take the place of the c/l fuel tank or the wing tanks.

 

Jari

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While I was at Korat the 17th Wild Weasels were assigned and had the tail code of "JB".

What do you show the F-4 squadrons assigned to be?  I know the 34th T.F.S. used "JJ".

 

Here's a couple pictures that may or may not help:

scan0078-2.jpg

 

scan0111-3.jpg

 

scan0112-3.jpg

 

I had a few others to post but as usual, photobucket was not co-operating.

 

 

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I was looking at the first picture you showed.  Wasn't that of a Verlinden project?

 

He had a tendency to overdo things a bit.  There was one where he had a piston engine sitting in the back of the reventment and the ground crew were wearing colored T-Shirts with job labels on their backs like the Navy would.  Depending on the condidions, which were almost always hot and sometimes very wet, they would wear their jungle fatigue shirt, or just a white T-Shirt, or sometimes no shirt at all.  This gave them an advantage over us.  There would never be aircraft parts just laying around, especially near another aircraft.  The reventments didn't look that worn out and dirty from what I saw when I went out to take pictures or drove around on patrol, and the reventment sides looked like a gray steel color.  As far as growth on the top of the barriers, I don't remember there being any at Korat, but we did have some here and there at U-Tapao.

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