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F-14 - Why is it so popular?


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On 7/30/2017 at 7:32 PM, Andrew D. the Jolly Rogers guy said:

Good question, but I fell in love with it in the early 80's before Top Gun even came out. It's just got something...think in the 70's they would have said it's got "IT." My heart forever went to that marvelous machine before I knew anyone else even heard of it, so it's not like I was following a trend. 

 

And it's got 5 kills, not 4 :) 

Uh, you forgot about the two Zeros that got "splashed"

 

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On 7/30/2017 at 6:32 PM, Andrew D. the Jolly Rogers guy said:

Good question, but I fell in love with it in the early 80's before Top Gun even came out. It's just got something...think in the 70's they would have said it's got "IT." My heart forever went to that marvelous machine before I knew anyone else even heard of it, so it's not like I was following a trend. 

 

And it's got 5 kills, not 4 :) 

 

1 hour ago, model junky said:

Uh, you forgot about the two Zeros that got "splashed"

 

 

No, No.  9.  NINE.  EVERYBODY overlooks LT Pete "Maverick" Mitchell and LT Tom "Iceman" Kazanski four MIg-28 kills when that communications ship drifted into hostile waters and they flying the CAP.

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1 hour ago, Darren Roberts said:

I forgot about that one! I bet the RF-4 crew was a bit surprised. I'm sure the F-14 crew was thinking, "Well, there goes our careers!"

One of the RF-4 crewmembers was badly hurt ejecting at over 600 mph and never flew again.   The pilot was the son of a high ranking admiral and despite a lot of controversy,  as was noted above, ended up getting promoted to admiral himself. 

 

 

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2 hours ago, 11bee said:

One of the RF-4 crewmembers was badly hurt ejecting at over 600 mph and never flew again.   The pilot was the son of a high ranking admiral and despite a lot of controversy,  as was noted above, ended up getting promoted to admiral himself. 

 

 

What caused the mishap? Was it pilot error, maintenance error, or just bad luck?

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The lunatic in the front seat of the F-14 mistook his RIO's insistence of firing a simulated fox 2 to mean do it for real.

 

If that judgement seems a little harsh, the guy refused to take responsibility for it even to this day.

Edited by Swordsman422
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I'm going to play the devils advocate here..... the F-14 doesn't do much for me, and never has.  I'm not knocking its capabilities, or service record. But personally, it just doesn't pull my trigger. As a teenager during the mid to late 80's, myself and some buddies used to go down to Miramar and talk our way onto the flight line of the various units to take photo's. We got out on the ramps of all of the west coast Tomcat units. I always enjoyed shooting the 14's, but was always far more interested in the adversary F-5s, and A-4s. So I was up close and personal with them many times, but it just doesn't do it for me. To this day I've built close to 200 models in the three major scales, and only two of them are F-14s, whereas 25 of them are F-18s. I think that most of the F-14s popularity can be traced to those 80's movies, as others have said. Fred K.

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9 minutes ago, f5guy said:

I think that most of the F-14s popularity can be traced to those 80's movies, as others have said. Fred K.

 

Well, yeah, there is definitely plenty of that. I can only speak for myself and say I fell in love with the beast LONG before I ever saw it in a movie. It's what made me WANT to see the movie, actually, knowing what was "starring" in it.

Edited by Andrew D. the Jolly Rogers guy
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2 hours ago, Swordsman422 said:

The lunatic in the front seat of the F-14 mistook his RIO's insistence of firing a simulated fox 2 to mean do it for real.

 

If that judgement seems a little harsh, the guy refused to take responsibility for it even to this day.

And he made Admiral.......?

 

Edit: I did some reading on the shootdown. It seems he was recommended for Admiral, but his promotion wasn't acted upon, thus effectively rejecting it. When the shootdown happened, he only had about 400 hours in the Tomcat and was 25 years old. In other words, he was wet behind the ears. Communication about the expectations of the exercise were not fully conveyed to the pilots. Of course, he had just hit the tanker with the same the RF-4 he ended up shooting down, so I'm not sure why he thought it was a threat to the boat. He also knew he was participating in an exercise. I think the biggest no-no was that the Tomcats weren't supposed to be armed during the exercise, yet they were sent out with live missiles. I wonder who made that decision?

Edited by Darren Roberts
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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.

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On ‎8‎/‎1‎/‎2017 at 1:56 PM, silverkite211 said:

Actually, during the AIMVAL/ACEVAL trials, F-15s and F-14s would engage in dogfights "off the record" while returning to base at the end of an exercise. During the exercise Tomcats were not allowed to use their entire suite of ECM, etc, however the pilots of both services agreed, during these "lets see what we can really do" engagements that all bets were off, that everything available to use was fair game. During those engagements the Tomcats consistently came out the victor. This was reported in either Wings or Airpower magazine, I can't recall which.

 

That's funny, because I actually fought Kittykats on numerous training occasions, from full up BVR (including that incredible ASW weapon the AIM-54) to high aspect visual fights.  I was "killed" once, due to my buffoonery as a young flight lead.  In a visual fight, it became such a joke fighting the F-14 that for style points we used to put the pipper on both the front and back seater for a gun kill.

 

Regards,

Murph

Edited by Murph
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I figured out the Tom's popularity.   It's the airborne equivalent to a 1980 Trans Am.  You know, the big, clunky car with the ginormous bird decal on the hood, fake air scoops and T-roofs?  

 

To a certain demographic, it's the ultimate and nothing will ever surpass it. 

 

 

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9 hours ago, 11bee said:

I figured out the Tom's popularity.   It's the airborne equivalent to a 1980 Trans Am.  You know, the big, clunky car with the ginormous bird decal on the hood, fake air scoops and T-roofs?  

 

To a certain demographic, it's the ultimate and nothing will ever surpass it. 

 

 

I don't know my cars very well, but if you're talking about the Smokey and the Bandit car, absolutely! I loved that car! Now, if you're talking about when they changed the body style to the stupid Knight Rider car, no thanks. Anyone who truly believes nothing could surpass the Trans Am (and the Tomcat for that matter) are just silly. I would surmise there aren't many who truly believe that. But one can still hold it in high regard and appreciate it for what it was. As they say, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. This whole thread is really just one, big, subjective discussion, with comments being posted based on which view you have of the Tomcat. It is fun and entertaining, though. 

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36 minutes ago, Darren Roberts said:

I don't know my cars very well, but if you're talking about the Smokey and the Bandit car, absolutely! I loved that car! Now, if you're talking about when they changed the body style to the stupid Knight Rider car, no thanks. Anyone who truly believes nothing could surpass the Trans Am (and the Tomcat for that matter) are just silly. I would surmise there aren't many who truly believe that. But one can still hold it in high regard and appreciate it for what it was. As they say, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. This whole thread is really just one, big, subjective discussion, with comments being posted based on which view you have of the Tomcat. It is fun and entertaining, though. 

Trans Am was a fanboi car.   5.0 Mustangs were the way to roll!  

 

Automotive equivalent to an F-15.  

 

😀

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3 hours ago, 11bee said:

Trans Am was a fanboi car.   5.0 Mustangs were the way to roll!  

 

Automotive equivalent to an F-15.  

 

😀

I don't know. The Mustang was a FORD product...as in Found On Road Dead....or &(*#&$ Over Rebuilt Dodge. There's even a poem:

Ashes to ashes

Dust to dust

If it weren't for Fords

Our tools would rust

 

On second thought, that sentiment could be applied to almost every US car manufacturer in the 70's and 80's! LOL

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On ‎8‎/‎4‎/‎2017 at 11:44 PM, Sabre Freak said:

 

 

No, No.  9.  NINE.  EVERYBODY overlooks LT Pete "Maverick" Mitchell and LT Tom "Iceman" Kazanski four MIg-28 kills when that communications ship drifted into hostile waters and they flying the CAP.

 

9 1/2........That MiG-28 pilot that got flipped off by "Maverick" was so upset over seeing the bird that he quit flying altogether.......

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2 hours ago, Johnopfor said:

 

9 1/2........That MiG-28 pilot that got flipped off by "Maverick" was so upset over seeing the bird that he quit flying altogether.......

 

Not sure that was really the case.  I read somewhere that he was so disturbed by the over the top homoeroticism of Top Gun that he grounded himself for psychiatric reasons.  

 

He's never been the same...

 

 

   

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8 hours ago, Darren Roberts said:

Ashes to ashes

Dust to dust

If it weren't for Fords

Our tools would rust

As a past owner of a 1970 Lotus Elan +2S, my favorite was "Joseph Lucas, Prince of Darkness"

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Darren, also

 

First On Race Day

Fastest On Race Day

 

and my favorite

 

What the good Ford giveth, the sanctioning body taketh away

 

(old Cougar drag racer and Mustang short track driver)

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