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F-22 Pilot’s Comments after Flying an F-4


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22 hours ago, 11bee said:

Ok, I’m bored today so I’ll play along:

 

Interesting conclusion about tolerance to battle damage.  How many F-22’s have taken hits and not made it home?    Compare that to an F-4, where you won’t have to walk very far in Vietnam without coming across an F-4 crash site.   If that’s your idea of an aircraft that could take a punch, good for you.   
 

Also, you are aware that if stealth works the way it should, the F-22 won’t have to demonstrate how it can or can’t take a punch, so it’s kind of a moot point anyway.   On the opposite side of the coin is the massive F-4, trailing black smoke for a few miles behind it.  

Most Phantoms south of the DMZ made it back. Huey hulks were everywhere. Out on the border, you saw a little bit of everything on the ground. But still nothing like what you discribed

Gary

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On 3/20/2020 at 1:30 AM, GeneK said:

 

Actually, the airplane would "adverse yaw" and then flip rapidly in the direction opposite the intended turn. Easy to recover, and far from a spin. 

 

 

Amen, glt. The F-4 certainly wasn't a one trick pony -- did everything it wasn't intended to do.

 

Gene K

I always ran for the deepest ditch when a Phantom rolled in hot! They had not idea what precision bombing was. Now the A6 was another story! Never saw an A7 make bombing run, so won't comment. A4's did better on the deck than a typical F4, but were only slightly more accurate. An F100 could literally crawl over you with a full load of snakeyes. The slower the better

Gary

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2 hours ago, ChesshireCat said:

Most Phantoms south of the DMZ made it back. Huey hulks were everywhere. Out on the border, you saw a little bit of everything on the ground. But still nothing like what you discribed

Gary

455 Phantoms were lost in SEA.  That’s a good portion of the production run.   Not exactly reassuming me that the F-4 was impervious to battle damage.   

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30 minutes ago, 11bee said:

455 Phantoms were lost in SEA.  That’s a good portion of the production run.   Not exactly reassuming me that the F-4 was impervious to battle damage.   

How many of those were lost due to enemy action verses accidents?

 

Also, does that number include USN Phantoms?

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1 hour ago, 11bee said:

455 Phantoms were lost in SEA.  That’s a good portion of the production run.   Not exactly reassuming me that the F-4 was impervious to battle damage.   

I think your figures are out of context. Just how many were shot down? Don't even begin to believe the propaganda from north of the 17th parallel! I've all over the lower three quarters of I-Corp, and I can't remember ever seeing the wreckage of a Phantom. Yet I've seen burnt out hulks at airbases from rockets and flight line mishaps. Maybe seen a dozen wrecks in Laos, and there might have been a couple along the way. 

glt

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1 hour ago, GW8345 said:

How many of those were lost due to enemy action verses accidents?

 

Also, does that number include USN Phantoms?

with advent of the Russian built 57mm radar guided anti aircraft guns, things got testy. Even then they knew how to deal with them in a hard way. SAM's were over rated in the U.S., but still quite deadly. Till the Shriek came along. 455 planes sounds like a total of everything to me. 

gary

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10 hours ago, mrvark said:

I'm surprised that he failed to mention only moving the stick fore and aft in the landing pattern because of adverse yaw--all the turning was done with rudder. 

 

I have to respectfully  say that's not entirely true -- in the break, the base turn, or on final, coordinated turns were used.

 

Rudder was particularly useful, however, on final when landing from the back seat (USAF). As the airplane had items like scopes added to the  front instrument shroud, and the rear instrument panel grew, forward visibility from the back seat became more obscured ... to the point that the best final technique from the pit was to yaw the airplane to the right, slipping the airplane using ailerons to keep lined up looking out the left front quarter panel, then straightening the airplane just before touchdown, and then using references out of both sides to keep on centerline. 

 

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I always ran for the deepest ditch when a Phantom rolled in hot! They had not idea what precision bombing was.

 

ChessireCat, you and I had the same testy discussion many, many moons ago when you derided the Phantom and its crews for the work done in VietNam. You used the same words back then  -- I remember the sting as clearly as a mother whose baby has just been called ugly.  As I said back then, from Cam Rahn Bay, almost 90% of our missions were Close Air Support in the south, where precision was mandatory. Yes, we flew iron sights, and we had some new pilots to train coming out of the pipeline, but we did the job with precision ... and pride, day and night. I don't know how many Phantoms you saw working or what the circumstances were, but you obviously formed a badly biased  opinion

 

Gene K

 

 

Edited by GeneK
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11 hours ago, GeneK said:

 

I have to respectfully  say that's not entirely true -- in the break, the base turn, or on final, coordinated turns were used.

 

Rudder was particularly useful, however, on final when landing from the back seat (USAF). As the airplane had items like scopes added to the  front instrument shroud, and the rear instrument panel grew, forward visibility from the back seat became more obscured ... to the point that the best final technique from the pit was to yaw the airplane to the right, slipping the airplane using ailerons to keep lined up looking out the left front quarter panel, then straightening the airplane just before touchdown, and then using references out of both sides to keep on centerline. 

Gene K

 

 

Hey Gene,

 

Sounds like you flew this beast?  Firstly, my hat's off to you sir!!  Second, were you a pilot or WSO?   Why would they want the backseater to land the aircraft?  

 

Did you flying in Vietnam and if so, up north or doing CAS in the south (or both of course)?

 

Regards,

 

John

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On ‎3‎/‎21‎/‎2020 at 9:20 PM, GeneK said:

 

I have to respectfully  say that's not entirely true -- in the break, the base turn, or on final, coordinated turns were used.

 

Rudder was particularly useful, however, on final when landing from the back seat (USAF). As the airplane had items like scopes added to the  front instrument shroud, and the rear instrument panel grew, forward visibility from the back seat became more obscured ... to the point that the best final technique from the pit was to yaw the airplane to the right, slipping the airplane using ailerons to keep lined up looking out the left front quarter panel, then straightening the airplane just before touchdown, and then using references out of both sides to keep on centerline. 

 

 

ChessireCat, you and I had the same testy discussion many, many moons ago when you derided the Phantom and its crews for the work done in VietNam. You used the same words back then  -- I remember the sting as clearly as a mother whose baby has just been called ugly.  As I said back then, from Cam Rahn Bay, almost 90% of our missions were Close Air Support in the south, where precision was mandatory. Yes, we flew iron sights, and we had some new pilots to train coming out of the pipeline, but we did the job with precision ... and pride, day and night. I don't know how many Phantoms you saw working or what the circumstances were, but you obviously formed a badly biased  opinion

 

Gene K

 

 

Gene,

I started out with Phantoms out of Danang, even though much of the time I was within eyesight of Chu Lai. Chu Lai was a big Marine base, and seemed to fly due north, or head out to Khe Sahn. All in all that was silly when you thought about it. A Phantom leaving Chu Lai with a max load had about twenty minutes before the fuel light came on. A6's always went north, but A4's and F4's didn't. Long about mid June I watch an all day fist fight inside a foggy valley about two klicks inside of Laos. Lots and lots of bombing run with big green tracers going everywhere. The F4's just couldn't get deep in that valley. Then finally about five in the afternoon three Intruders showed up. The first one flew over headed almost due south. Then two more came in right behind him. One of them all of a sudden came in out of nowhere, and just got lower and lower till we lost him in the fog bank down in the valley. It was starting to drizzle over there ( we were above the rain) when we started to see flashes in the clouds with almost continuous secondary's. Then the next one rolled in there, but hit the west bank over the valley. Big green tracers were going everywhere after we saw him break out of the fog. In all they made six passes over about ten minutes. After that it was stone silent, and we had a new friend. We learned from the SOG guys passing thru our base camp that they had placed sensors in that valley a week or so prior. Those big green tracers were 57mm cannon! 

gary

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