F-14 Questions Answered - Ask Away

Originally Posted By: tom slick
How come the Navy doesn't use a boom like the AF?

Booms are great if you've got great big airplanes, and great big runways for them to take off and land. Only the USAF does this....those big airplanes are expensive. Even NATO uses probe and drogue.

While big tankers are great, in terms of off load and range, a fighter running low on fuel on a dark night needs a tanker that can be launched from the carrier...right now.

Put a D-703 buddy store on a Navy airplane, and you've got gas for that fighter in need. Close by, low altitude, in position for the fighter coming off the deck from a bolter or wave off. That proximity can't be achieved with big tankers.

We called it "organic tanking"...everything comes off the boat. The buddy store is far, far cheaper than a boom, lighter, smaller, and allows nearly any airplane that can carry external fuel to be able to refuel a carrier airplane.

The Navy has to be able to operate independently, out of the range of land based support aircraft. Sure, they're nice when you can get them, but if we depended on them there would be places in the world where we could not sail and fly.

An unacceptable constraint.
 
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^^^^Astro, wow, that is detail, red meat for us flight control engineers and aviation enthusiasts. Refueling at night, when you're tired, well its more 'Adventure' than Job:

Originally Posted By: Astro14
Falling leaf mode was no joke. We lost a few Hornets to that...and the boldface (immediate response memory items) addressed it in departure recovery... The F-14 had wing rock. It would oscillate in roll above about 20 AOA. The longer you stayed there, the worse it got.


Falling Leaf is Dutch Roll on steroids, a limit cycle that may be initiated by Pilot Induced Oscillation (PIO) or dominating gyroscopic moments coupled with flow separation and wing twist to create a witch's brew of trouble at times.

F-14 Wing Rock you mentioned is also a more annoying form of Dutch Roll. .... Even KC-135 tankers aren't immune from fatal accidents in lateral directional stability: [deal link removed]

Back when I first learned of Dutch Roll, 32 years ago in college and at McAir (McDonnell-D 'Phantom Works') it seemed like merely an underdamped annoying air-sickness inducer readily seen with eigenvalue-vector linear analysis or transfer function methods. Back then in the early 1980's, experienced engineers at McAir would wonder out loud about getting into non-linear Limit Cycles with forcing functions coming from unanticipated sources. At the time, F/A-18A development work busied a lot of engineers with bandaid fixes to the then-new flight control software as early problems popped up one after another. We were also busy with AV-8B and F-15 flight control too. Falling Leaf might have been considered a possibility, but not seriously enough to pursue. (It wasn't until 20 years later the control law software really attacked Falling Leaf, outrageous.)

As with other engineering flaws in products over the years, I'd like to think the engineers should have anticipated Falling Leaf at least.
 
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I've always wondered why we were so slow to employ IRST. The 14 long had the TV sensor IIRC but it always seemed to me to place us at a disadvantage. Was it thought that cueing by Hawkeye/other made it redundant?
 
After looking around I think I've answered my question in one respect. IRST has been widely used by the US for quite some time but less emphasized on USAF aircraft unless pod mounted or so it appears. Sorry to have put noise on the channel before looking on my own.
 
Originally Posted By: DeepFriar
After looking around I think I've answered my question in one respect. IRST has been widely used by the US for quite some time but less emphasized on USAF aircraft unless pod mounted or so it appears. Sorry to have put noise on the channel before looking on my own.

After your post on Infrared IRST imaging vision, I looked up a couple of internet sources and I'm still not clear when and how often which visible or infrared options were used and available on the F-14, so Astro can line up which was used, IF its not classified. Certain things he can't talk about because they carry over into today's fighter tactics I'd assume.

F-14 Trivia:

Ug268s4.jpg


Always wondered why they'd chosen such a stupid name for a great jet like that. WWII-era had Grumman Iron Works Wildcat, Hellcat, Bearcat, Tigercat, then Panther, Cougar, Tiger, so maybe Tomcat should have been SaberCat or something, dunno, less politically correct I guess.
 
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Originally Posted By: DeepFriar
I've always wondered why we were so slow to employ IRST. The 14 long had the TV sensor IIRC but it always seemed to me to place us at a disadvantage. Was it thought that cueing by Hawkeye/other made it redundant?

The F-14 had an IRST back in the early 70s. IRST allows passive track. And allows a target track separate from the radar. So does the TCS.

The TCS was actually a huge advantage: it allowed Visual Identification at much longer range because of its magnification. In many scenarios, and under multiple ROE, you had to visually identify the target (airframe recognition) before you could shoot. The 10x lens in the TCS allowed that VID at much longer range than the pilots eyeball that every other fighter used.

Advantage: Tomcat

Now, the F-14D model had both..
 
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Originally Posted By: lubricatosaurus

Trivia from "Modern Marvels":
Ug268s4.jpg


Always wondered why they'd chosen such a stupid name for a great jet like that. WWII-era had Grumman Iron Works Wildcat, Hellcat, Bearcat, Tigercat, then Panther, Cougar, Tiger, so maybe Tomcat should have been SaberCat or something, dunno, less politically correct I guess.


VADM Tom Connolly told the brutal truth in Cingressional testimony about the F-111B Navy model when he said, "There isn't enough thrust in all of Christendom to make that thing a fighter".

By going against SECDEF's pet program, he gave up any chance of future promotion, but he saved generations of Navy fighter pilots from flying what was a very good bomber, but would have been a horrible fighter.

The Navy went out with an RFP (Request for Proposal) for a new fighter. It had to carry the AWG-9/AIM-54, be able to reach Mach 2 while landing at 135KTS, pull full g over that flight envelope (the F-111 had poor supersonic maneuverability) and have unequaled cockpit visibility and an internal gun.

Grumman met the VFX proposal with design 303E, which became the Tomcat. It was radical for its time, able to outmaneuver the F-4 or any other fighter in the world, while able to track and shoot multiple targets simultaneously. It was a huge leap forward in fighter performance, outperforming, and out shooting the USAF's new F-15 Eagle, that had similar performance requirements.

I've always liked the name. And when you know it was named for a guy that put integrity above career, and got the navy the fighter we needed instead of following the politically correct course, well...

I like it even more!
 
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At the Vet I worked for in college, Tomcats could be a fearsome critter. You didn't want one stuck on you.
 
Originally Posted By: Win
At the Vet I worked for in college, Tomcats could be a fearsome critter. You didn't want one stuck on you.
Compared to a sabre-toothed cat, a tomcat is pussyfootin' around. Would have been cool to have this logo, maybe a profile on the vertical tail or near the alpha vanes on an F-14:
MV5a8HD.jpg


Analogy of long teeth, long range Phoenix, not lost on the enemy either.

Originally Posted By: lubricatosaurus
Always wondered why they'd chosen such a stupid name for a great jet like that. WWII-era had Grumman Iron Works Wildcat, Hellcat, Bearcat, Tigercat, then Panther, Cougar, Tiger, so maybe Tomcat should have been SaberCat or something, dunno, less politically correct I guess.
 
The f-14 came out as the Vietnam war ended. I have to wonder what would have been the effect if the jet had reached production a year earlier, would have been interesting.

When I hear about the training of pilots like Astro14 and others, it makes me amazed at the skill of WW2 and Vietnam pilots who flew with out that level of education in math and science. How about the first squadrons of f-14 pilots, what background did they have? were they former f-4 pilots?
Pilots must have been selected by their intuition and seat of the pants skill( or they died early).
 
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Originally Posted By: spasm3
The f-14 came out as the vietnam war ended. I have to wonder what would have been the effect if the jet had reached production a year earlier, would have been interesting.
The F-14 was designed to shoot down multiple air targets, large USSR or Chinese formations of early cruise missiles or manned jets. Not much affect on Vietnam issues. As for Top Gun air-to-air dogfighting skills, that could have been emphasized sooner in the war, regardless of the airframes used (Crusader, PhantomII, SuperSabre, F-5).
 
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In the movie The Final Countdown, there is footage where it looks like the f-14 stalls or almost stalls. How close was the pilot to really losing that plane?


Starts about 2:48
 
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No need to post the video for me...know the scene well...

VF-84, the "Jolly Rogers", supported the filming of that movie. The Jolly Rogers was my first Tomcat Squadron...my vanity plate on the S600 even has a reference to the Jolly Rogers...

So, though this was filmed 9 years before I got to the squadron, it was still talked about.

The F-14 was flying in slow flight, about 200 KIAS, to maneuver around the T-6 that was simulating a Zero....and flying at his max speed of close to 200 KIAS... When the pilot rolled the airplane, the nose dropped, and you can see the engines go to max AB as he recovers from a low-altitude, low speed, nose low attitude.

The airplane doesn't "stall" in the conventional sense...the wings have a CL curve, and you can fly past (higher AOA than) stall while still getting lift from them and the big fuselage...but it creates tremendous drag at that AOA...as I've said earlier in this thread, the F-14 was a good slow speed airplane with excellent pitch authority. That pitch authority sure helped in this situation...

So, word on the street for this scene was that he got to about 200 feet...way, way lower than comfortable...but not the "near crash" that everyone like to speculate...

The AB plumes distort the view of the sparkling ocean off Key West...so, to some people, it looks like he was kicking up waves...but he wasn't...
 
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Thanks for the explanation! I figured you knew all the scenes.
Would an aim 9 track a small plane like a zero with a piston engine?

Did you guys train much with the guns?
 
We used to train with the gun quite a bit. I am a gun fan...and used the 20mm as often as I was allowed...

We used to do air - air gunnery with an F-14 or A-4 as the tow plane, and shoot live rounds at a 8'x40' banner towed about 1500' behind the plane. There was high-G multiple axis maneuvering...and it was a lot of fun...

We strafed ground targets as well. The M-61 was a good gun, and the Tomcat's ILCOS sight was nice (it computed lead based on airspeed, aircraft body rate, and range...pipper on and pull the trigger).

AIM-9 tracking, like any heat-seeking missile, is a matter of source discrimination. If the target is against a hot/cluttered background (like sunlight reflecting on the water), then the target would have to be pretty hot to stand out. Against a clear blue sky, the target can be much colder, and still stand out. Piston engine exhaust isn't that hot compared with jet exhaust...

You'll know, in the cockpit, if your AIM-9 is able to track a particular target from the weapon system cues, including sound, so you'll know before trigger squeeze if the shot is going to be a good one...

The radar would lock onto an airplane, even looking down...and a missile like the Sparrow, or AMRAAM, or AIM-54, would be able to track even a small airplane. Depending on atmospherics, target height, and background...the radar-guided missile might be a better choice when looking down on a light airplane.

The gun would be my choice against a Zero...but that's just me...
 
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But what if you're in a zero, and the other guy in an F-14. Would you try to vary your speed and manoeuvre in such a way that the f-14 can't keep you in his gun sights? Low altitude aswell I suppose. I imagine from seeing the above scene that's about the only advantage you would have...
 
Originally Posted By: Jetronic
But what if you're in a zero, and the other guy in an F-14. Would you try to vary your speed and manoeuvre in such a way that the f-14 can't keep you in his gun sights? Low altitude aswell I suppose. I imagine from seeing the above scene that's about the only advantage you would have...

What Claire Chennault did (which is the same if he would have had F-14's):
"When pilots arrived in China, Chennault told them to ignore everything they had learned about air combat. Like all U.S. pilots, they had been trained in World War I dog fighting. The Japanese aircraft were far superior at that. So Chennault trained his pilots to fly above their targets, use their superior speed and dense machine gun fire to dive through in a slashing attack, and then climb back for another run. He trained them intensively to fight this way."
 
that's how the allied fighters attacked messerschmidt jets aswell, but it doesn't quite work if the enemy is low to the ground. Besides that technique is used on a faster opponent, not a slower one
 
Originally Posted By: Jetronic
that's how the allied fighters attacked messerschmidt jets aswell, but it doesn't quite work if the enemy is low to the ground. Besides that technique is used on a faster opponent, not a slower one

My understanding is you always start from on high, dive down for a shot, no matter if your aircraft is faster or turns tighter, either way. Then, after that pass, if you are the faster less maneuverable airplane, you climb without much turning, then dive, and keep taking vertical diving shots, never getting into a horizontal fight with the other tighter turning airplane.

F-14 vs. Zero: Zero turns tighter. F-14 just keeps making vertical diving shots, flying in a roller coaster up-down pattern. If the opponent is low to the ground, it still works, just make sure you can pull up in time.

Mustang vs. Me-262: Mustang dives from on high at first, but then goes horizontal for the advantage. Problem is of course, the Me-262 speeds away, climbs up, and keeps making diving passes, so the Mustang is in trouble.

Famous example is Navy Wildcats vs. Zeros in the first half of WWII. Wildcats kept the fight in the vertical when they could.
 
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