F-14 Questions Answered - Ask Away

[Astro14]

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 as well I suppose. I imagine from seeing the above scene that's about the only advantage you would have...

A target that is rapidly changing direction, via roll, bank, and G, will be hard to hit. A hard pull orthogonal to the attacking fighter's line of sight will almost always break a gun tracking solution.

The challenge for the defending fighter (zero) is to maintain decent energy (altitude and speed) to be able to maneuver. Remember that gun engagements, with modern guns, take place at ranges from about 3,000 feet to 1,000 feet. There is some bullet time of flight, but mostly it's about screwing up the lead in the plane (geometric) that the attacking fighter has pulled to line up the shot.

F-14 v. Zero is nothing like Mustang v. ME-262 or P-40 v. Zero. The F-14 has a huge energy and speed advantage, not the advantage that was used back then, but a huge advantage.

With the understanding that asking fighter tactics questions is a bit like asking, "what's the best chess move?", because the answer is both complex and dependent on the situation, the best way to press the F-14 advantage v. A small prop plane is to stay well above, and get a weapon solution (heat and/or radar) and fire from the sanctuary of much higher altitude.

The Zero hopes that the F-14 will come down to his altitude, where the zero can get guns on target. This actually is depicted in the movie scene. But if the F-14 is smart, then he never gets down to where the Zero can get a shot. This makes a pure vertical gun shot a bit risky, as the F-14 has to fire, and turn to get out of range before the Zero,can point his nose at the attacking F-14.

The Zero's turn radius is tight, both in the horizontal, and vertical. But in the vertical, the Zero can only point up at the attacking F-14 for a moment, then it has to finish the vertical maneuver and regain lost energy. He has to finish the loop. The F-14 can time the attack, and shot, to avoid the Zero ever getting nose on...

Now, up at high altitude, for a Zero, the weapon lock will be much easier (discrimination is easier as the background isn't the sea), so lock him and shoot him with a missile. However, the same energy advantage exists, so the same gun tactic can be used, if one was low on missiles...

 

[lubricatosaurus]

From:

Grumman F-14 Tomcat - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Is that right? Only Mach 1.7 in the B/D models?

 

[Astro14]

Not that simple...

There were published limits, practical limits, and operational limits. Wikipedia draws from many sources, then puts apples next to oranges.

The F-14A went Mach 2.34 in trials. So, that's true. But it was with a brand new, clean airplane.

But getting the airplane up to Mach 2.34 when it has a full load is impossible. The F-14A was later restricted to 1.88 Mach/780 KIAS to save stress on engine components, even though it could exceed that IAS in level flight. The F-14B/D accelerated much faster than the A, so it was much faster in a practical sense, because you could get supersonic quickly, but compression ratios in the inlet/engine path actually limited top speed by a bit, compared with the -A...

So, the chart from Wikipedia represents an early test point and a much later operational/service life restriction. Apples and oranges...

 

[cjcride]

If I was in a Zero and the opponent was in a F-14... I bail out.

 

[spasm3]

Perhaps a large circle and let the zero think you are gone, then guns from behind before he sees you.

 

[cjcride]

I bet you could probably take the Zero out with wake turbulence or definitely jet wash.

 

[Astro14]

Originally Posted By: cjcride
I bet you could probably take the Zero out with wake turbulence or definitely jet wash.

Perhaps, but to make the wake hit the Zero (or more correctly- the Zero hit the wake), you would have to pass very close in front of him, during that moment, you would cross his line of fire at close range...if he saw you coming and put the hammer down just prior, it could ruin your whole day...

 

[lubricatosaurus]

I was thinking the same thing about getting slow and horizontal with a Zero. It still has guns, and you're in it's world.

Astro, know a good paper on the internet that discusses F-14 handling qualities? Like the deep discussion in http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/p011127.pdf about the Super Duper Hornet.

where they say about the Tomcat:
"The F-14A can safely be maneuvered to 50 degrees AOA, but
then requires the pilot to execute a "controlled departure"
to maneuver tactically because it has very little excess
roll/yaw control power above that needed for stability
purposes in this area."

 

[DeepFriar]

Maneuvering brings another question to mind (have we thoroughly worn you out yet?) And that is about vectored thrust. The Russians over the years have shown an inclination to multiple degrees of freedom and ,in some cases, continuous (poor word) or circular (worse) thrust. We seem to prefer to stay with single degree of freedom, usually just up and down. Do you feel the lower complexity of our approach outweighs the possible benefits of multi-angle thrust?

 

[Astro14]

Originally Posted By: lubricatosaurus
I was thinking the same thing about getting slow and horizontal with a Zero. It still has guns, and you're in it's world.

Astro, know a good paper on the internet that discusses F-14 handling qualities? Like the deep discussion in http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/p011127.pdf about the Super Duper Hornet.

where they say about the Tomcat:
"The F-14A can safely be maneuvered to 50 degrees AOA, but
then requires the pilot to execute a "controlled departure"
to maneuver tactically because it has very little excess
roll/yaw control power above that needed for stability
purposes in this area."

I don't know a good F-14 handling qualities paper...there are some very technical articles. RichardH, who asked a few questions in this thread, has a compilation here: http://www.zaretto.com/content/f-14-aerodynamic-data-sources

The NATOPS has, perhaps, the most reasonable summary, in Chapter 4. You can download the F-14D NATOPS here: https://info.publicintelligence.net/F14AAD-1.pdf
but it's for a later version of the airplane than the one that I flew. At the time of this printing, the airplane had been retrofitted with a Digital Flight Control System (DFCS) that utilized new flight control computers coupled with the stability augmentation actuators from the original design to give better control throughout the envelope.

The bottom line for F-14 handling, as I alluded to earlier, is that it's a pilot's airplane. Mechanical flight controls require an experienced, often deft, touch to make the airplane perform to its limits. What is said about the 50 AOA is true, and I know that I've said that the big tails give excellent pitch response...

What I may have said, I'll have to go back and re-read, is that above about 25 AOA, an experienced Tomcat driver would feed in rudder in the direction he wanted to go, and then put in opposite stick, cross-controlling the airplane. He would make use of the adverse yaw, and proverse roll, present at that AOA to maneuver the airplane...but it wasn't precise...and all you could do was point the airplane roughly, then unload it (again, big tails really helped), get the AOA under control and you could point with precision again.

In the -B/D models, you could (though there was some risk...Lord help you if you lost control of the jet because of this), select ATLS off (ATLS was the Asymmetric Thrust Limiting System - it would reduce an engine to min AB if the other engine did not have AB lit. This reduced the thrust asymmetry in the event of engine failure). With ATLS off, you could pull one engine out of AB, and the other engine would stay in AB, giving you quite a bit of yaw, without taking too much energy addition away. Use the yaw to point the airplane (particularly good in a very nose high, very low airspeed situation). Once the airplane started responding to the yaw, push that engine back into AB and fly again...at very low speed, you might need to pull the opposite engine out of AB to stop the yaw...this would not work in the -A...you would just induce a compressor stall, which would give you the thrust asymmetry...and a bit of an inflight emergency as well...not ideal...

DFCS helped with all of this. But we used to maneuver the airplane in a way the designers never anticipated...

That's what fighter pilots do...

 

[Astro14]

Originally Posted By: DeepFriar
Maneuvering brings another question to mind (have we thoroughly worn you out yet?) And that is about vectored thrust. The Russians over the years have shown an inclination to multiple degrees of freedom and ,in some cases, continuous (poor word) or circular (worse) thrust. We seem to prefer to stay with single degree of freedom, usually just up and down. Do you feel the lower complexity of our approach outweighs the possible benefits of multi-angle thrust?

Well...I just described how we made our own "vectored" thrust, once we had engines that could handle the throttle transients at low speed and high AOA...

Vectored thrust has big advantages, huge advantages, in the low-speed regime where the flight control authority is limited.

The question, really, is the cost of integration. It takes a huge amount of (expensive) flight control system design and testing to include thrust vectoring in the flight control system.

Grumman proposed the incorporation of thrust vectoring in the F-14D and Tomcat-21 designs. The GE F-110 nozzle actuators could be operated asymmetrically, to vector the thrust. No big engine changes needed, but flight control testing would have been needed.

When the decision was made, by SECDEF **** Cheney, in 1991, to kill all future Tomcat production and development, those proposals were relegated to history. Again, cost was the enemy...

 

[Astro14]

A trip down memory lane...

This is "Victory 211"...Whenever a squadron checked in with a controlling agency (ship, tower, whatever), you would use your squadron radio callsign (assigned and controlled by the USN) along with the "nose number" of the airplane.

VF-84's radio callsign was "Victory"...yep, about the coolest radio callsign...ever...

And the nose number on this airplane, during Desert Storm, was 211.

Technically, to the Navy, she was Bureau Number (BuNo) 161164. A block 110, TARPS (Tactical Air Reconnaissance Pod System) model F-14A.

Now, I flew that jet often during DESERT STORM, and this photo was taken on CAT 3 of the USS THEODORE ROOSEVELT, CVN-71 during Desert Storm. I know, because under the canopy rail, where my name was painted, is a little red circle, barely visible in this photo. That circle appeared on Victory 211 the night of 12 February, 1991, after a mission that I flew, in that airplane...but that's a story for another time.

Now, I bring this one airplane up because I had a discussion with a former jet engine mechanic (an "AD" for those of you in the Navy) in my squadron the other day, and I mentioned that 211 was a fast jet.

And she was. I would run up the coast of Kuwait at 10,000 feet, supersonic, imaging the coast for the Marine landing (that never happened...GEN Schwarzkopf went with the "hail Mary" western option). In zone 2 after burner, 211 would run at 1.2 IMN...over 700 knots indicated airspeed. Fast enough that by the time any Iraqi missile/gun crews heard us, we were long gone...

TARPS airplanes always had an escort. That escort would be responsible for identifying threats to the reconnaissance jet, since we were flying a straight, stable path, to allow the cameras to get good pictures. The escort/wingman would maneuver and watch the ground while in combat spread (stepped up 2 - 3,000 feet, about 1.0 to 1.5 miles abeam).

VF-41, our sister squadron on TR, would provide the escort, as tasked, on all our TARPS missions. And at the end of our recce run, we would head back toward the tanker and come out of AB and slow down. I always, and I mean always had a lot more gas than my wingman. The VF-41 jet had to use full AB (zone 5 on the TF-30) to stay in position with 211, while we were only in zone 2, using about 1/4 of the fuel...

Turns out, according to the tech, a great guy named Patrick, now retired, who checked his notebook (which he still has!) that 211 had engines that were rebuilt from the TF-30-P7 engines that came from an F-111. The -P7 ran at higher temps than the -414A engines that were standard in the F-14A at that time. I worked with those guys to make certain that our TARPS engines, all our engines, actually, ran at near max temps so that we were getting the maximum possible thrust from them in combat operations.

But 211 was always faster than the rest. We all knew it, and she was a trusted platform for TARPS because of her speed. And now, nearly 25 years later, I know why...she was a sleeper...equipped with engines that run just a bit beyond what every other airplane had.

I loved that jet.

She was stricken from the inventory September 30, 1999.

 

[Oldmoparguy1]

Astro, that post is priceless! Thank you...

 

[lubricatosaurus]

Originally Posted By: Oldmoparguy1
Astro, that post is priceless! Thank you...

Certainly so, awesome posts. That kind of detail.

Astro, ever have fun playing with civilian VFR aircraft in a MOA (military operations area)?
I guess they can fly through those areas, as in where an F-16 in Arizona got very close to a civilian, probably playing too aggressively. Then the comment section of the youtube video mentioned a Navy MOA with jets practicing intercepts on the civilians. They'll either feel harassed or think its cool I guess.

 

[cjcride]

Thank You Astro.

 

[Astro14]

Just reminiscing...but thought it germane to the discussion in this thread. That really is my name on there, if you could see it...and I've got a few stories about that particular airplane.

Found that picture on the Internet the other day, following the phone call with my old squadron mate...like seeing an old friend that's no longer with us...well...to me anyways...

 

[spasm3]

Wow cool story!

 

[spasm3]

Astro, is the low vis paint really for less chance of being seen vs the brighter paint schemes of the past, or was it just less paint to maintain?

 

[Astro14]

Originally Posted By: spasm3
Astro, is the low vis paint really for less chance of being seen vs the brighter paint schemes of the past, or was it just less paint to maintain?

The gloss paint was easier to see under certain atmospheric conditions. For the most part, against clear sky, etc. it didn't really make a difference, but once in a while, you could see a gloss jet when you couldn't see a flat grey one.

So there was a tactical advantage to the light, flat grey color.

Under the navy regs in place at the time, we couldn't paint an airplane for cosmetic reasons. Paint was purely for corrosion control. So, no more than 20% of the airplane was supposed to be painted at one time...of course, we didn't follow that rule perfectly, but as a practical matter, on a ship, it was impossible to do a big paint job. There was little room; too many airplanes parked only a few feet away, lots of people working on airplanes nearby, and you were painting in humid, salty air, which didn't help.

When you see Navy jets looking dirty and blotchy, you're seeing them as they were on deployment. We operated them in a harsh environment, even washing them was difficult aboard ship...we did the best we could...and would clean them up when we got home.

 

[Fastzntn]

Sounds like there was a high level of confidence in the F-14, armament and pilots. I'm curious to know which adversarial aircraft you and your peers thought was the best match for the Tomcat while you were in the Navy.