VX-4 phantom loads

Ed Rasimus wrote:

On Fri, 11 Mar 2005 05:08:21 GMT, Guy Alcala
wrote:

Ed Rasimus wrote:

By 1972, I was just checking out in the F-4 and arriving in theater.
We were NORMALLY carrying three AIM-7s on all missions with one pod in
a forward missile well. No camera pods.

You had a different mission (H/K).

We didn't have the luxury of configuring specific jets for specific
missions other than with regard to the mission expendables themselves.
By that I mean a H/K F-4E during Linebacker was loaded with 4xCBU-52
on the inboard TERs (two on each), three fuel tanks, three AIM-7E-2,
and ONE ECM pod in the (usually) left forward missile well.

Yes, I know, but we're talking about the majority of F-4s, not just your H/K birds.
Loads varied depending on the unit and the tasking.

If squadron airplanes were tasked for other missions (by 1 Oct '72 we
only had one F-4 squadron at Korat--the 34th), they got different bomb
loads but the AIM-7 and ECM pod configuration remained constant.

An escort mission (the other primary mission tasking of the 34th TFS)
would load three tanks, four AIM-9E on the inboard MAU-32s and the
same three Sparrows and ECM.

Judging by photo frequency, strikers and
strike escorts were often carrying a pair of ALQ-87s in the forward wells by that
time, if they weren't carrying a strike camera in place of one of the jammers.

Over the years there were a lot of different configurations. Some
places and times carried ECM on an inboard wing station. Some carried
two pods. Various models of pods were carried and, yes, strike cameras
were occasionally hung.

For instance, I've got a shot of Coe and Webb's 34th TFS F-4E waiting to tank P/S
after they'd gotten their MiG-21 on 5 Oct. 1972.

I was in the 34th at the time, although not flying that day. While
that may be the tail number and it might even be a picture with Coe
and Webb flying it, I'm not sure that you could guarantee the
pedigree. Seems highly fortuitous that someone could have been there
with a camera to take the picture on the day of the kill. (Was it a
shot from the boomer?)

No, from another F-4, probably Coe's wingman. The photo appears in Squadron/Signal's
"and kill MiGs" by Lou Drendel, on page 34 of my second edition. The caption reads
"F-4E of DickCoe refueling on egress from North vietnam after kill. Note missing
AIM-7!"

While I'm normally careful about trusting captions as to details, in the background is
a KC-135 along with 3 F-4D strikers, all of which appear to be from the 25 TFS (FA),
one of which is on the boom. Coe's a/c, "JJ" 68-0493 is missing an AIM-7E-2 from the
aft left well, plus all the tanks, and is presumably waiting his turn on that or
another tanker. Oh, and Drendel's source for the photo is Coe himself, so I think in
this case we can trust that the date and details are correct;-) Coe himself says he
was tasked as the only spare flight lead "for three MiGCAP flights [Sic. Presumably he
means escort, as is clearer below] and two flights in support of the Wild Weasels. As
soon as I got on the Ground frequency, the leader of the last flight in support of the
bombers aborted. He told me to go ahead and take his flight."

They were tasked as strike
escort, and theyre carrying four AIM-9Es, plus two ALQ-87s forward and a single
AIM-7E-2 aft (they got the MiG with the other). Course, they had to sit there
and wait for the SAMs and MiGs to a greater extent than you did, plus they turned
the pods ON, so I imagine carrying a pair of them was a lot more valuable to them
than an extra (and unlikely to be used) AIM-7.

You are making a bad assumption here. A/A escort flights flew as
"out-riggers" on a set of bomb-droppers, usually three or four flights
of four. They went in with the bombers and out with the bombers.

H/K flights were "first-in/last-out", sweeping ahead of the strikers
and remaining in the area until the package was clear--and often
beyond that if fuel allowed to do visual armed recce for SAM sites.

We have no disagreement here, Ed. I wasn't referring to duration of time you spent in
Indian country, I was referring to the relative freedom to maneuver of the H/K (and
MiGCAP) flights compared to strikers, chaffers and escorts. The escorts were tied to
the chaffers and strikers, couldn't maneuver freely, and were usually on the edge of
the chaff corridor (as you said, outriggers) so the extra jamming power would come in
handy. As Coe says, he was tasked as spare flight lead for either strike or WW
escort, and his a/c is carrying a pair of pods.

They did run pods "ON" and we never turned them on except as a
last-ditch defense in a SAM-dance. But, as mentioned above, we did not
have the luxury of uploading and downloading ECM pods for the day's
mission. They were bolted on (unjettisonable) and stayed on.

Well, this and other a/c with the same mission have two "bolted on" in that time
frame, judging by the photos.

As for the likelihood of use--since we were not configured with
AIM-9s, we were at least as likely as the escort guys to need an
AIM-7.

Given that the AIM-7s were your only missiles, far more so.

The Strike escorts seem to have
felt that they were primarily there as Atoll absorbers for the strikers, and
comments by COM 7th AF (or maybe it was CINCPACAF, I forget) at the time seem to
confirm that was the case.

Strike escort guys more commonly felt themselves used (abused?) as
"herders" to create a situation to turn the MiGs to a place where the
fair-haired boys of the 555th could get their shots. We didn't even
get to talk to Teaball.

Given the number of frequencies you guys had to monitor, I'd say that was a reasonable
decision. After all, presumably the escort guys needed to have one radio on the
strike (or chaffer, if that was a different frequency), monitor Guard, plus be able to
talk to Disco/Red Crown. MiGCAPs were free to engage and AFAIK didn't need tobe on
the strike frequency, so letting them talk directly to Teaball makes sense.

But it's instructive to look at the 1972 losses to MiGs, and see which taskings took
the losses. In Linebacker I strike/chaff escorts suffered exactly half the losses to
MiGs, 9/18.

The 432nd MiGCAP guys seem to have carried a full load of AIM-7s and AIM-9s, but
also carried two ALQ-87s or -100s, one on each I/B.

They also had "Agile Eagle" aircraft, the first increment of TCTO-566
modded airplanes with LES and TISEO. And, they had Combat Tree,
dedicated GCI support and a serious public-relations corps to make a
USAF ace. They were mostly 555th TFS and mostly Fighter Weapons School
grads and instructors, so they were arguably the best trained,
qualified and equipped to do that mission.

Sure. In particular, the 13th/555th Combat Tree F-4Ds used as flight leads always
carried a full bag of AIM-7s, because they were the most likely to be able to take a
BVR or at least a head-on shot. My point was that, as flights operating well away
from the chaff and mass jamming support of the strike flights, and lacking any ability
to suppress/destroy SAM and AAA radars, they _needed_ two pods. They seem to have
usually had noise/deception ALQ-101s instead of the pure noise jamming -87s which were
usually given to the strike and escort flights, which also makes sense.

Guy

....and then there was always the threat of "bridle-slap" into the CL tank
off the waist cats.
At night was quite a show...

"Phormer Phighter Phlyer" wrote in message
news:1110551117.df4c0e0d2d0180affc7668b7b7146eb0@t eranews...
Guy Alcala wrote:
Ed Rasimus wrote:


On 9 Mar 2005 08:33:25 -0800, "Bob" wrote:


The Navy did not use wing tanks on their F-4's. The normal external
tank configuration was the single centerline tank. The reason was that
wing tanks made the already cumbersome F-4 even harder to turn. Roll
rate was reduced and nose high maneuvers were harder.

The Navy bought a different centerline tank than USAF did. (Not sure,
but as I recall it was a MacAir tank for USN and a Sargent-Fletcher
for AF).


From an RF-4C stores limitation chart, the USAF used McAir and Royal Jet
C/L
tanks. McAir and Sargent-Fletcher made the wing tanks. The McAir C/L
limits are somewhat higher than the Royal Jet's, but the jettison limits
are
the same.


The Navy tank was stressed for close to aircraft limits and
with lower drag than a pair of outboard 370s made for better
efficiency all around.


Drag appears to be the same as a pair of 370s.

snip

Normally each
F-4 carried 2 Aim-7 missiles in the under fuselage cavities and four
Aim-9H or G missiles on under wing pylons.

Here you highlight one shortcoming of the C/L tank option. Two of the
four missile wells couldn't be used.


Considering the reliability of AIM-7s after a few cat shots and traps, I
imagine it wasn't a big deal. And you could always punch the tank. By
1972
USAFf-4s were normally just carrying a pair of AIM-7s in the aft wells,
with
jamming or camera pods in the forward wells. and unlike the USAF, the
navy
had already modified their I/B pylons to carry AIM-9s and other ordnance
simulataneously. Cunningham/Driscoll had been carrying Rockeyes on I/B
TERs
(plus a C/L, 2 AIM-7s and 4 x AIM-9Gs) when they claimed 3 MiGs with
AIM-9s
on 10 May.


Air-to-ground ordnance was
hung in TERs (triple ejector racks) under the wings. MERs (multiple
ejector racks) could be carried but normally weren't.

Are you saying it was Navy practice to carry TERs on the outboard
stations rather than MERs?


I've got more than a few shots of TERs O/B on navy F-4s in Vietnam, but
I've
also got a couple showing them carrying MERS (and bombs) there.


Never saw it done in the USAF. Seems like
it would create a very forward C/G.


ISTR reading that one of the reasons the navy didn't like to carry wing
tanks was apparently due to overrotation following the cat shot,
probably
owing to fuel slosh creating an aft Cg, so a more forward Cg would seem
to
be a good thing for their purposes.



Wing tanks were frowned upon because they got beat up by the deck crew
and were twice the problem of a CL w/o any real advantage. As for
'blowing off the CL...no-no-do that a few times and you'll be outta CL
tanks. It may have been common in the USAF, with a warehouse full of
them but not so on a CV.

richard goldsberry wrote:
...and then there was always the threat of "bridle-slap" into the CL tank
off the waist cats.
At night was quite a show...





Not just off the waist, off any cat with the vanzelm holdback...It was
called a 'bridle slap' but it was one of the brass things that was
attached to the bridle via rope to prevent the bridle from going over
the side. I have about 5-6 of them on Indy and Midway(bow cats only).
WAS quite a show, out of A/B, fire out.

I also had a smack of the horseshoe thing that was placed over the cat
assembly to allow the bridle to be retracted...By a deck ape, who left
it on the cat track, at night. My nose wheel hit it, threw it into the
C/L, lots of noise and flame, I blew off everything, 2 and 2 plus
CL...VERY exciting.

My CO, Fox Farrell, slamed me for blowing everything off for a 'bridle
slap'. I knew it was something else. The Safety Officer, 'Snuffy' Smith
did a great investigation and came up with the true cause.

"Rob van Riel" wrote in message
news
VX-4 has created some of the most spectacular paintjobs seen on F-4
Phantoms

Two thoughts I've had as I've read this thread:

1) It is awesome knowing the guys that actually slung the Phantom around in
the air and in the hangars are among us, and that they recall all of the
detail with such clarity.

2) I hope you never get to judge one of my F-4 builds. ;-)

Seriously, enjoyed reading this thread.

WmB

On Fri, 11 Mar 2005 23:48:34 GMT, Guy Alcala
wrote:

Ed Rasimus wrote:

We didn't have the luxury of configuring specific jets for specific
missions other than with regard to the mission expendables themselves.
By that I mean a H/K F-4E during Linebacker was loaded with 4xCBU-52
on the inboard TERs (two on each), three fuel tanks, three AIM-7E-2,
and ONE ECM pod in the (usually) left forward missile well.

Yes, I know, but we're talking about the majority of F-4s, not just your H/K birds.
Loads varied depending on the unit and the tasking.

My point is that aircraft scheduled for Hunter/Killer and aircraft
scheduled for A/A escort, and aircraft that were scheduled as bomb
droppers all came out of the basic 27 aircraft that were available to
the 34th TFS--24 UE plus 3 attrition spares.

Before 1 October '72, when the 469th was still around, the two
squadrons were equipped at 18 UE, so the frag drew from those 36
aircraft for whatever mission was required.

Judging by photo frequency, strikers and
strike escorts were often carrying a pair of ALQ-87s in the forward wells by that
time, if they weren't carrying a strike camera in place of one of the jammers.

Over the years there were a lot of different configurations. Some
places and times carried ECM on an inboard wing station. Some carried
two pods. Various models of pods were carried and, yes, strike cameras
were occasionally hung.

For instance, I've got a shot of Coe and Webb's 34th TFS F-4E waiting to tank P/S
after they'd gotten their MiG-21 on 5 Oct. 1972.

No, from another F-4, probably Coe's wingman. The photo appears in Squadron/Signal's
"and kill MiGs" by Lou Drendel, on page 34 of my second edition. The caption reads
"F-4E of DickCoe refueling on egress from North vietnam after kill. Note missing
AIM-7!"

While I'm normally careful about trusting captions as to details, in the background is
a KC-135 along with 3 F-4D strikers, all of which appear to be from the 25 TFS (FA),
one of which is on the boom. Coe's a/c, "JJ" 68-0493 is missing an AIM-7E-2 from the
aft left well, plus all the tanks, and is presumably waiting his turn on that or
another tanker. Oh, and Drendel's source for the photo is Coe himself, so I think in
this case we can trust that the date and details are correct;-) Coe himself says he
was tasked as the only spare flight lead "for three MiGCAP flights [Sic. Presumably he
means escort, as is clearer below] and two flights in support of the Wild Weasels. As
soon as I got on the Ground frequency, the leader of the last flight in support of the
bombers aborted. He told me to go ahead and take his flight."

Curiosity got the better of me, so I dug out Don Logan's excellent
photo anthology, "The 388th Tactical Fighter Wing" by Schiffer
Publishing. (As an aside, Don was shot down about three days before I
arrived at Korat in '72. I moved into his hootch room even before his
personal effects were packed up.)

What surprised me was the number of F-4E photos both ground and
in-flight in which aircraft had NO ECM pod. Even in photos indicating
that they were taken after the commencement of Linebacker operations
there is no evidence of a pod.

There is a brief account of the Coe/Webb victory, but no mention of
pod configuration nor of tank jettisoning. Apparently from that
account, he was vectored by Disco to the vicinity of a pair of MiG-21s
cruising along in route formation. He sliced down into their six
o'clock and got an auto-aq lock-on and fired one AIM-7 for his kill.
(So much for the dog-fighting....)

All the pictures of pods in Don's book show the pod carried in a
forward missile well--none on an inboard wing station (at least at
Korat at that time.) In none could I discern carrying two pods.

They were tasked as strike
escort, and theyre carrying four AIM-9Es, plus two ALQ-87s forward and a single
AIM-7E-2 aft (they got the MiG with the other). Course, they had to sit there
and wait for the SAMs and MiGs to a greater extent than you did, plus they turned
the pods ON, so I imagine carrying a pair of them was a lot more valuable to them
than an extra (and unlikely to be used) AIM-7.

You are making a bad assumption here. A/A escort flights flew as
"out-riggers" on a set of bomb-droppers, usually three or four flights
of four. They went in with the bombers and out with the bombers.

H/K flights were "first-in/last-out", sweeping ahead of the strikers
and remaining in the area until the package was clear--and often
beyond that if fuel allowed to do visual armed recce for SAM sites.

We have no disagreement here, Ed. I wasn't referring to duration of time you spent in
Indian country, I was referring to the relative freedom to maneuver of the H/K (and
MiGCAP) flights compared to strikers, chaffers and escorts. The escorts were tied to
the chaffers and strikers, couldn't maneuver freely, and were usually on the edge of
the chaff corridor (as you said, outriggers) so the extra jamming power would come in
handy. As Coe says, he was tasked as spare flight lead for either strike or WW
escort, and his a/c is carrying a pair of pods.

I'm not enough of an electronic warfare guru to comment on whether
carrying a second pod would provide either additional jamming power or
broader frequency coverage. Clearly with a straight noise jammer the
advantage would be delayed burn-through, but by the time of the ALQ-87
and 101, there was at least as much deception output as noise (as
evidenced by the demise of the dreaded "pod roll-in" tactics.)

Since resolution pod formation depended on four-ship, there wouldn't
have been much benefit to a second pod on what was essentially an
autonomous two-ship formation.

They did run pods "ON" and we never turned them on except as a
last-ditch defense in a SAM-dance. But, as mentioned above, we did not
have the luxury of uploading and downloading ECM pods for the day's
mission. They were bolted on (unjettisonable) and stayed on.

Well, this and other a/c with the same mission have two "bolted on" in that time
frame, judging by the photos.

As for the likelihood of use--since we were not configured with
AIM-9s, we were at least as likely as the escort guys to need an
AIM-7.

Given that the AIM-7s were your only missiles, far more so.

The Strike escorts seem to have
felt that they were primarily there as Atoll absorbers for the strikers, and
comments by COM 7th AF (or maybe it was CINCPACAF, I forget) at the time seem to
confirm that was the case.

Strike escort guys more commonly felt themselves used (abused?) as
"herders" to create a situation to turn the MiGs to a place where the
fair-haired boys of the 555th could get their shots. We didn't even
get to talk to Teaball.

Given the number of frequencies you guys had to monitor, I'd say that was a reasonable
decision. After all, presumably the escort guys needed to have one radio on the
strike (or chaffer, if that was a different frequency), monitor Guard, plus be able to
talk to Disco/Red Crown. MiGCAPs were free to engage and AFAIK didn't need tobe on
the strike frequency, so letting them talk directly to Teaball makes sense.

The F-4 add a "one and a half" UHF radio--meaning a transmit/receive
primary radio and a receive-only auxiliary channel (with a limited
number of pre-set channel choices.) Plus Guard channel, of course.

All strike flights after tanker drop-off were on strike primary
frequency--Weasels, escorts, bombers, chaffers, jammers, et. al. Disco
and Red Crown broadcast on Guard--never any need to talk to them, so
that's not a factor. Teaball could have simulcast MiG calls on strike
primary to let the guys being targetted know what was going on. They
could have let the players know what the MiGCAP was doing. There was
no need to talk back to Teaball since we weren't being vectored by
them, but to deny guys in the arena essential elements of situational
awareness is unconscionable.


Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (USAF-Ret)
"When Thunder Rolled"
www.thunderchief.org
www.thundertales.blogspot.com

Curiosity got the better of me, so I dug out Don Logan's excellent
photo anthology, "The 388th Tactical Fighter Wing" by Schiffer
Publishing. (As an aside, Don was shot down about three days before I
arrived at Korat in '72. I moved into his hootch room even before his
personal effects were packed up.)

Don's a member of some Yahoo groups I subscribe to, great guy!
_____________
José Herculano

Phormer Phighter Phlyer wrote:

richard goldsberry wrote:

...and then there was always the threat of "bridle-slap" into the CL tank
off the waist cats.
At night was quite a show...





Not just off the waist, off any cat with the vanzelm holdback...It was
called a 'bridle slap' but it was one of the brass things that was
attached to the bridle via rope to prevent the bridle from going over
the side. I have about 5-6 of them on Indy and Midway(bow cats only).
WAS quite a show, out of A/B, fire out.

I also had a smack of the horseshoe thing that was placed over the cat
assembly to allow the bridle to be retracted...By a deck ape, who left
it on the cat track, at night. My nose wheel hit it, threw it into the
C/L, lots of noise and flame, I blew off everything, 2 and 2 plus
CL...VERY exciting.

My CO, Fox Farrell, slamed me for blowing everything off for a 'bridle
slap'. I knew it was something else. The Safety Officer, 'Snuffy' Smith
did a great investigation and came up with the true cause.

Worst I've heard of lately (a bit ago, but more recently) was a Hornet
that went down the stroke with the rubber track mat (I don't know what
it's called, but it's there to protect the cat when not in use - a
weather protector) still in place. Took some of it down one
intake...with the obvious results.

Made it back around and back aboard though - but I think the jet ended
up a strike.

--
- Rufus

Ed Rasimus wrote:

On Fri, 11 Mar 2005 23:48:34 GMT, Guy Alcala
wrote:

Ed Rasimus wrote:

We didn't have the luxury of configuring specific jets for specific
missions other than with regard to the mission expendables themselves.
By that I mean a H/K F-4E during Linebacker was loaded with 4xCBU-52
on the inboard TERs (two on each), three fuel tanks, three AIM-7E-2,
and ONE ECM pod in the (usually) left forward missile well.

Yes, I know, but we're talking about the majority of F-4s, not just your H/K birds.
Loads varied depending on the unit and the tasking.

My point is that aircraft scheduled for Hunter/Killer and aircraft
scheduled for A/A escort, and aircraft that were scheduled as bomb
droppers all came out of the basic 27 aircraft that were available to
the 34th TFS--24 UE plus 3 attrition spares.

Be that as it may, Coe's a/c wound up with a pair of pods, and it's not the only one. I've
got another shot of a 34th bird (68-0498) with a pure A/G load: Mk.84s on the O/Bs, 2 CBUs
on each I/B, a C/L, pods in both forward wells, and NO AIM-7s. Both of the 34th TFS birds
I've mentioned, Coe's 0493 and 0498, have the long gun blast fairing (given the serials it
had to be a retrofit, as they weren't installed on the production line until 69-7261) and
formation strip lights, so these photos almost certainly date to the latter half of 1972.
I once asked Dweezil when they got the long fairings and striplights, and IIRR he thought
not before 1972 for the fairings; I don't remember what he said about the strip lights, but
it's clear from photos that neither was a universal fit in 1972, as numerous a/c lack them,
especially some of the TDY units like the squadrons from the 4th TFW. Do you remember if
both features were present (on at least some a/c) when you arrived in July?

I also have shots of A/A loaded 421st F-4Es (per the captions, after the move from DaNang
toTakhli) with the same 2 pod/2 AIM-7/4 AIM-9 as Coe's a/c.

Before 1 October '72, when the 469th was still around, the two
squadrons were equipped at 18 UE, so the frag drew from those 36
aircraft for whatever mission was required.

Judging by photo frequency, strikers and
strike escorts were often carrying a pair of ALQ-87s in the forward wells by that
time, if they weren't carrying a strike camera in place of one of the jammers.

Over the years there were a lot of different configurations. Some
places and times carried ECM on an inboard wing station. Some carried
two pods. Various models of pods were carried and, yes, strike cameras
were occasionally hung.

For instance, I've got a shot of Coe and Webb's 34th TFS F-4E waiting to tank P/S
after they'd gotten their MiG-21 on 5 Oct. 1972.

No, from another F-4, probably Coe's wingman. The photo appears in Squadron/Signal's
"and kill MiGs" by Lou Drendel, on page 34 of my second edition. The caption reads
"F-4E of DickCoe refueling on egress from North vietnam after kill. Note missing
AIM-7!"

While I'm normally careful about trusting captions as to details, in the background is
a KC-135 along with 3 F-4D strikers, all of which appear to be from the 25 TFS (FA),
one of which is on the boom. Coe's a/c, "JJ" 68-0493 is missing an AIM-7E-2 from the
aft left well, plus all the tanks, and is presumably waiting his turn on that or
another tanker. Oh, and Drendel's source for the photo is Coe himself, so I think in
this case we can trust that the date and details are correct;-) Coe himself says he
was tasked as the only spare flight lead "for three MiGCAP flights [Sic. Presumably he
means escort, as is clearer below] and two flights in support of the Wild Weasels. As
soon as I got on the Ground frequency, the leader of the last flight in support of the
bombers aborted. He told me to go ahead and take his flight."

Curiosity got the better of me, so I dug out Don Logan's excellent
photo anthology, "The 388th Tactical Fighter Wing" by Schiffer
Publishing. (As an aside, Don was shot down about three days before I
arrived at Korat in '72. I moved into his hootch room even before his
personal effects were packed up.)

What surprised me was the number of F-4E photos both ground and
in-flight in which aircraft had NO ECM pod. Even in photos indicating
that they were taken after the commencement of Linebacker operations
there is no evidence of a pod.

I've got a fair number of those too (always A/G birds, usually from the 1968-1971 period),
and I've always assumed that podless a/c were being sent to SVN or Laos. Presumably you had
a limited number of (working) pods, so a/c assignments and tasking would reflect that.
These a/c often have a KB-18 in the forward right AIM-7 well, and often no AIM-7s, which
again would indicate that they weren't being sent into areas with nothing but
manually-aimed AAA.

There is a brief account of the Coe/Webb victory, but no mention of
pod configuration nor of tank jettisoning. Apparently from that
account, he was vectored by Disco to the vicinity of a pair of MiG-21s
cruising along in route formation. He sliced down into their six
o'clock and got an auto-aq lock-on and fired one AIM-7 for his kill.
(So much for the dog-fighting....)

Well, sort of. Coe's account in "and kill MiGs" goes into a lot more detail. Coe says he
was at about M1.6 and estimates the MiGs were at about M1.1 when he shot, and Webb called a
break immediately after the shot, which caused another pair of MiG-21s to overshoot over
the top of him (these were probably the ones that had been called merged by Disco, and
which caused at least one of the strikers to jettison when the strike flight spotted
them). BTW, I believe this is the highest speed attained during a kill in Vietnam, and
very possibly the highest speed attained by a tactical a/c during a combat mission.

All the pictures of pods in Don's book show the pod carried in a
forward missile well--none on an inboard wing station (at least at
Korat at that time.) In none could I discern carrying two pods.

The 388th carried pods on the I/B prior to the introduction of the pod adapter for the
forward wells, at which point the 388th seems to change over completely to carriage in the
forward well(s). Judging by the dates in photo captions the adapter wasn't available much
before 1972, because I can't find photos of a/c from any of the wings carrying them there
prior to that.


They were tasked as strike
escort, and theyre carrying four AIM-9Es, plus two ALQ-87s forward and a single
AIM-7E-2 aft (they got the MiG with the other). Course, they had to sit there
and wait for the SAMs and MiGs to a greater extent than you did, plus they turned
the pods ON, so I imagine carrying a pair of them was a lot more valuable to them
than an extra (and unlikely to be used) AIM-7.

You are making a bad assumption here. A/A escort flights flew as
"out-riggers" on a set of bomb-droppers, usually three or four flights
of four. They went in with the bombers and out with the bombers.

H/K flights were "first-in/last-out", sweeping ahead of the strikers
and remaining in the area until the package was clear--and often
beyond that if fuel allowed to do visual armed recce for SAM sites.

We have no disagreement here, Ed. I wasn't referring to duration of time you spent in
Indian country, I was referring to the relative freedom to maneuver of the H/K (and
MiGCAP) flights compared to strikers, chaffers and escorts. The escorts were tied to
the chaffers and strikers, couldn't maneuver freely, and were usually on the edge of
the chaff corridor (as you said, outriggers) so the extra jamming power would come in
handy. As Coe says, he was tasked as spare flight lead for either strike or WW
escort, and his a/c is carrying a pair of pods.

I'm not enough of an electronic warfare guru to comment on whether
carrying a second pod would provide either additional jamming power or
broader frequency coverage. Clearly with a straight noise jammer the
advantage would be delayed burn-through, but by the time of the ALQ-87
and 101, there was at least as much deception output as noise (as
evidenced by the demise of the dreaded "pod roll-in" tactics.)

Checking Jenkins book on the F-105 confirmed my memory that the -87 didn't have deception
capability; that was the -101. He writes "Besides laying down a continuous jamming barrage,
the ALQ-87 also had a sweep modulator that could introduce random bursts of reinforcing
noise in a so-called pulse power option. The pod could simultaneously perform any two of
three functions: denying range and azimuth data to Fire Can; depriving Fan Song of range,
altitude and azimuth; and jamming the position beacon installed in the sustainer section of
the Guideline missile." so carrying a pair of them would certainly add to the
jammingpowerandcapability, even if each pod was able to cover the entire threat frequency
spectrum (I don't know if they could). Re the -101, he writes "This pod could perform
either deception or noise-barrage jamming, and was specifically intended for activities
such as Iron Hand [Guy: Also used for MiGCAP by the 432nd in 1972, for the same reason]
where formation flying wasn't feasible."

Hopefully Bob Payette or others with personal experience of the pods can comment/correct as
to band coverage. I've got various conflicting sources.

Since resolution pod formation depended on four-ship, there wouldn't
have been much benefit to a second pod on what was essentially an
autonomous two-ship formation.

See above.

snip

The Strike escorts seem to have
felt that they were primarily there as Atoll absorbers for the strikers, and
comments by COM 7th AF (or maybe it was CINCPACAF, I forget) at the time seem to
confirm that was the case.

Strike escort guys more commonly felt themselves used (abused?) as
"herders" to create a situation to turn the MiGs to a place where the
fair-haired boys of the 555th could get their shots. We didn't even
get to talk to Teaball.

Given the number of frequencies you guys had to monitor, I'd say that was a reasonable
decision. After all, presumably the escort guys needed to have one radio on the
strike (or chaffer, if that was a different frequency), monitor Guard, plus be able to
talk to Disco/Red Crown. MiGCAPs were free to engage and AFAIK didn't need tobe on
the strike frequency, so letting them talk directly to Teaball makes sense.

The F-4 add a "one and a half" UHF radio--meaning a transmit/receive
primary radio and a receive-only auxiliary channel (with a limited
number of pre-set channel choices.) Plus Guard channel, of course.

All strike flights after tanker drop-off were on strike primary
frequency--Weasels, escorts, bombers, chaffers, jammers, et. al. Disco
and Red Crown broadcast on Guard--never any need to talk to them, so
that's not a factor. Teaball could have simulcast MiG calls on strike
primary to let the guys being targetted know what was going on. They
could have let the players know what the MiGCAP was doing. There was
no need to talk back to Teaball since we weren't being vectored by
them, but to deny guys in the arena essential elements of situational
awareness is unconscionable.

The 8th tried using the aux. receiver during Bolo for MiG calls. From the summary of the
8th's now de-classified Operation Bolo report:

"The Aux. receiver was set up to receive the MiG warnings and other coded calls. However,
the west force received very few transmissions over the Aux. Receiver. The east force had
satisfactory Aux reception. This was the first time the Aux Receiver had been used for
this purpose. Post mission evaluation indicates that the Aux Receiver is too limited in
range to fulfill the requirement. The east force was much closer to the transmitting
source, therefore, the reception was adequate. The Aux Receiver was designed primarily as
a back-up recovery receiver and works off the ADF antenna. It does not have sufficient
range capability to be used for this purpose.

As for transmitting Teaball on strike primary, crews were already complaining about having
their ears blown off and being fed a lot of useless info that didn't apply to them by
BigEye/Disco/Red Crown on Guard; would it really make sense for Teaball to routinely step
on everyone else on strike primary for info that may only be of interest to the
free-ranging MiCAPs, thus potentially blocking a more time-sensitive transmission of
greater interest to the strikers?

Besides, Teaball appears to have been ballyhooed as much more effective than it was. Other
measures seem to have responsible for the improvements which were largely credited to
Teaball.

Guy

On Sun, 13 Mar 2005 02:32:12 GMT, Guy Alcala
wrote:

Ed Rasimus wrote:

On Fri, 11 Mar 2005 23:48:34 GMT, Guy Alcala
wrote:

Ed Rasimus wrote:

We didn't have the luxury of configuring specific jets for specific
missions other than with regard to the mission expendables themselves.
By that I mean a H/K F-4E during Linebacker was loaded with 4xCBU-52
on the inboard TERs (two on each), three fuel tanks, three AIM-7E-2,
and ONE ECM pod in the (usually) left forward missile well.

Yes, I know, but we're talking about the majority of F-4s, not just your H/K birds.
Loads varied depending on the unit and the tasking.

My point is that aircraft scheduled for Hunter/Killer and aircraft
scheduled for A/A escort, and aircraft that were scheduled as bomb
droppers all came out of the basic 27 aircraft that were available to
the 34th TFS--24 UE plus 3 attrition spares.

Be that as it may, Coe's a/c wound up with a pair of pods, and it's not the only one. I've
got another shot of a 34th bird (68-0498) with a pure A/G load: Mk.84s on the O/Bs, 2 CBUs
on each I/B, a C/L, pods in both forward wells, and NO AIM-7s. Both of the 34th TFS birds
I've mentioned, Coe's 0493 and 0498, have the long gun blast fairing (given the serials it
had to be a retrofit, as they weren't installed on the production line until 69-7261) and
formation strip lights, so these photos almost certainly date to the latter half of 1972.
I once asked Dweezil when they got the long fairings and striplights, and IIRR he thought
not before 1972 for the fairings; I don't remember what he said about the strip lights, but
it's clear from photos that neither was a universal fit in 1972, as numerous a/c lack them,
especially some of the TDY units like the squadrons from the 4th TFW. Do you remember if
both features were present (on at least some a/c) when you arrived in July?

I arrived at Korat in June of '72. I'd gone through the quicky
check-out at Luke flying C-models in May-June. All the airplanes I
encountered had the strip lights. I didn't register the gun fairing
difference at the time, so couldn't comment. I don't know if it was a
local mod (Logan mentions it in a photo caption and since he was
downed in July of '72, it had to have been on at least some of the
birds by that time. We got TCTO-556, the new conventional weapons
switchology in July/Aug of '72.

As for that load on 0498, I never encountered a mix of -84s and CBU.
When I carried CBU and GP bombs, it was always 6xMK-82 on a C/L MER
and 4xCBU in pairs on the I/B TERs.

I just looked at my form 5 and found that I flew 498 one time in my
year at Korat--what are the odds of that, not hitting a tail number in
9 months of single-squadron operation?

Curiosity got the better of me, so I dug out Don Logan's excellent
photo anthology, "The 388th Tactical Fighter Wing" by Schiffer
Publishing. (As an aside, Don was shot down about three days before I
arrived at Korat in '72. I moved into his hootch room even before his
personal effects were packed up.)

What surprised me was the number of F-4E photos both ground and
in-flight in which aircraft had NO ECM pod. Even in photos indicating
that they were taken after the commencement of Linebacker operations
there is no evidence of a pod.

I've got a fair number of those too (always A/G birds, usually from the 1968-1971 period),
and I've always assumed that podless a/c were being sent to SVN or Laos. Presumably you had
a limited number of (working) pods, so a/c assignments and tasking would reflect that.
These a/c often have a KB-18 in the forward right AIM-7 well, and often no AIM-7s, which
again would indicate that they weren't being sent into areas with nothing but
manually-aimed AAA.

During the period between the end of Rolling Thunder (1968) and the
beginning of Linebacker (1972) there was virtually no SAM threat and
no MiG threat. Heaviest defenses were in Barrel Roll and the northern
half of Steel Tiger region of Laos.

Wear and tear on the AIM-7 from landing and take-off jolting wouldn't
be balanced against the probability of needing the weapon. Despite
this husbanding of resources, when Linebacker started, the mechanical
reliability of the AIM-7 was abysmal.

Well, sort of. Coe's account in "and kill MiGs" goes into a lot more detail. Coe says he
was at about M1.6 and estimates the MiGs were at about M1.1 when he shot, and Webb called a
break immediately after the shot, which caused another pair of MiG-21s to overshoot over
the top of him (these were probably the ones that had been called merged by Disco, and
which caused at least one of the strikers to jettison when the strike flight spotted
them). BTW, I believe this is the highest speed attained during a kill in Vietnam, and
very possibly the highest speed attained by a tactical a/c during a combat mission.

We all get taller, smarter, braver and better looking as the years
pass. I'm just a bit skeptical of the M1.6 estimate. Starting with
three tanks and wall-to-wall missiles from 420 KIAS in the escort role
and then being able to configure to clean, accelerate and hit that
kind so speed at the typical altitude would be very unlikely. To get
M1.6 with the missiles, the pods and the altitude under FL 400 just
doesn't seem within the realm of capability of the airplane.

Checking Jenkins book on the F-105 confirmed my memory that the -87 didn't have deception
capability; that was the -101. He writes "Besides laying down a continuous jamming barrage,
the ALQ-87 also had a sweep modulator that could introduce random bursts of reinforcing
noise in a so-called pulse power option. The pod could simultaneously perform any two of
three functions: denying range and azimuth data to Fire Can; depriving Fan Song of range,
altitude and azimuth; and jamming the position beacon installed in the sustainer section of
the Guideline missile." so carrying a pair of them would certainly add to the
jammingpowerandcapability, even if each pod was able to cover the entire threat frequency
spectrum (I don't know if they could). Re the -101, he writes "This pod could perform
either deception or noise-barrage jamming, and was specifically intended for activities
such as Iron Hand [Guy: Also used for MiGCAP by the 432nd in 1972, for the same reason]
where formation flying wasn't feasible."

Well, as much as I respect the considerable research that Jenkins did
on the F-105, as we've often discussed, the use of pods by Iron Hand
flights was much more the exception than the rule.





Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (USAF-Ret)
"When Thunder Rolled"
www.thunderchief.org
www.thundertales.blogspot.com

Wear and tear on the AIM-7 from landing and take-off jolting wouldn't
be balanced against the probability of needing the weapon. Despite
this husbanding of resources, when Linebacker started, the mechanical
reliability of the AIM-7 was abysmal.

"Cold-soaking" was a big problem in the Sparrow at the time.