The F-102 Delta Dagger (Was GWB as a Nat'l Guard Fighter Pilot threads.)

"Guy Alcala" wrote in message
. ..
"Paul J. Adam" wrote:

In message m, David
E. Powell writes
Third. did the F-102 have a gun or just internal missiles in a weapon
bay?

Falcon missiles (six IIRC) in the bay, plus 24 x 2.75" rockets (launch
tubes in the bay doors). From memory there were twelve tubes each with
two rockets nose-to-tail: this was sometimes downloaded to twelve, and
F-102s in Vietnam did some very light ground attack (using their IR
sensor to find targets like campfires and the rockets to engage). My
recollections may be at variance with the facts, so check before using


Thanks! I hadn't known about the 2.75 rockets, sounds like the F-94
Scorpion. The Falcon must have been a decent missile, the -106s and other
fighters used them into the 80s and early 90s.

*There was a massive "Was GENIE a rocket or a missile" debate on
another
group, which I won't get into here. I think the verdict was a rocket,
which
it was, guided missile or not.

Unguided (and hence unjammable, but demanding to use correctly)

OK....

Jack Broughton was less than confident about the Genie's accuracy. He
compared
firing one to tying a piece of string around your finger and the other end
around the trigger of a shotgun. When you wanted to fire the shotgun, you
threw
it away from you and it fired when the string pulled taught, with the
accuracy
you'd expect under such conditions. He goes on (I've left his spelling
unchanged):

"Two specific cases made me a non-Geenie [sic] fan. The first Geenie that
was
test-fired from an F-106 came right back up, blew the nose off the
aircraft, and
killed the pilot. Years later I got a chance to go to Tyndal [sic] with
my
F-106 squadron. ADC had saved their resources too well and wound up with
a
large number of Geenies that only had a few days to go before they would
run out
of shelf life and have to be destroyed. The plan was to fire as many of
them as
fast as we could, so for a week straight we saturated the Gulf of Mexico
with
every Geenie that we could get to accept the firing signal and leave our
aircraft. They took off in all directions, but very seldom towards the
target
drones. One particular Geenie turned hard left as I fired and I watched
it do
lazy concentric barrel rolls as it headed straight down to my left. I
knew that
if it was for real the boom only had to be close, but suppose straight
down and
to the left was the area I was supposed to be defending? Well, the other
theory
of the times was that we would be intercepting all the invading bombers
way up
north someplace, where I wouldn't know anybody living off to my lower
left."

Over tundra or ocean would have been the ideal use considered, I guess....

[quoted from "Going Downtown", by Jack Broughton]

Guy

In message m, David
E. Powell writes
Thanks! I hadn't known about the 2.75 rockets, sounds like the F-94
Scorpion. The Falcon must have been a decent missile, the -106s and other
fighters used them into the 80s and early 90s.

No, it sucked really badly (less than 5% Pk in Vietnam, although against
fighters at low level with some hostile factors) but it was a low
priority for replacement or enhancement.


--
When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
W S Churchill

Paul J. Adam MainBoxatjrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk

"Paul J. Adam" wrote in message
...
In message m, David
E. Powell writes
Thanks! I hadn't known about the 2.75 rockets, sounds like the F-94
Scorpion. The Falcon must have been a decent missile, the -106s and other
fighters used them into the 80s and early 90s.

No, it sucked really badly (less than 5% Pk in Vietnam, although against
fighters at low level with some hostile factors) but it was a low
priority for replacement or enhancement.

Whoa - Considering how long they served I would have thought the opposite.
Maybe it was felt they had better odds against bombers. Or there was some
sort of upgrade by the '80s. Considering alot of ANG fighters that escorted
bombers up and down the seacost in the Cold War carried them.

I wonder if GWB ever flew with the nuclear version....?

DEP

Maybe that's why the F-106 got a cannon....

--
When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
W S Churchill

Paul J. Adam MainBoxatjrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk

"Paul J. Adam" wrote in message
...
In message m, David
E. Powell writes
Thanks! I hadn't known about the 2.75 rockets, sounds like the F-94
Scorpion. The Falcon must have been a decent missile, the -106s and other
fighters used them into the 80s and early 90s.

No, it sucked really badly (less than 5% Pk in Vietnam, although against
fighters at low level with some hostile factors) but it was a low
priority for replacement or enhancement.

The real deal is that most F-106s were decoys, by the mid 1970s.

In article ,
"Paul J. Adam" writes:
In message m, David
E. Powell writes
Thanks! I hadn't known about the 2.75 rockets, sounds like the F-94
Scorpion. The Falcon must have been a decent missile, the -106s and other
fighters used them into the 80s and early 90s.

No, it sucked really badly (less than 5% Pk in Vietnam, although against
fighters at low level with some hostile factors) but it was a low
priority for replacement or enhancement.


As an anti-fighter weapon, it suffered from 2 serious flaws:
It had an extremely long initialtion time - the delay between when you
decide to fire the missile, and the missile has to be woken
up, (The batteries started, gyros brought up to speed, the seeker
receiver warmed up & tuned, for a radar missile, or, in the case of an
IR Falcon, cooled for more sensitivity, and then the missile is
"briefed", if you will, by the Fire COntrol System on the airplane, so
that the seeker is looking at the right target, and the range &
velocity gates are set correctly. With a Falcon, as I understand it,
this could take 5-10 seconds, which is a danged long time, in a
dogfight. But, then, a MiG-17 pulling 8Gs on the deck is a different
matter than an Mya-4 pulling 2 Gs at 36,000'.

The second problem was that the Falcons never got a Proximity Fuze.
Prox Fuzes are just about the most difficult systems that a missile
will have - they have to take into account the shape of the fragment
pattern of the warhead, and the velocity that the fragmants will
have. A simple "Closest Approach" fuze will inievietably fire late.
It's much more difficult for a missile than for an artillery shell,
becasue the missile has to deal with a larger variety of closing
velocities adn aspect angles. Almost all Falcons had to actually hit
the target to detonate the warhead. That's perhaps, not unrealistic
when you're firing a salvo of them at a big bomber-sized target, but
it's very unlikely that it will be successful against a maneuvering
fighter.

(Secret Analysts Trick - When somebody boasts that they've invented a
"Hittile", a missile so accurate that it doesn't need a Proximity
Fuze, that menasn that they couldn't get one to work, and thas are
trying to make a feature out of a bug.)

--
Pete Stickney
A strong conviction that something must be done is the parent of many
bad measures. -- Daniel Webster

I seem to recall that one method of employing the 2.75 rocket against a
bomber entailed a 'beam' attack where the heading crossing angle (between
the interceptor and target) was somewhere in the vicinity of 135 degrees.
IIRC the combination of short range and high closure caused for a VERY
interesting time in 'getting out of the way' of the debris (assuming you hit
anything; and if you didn't not running into the side of the target)

Mark

"David E. Powell" wrote in message
s.com...
"Guy Alcala" wrote in message
. ..
"Paul J. Adam" wrote:

In message m, David
E. Powell writes
Third. did the F-102 have a gun or just internal missiles in a weapon
bay?

Falcon missiles (six IIRC) in the bay, plus 24 x 2.75" rockets (launch
tubes in the bay doors). From memory there were twelve tubes each with
two rockets nose-to-tail: this was sometimes downloaded to twelve, and
F-102s in Vietnam did some very light ground attack (using their IR
sensor to find targets like campfires and the rockets to engage). My
recollections may be at variance with the facts, so check before using


Thanks! I hadn't known about the 2.75 rockets, sounds like the F-94
Scorpion. The Falcon must have been a decent missile, the -106s and other
fighters used them into the 80s and early 90s.

Question on the F-102:

When the pilot went to fire missiles, he presumably had to open the
missile-bay doors.

Could this be done at supersonic speeds, or what speed did he have to
slow to?

all the best -- Dan Ford
email:

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

"David E. Powell" wrote in message ws.com...
"Guy Alcala" wrote in message
. ..
"Paul J. Adam" wrote:

In message m, David
E. Powell writes
Third. did the F-102 have a gun or just internal missiles in a weapon
bay?

Falcon missiles (six IIRC) in the bay, plus 24 x 2.75" rockets (launch
tubes in the bay doors). From memory there were twelve tubes each with
two rockets nose-to-tail: this was sometimes downloaded to twelve, and
F-102s in Vietnam did some very light ground attack (using their IR
sensor to find targets like campfires and the rockets to engage). My
recollections may be at variance with the facts, so check before using


Thanks! I hadn't known about the 2.75 rockets, sounds like the F-94
Scorpion. The Falcon must have been a decent missile, the -106s and other
fighters used them into the 80s and early 90s.

The Northrop Scorpion was the F-89; the F-94 was the Lockheed Starfire.
Both carried 2.75 inch unguided rockets: the Scorpion in wingtip pods
that also carried jet fuel, and the Starfire in the aircraft's nose
and in small pods halfway out on the wings.

Peter Wezeman
anti-social Darwinist
Suddenly, Jacques found himself looking down the barrel
of George's Hyper-Power.

"peter wezeman" wrote in message
m...
"David E. Powell" wrote in message
ws.com...
"Guy Alcala" wrote in message
. ..
"Paul J. Adam" wrote:

In message m,
David
E. Powell writes
Third. did the F-102 have a gun or just internal missiles in a
weapon
bay?

Falcon missiles (six IIRC) in the bay, plus 24 x 2.75" rockets
(launch
tubes in the bay doors). From memory there were twelve tubes each
with
two rockets nose-to-tail: this was sometimes downloaded to twelve,
and
F-102s in Vietnam did some very light ground attack (using their IR
sensor to find targets like campfires and the rockets to engage). My
recollections may be at variance with the facts, so check before
using


Thanks! I hadn't known about the 2.75 rockets, sounds like the F-94
Scorpion. The Falcon must have been a decent missile, the -106s and
other
fighters used them into the 80s and early 90s.

The Northrop Scorpion was the F-89; the F-94 was the Lockheed Starfire.
Both carried 2.75 inch unguided rockets: the Scorpion in wingtip pods
that also carried jet fuel, and the Starfire in the aircraft's nose
and in small pods halfway out on the wings.

if you will check, the 89 carried various armament, depending on the model,
including .50 cal, AIM 4s and 2.75s and the Genie Rocket(AIR2A).

On Sat, 14 Feb 2004 18:11:59 GMT, "David E. Powell"
wrote:

The Falcon must have been a decent missile, the -106s and other
fighters used them into the 80s and early 90s.

The book "Sidewinder" is rather scathing about "competition" from the
Falcon development team. An interesting contrast.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1557509514/codesmiths

It's an excellent read BTW - especially if you're a project manager in
any sort of technology company.