QF-104A 1.0

Lockheed QF-104A Starfighter for Strike Fighters 2

The QF-104A was a special modified version of the (Y)F-104A Star-fighter which could be flown remotely controlled. The control was done by F-104 pilots on the ground or inside another aircraft.

The conversion of the (Y)F-104A to QF-104A was approved on 19 Februar 1960 by the USAF. Testing of the QF was conducted during the period of 9 Januar 1961 to 16 October 1961.

The reason for converting the (Y)F-104A was the need for high altitude, high mach targets for the development of ground-to-air (BOMARC) and air-to-air (AIM7 - AIM9 - GAR2B - MB1 - AIM4) missiles.

At the end of the summer in 1972 the QF-104 drone program had come to an end and the F-104D's were handed over to the Puerto Rice ANG which could use them very well. All of the personnel that were in the QF-104 program were reassigned to other duties and bases.

In total 24 QF-104's have been used by the USAF. Twenthy of them were actually killed as targets and 1 crashed while flying a manned mission. The pilot ejected safely.

What has happened to the other 3 aircraft is not known but it is very likely that they have been withdrawn from use.

In total the drone-flight has accomplished 162 unmanned missions. Most of the QF mission were flown at Eglin AFB. However, some were flown at Holloman AFB (NewMexico) and a small number at Point Mugu NAS in California (for the US NAVY).

The QF-104A were of course different from the normal 104’s.

The most important modifications/changes included (in reality there are a lot more...) :

1 - The QF-104A received anti-skid brakes.

2 - A smoke-generator was applied (JP-4 pumped into the exhaust).

3 - Remote control system to fly the aircraft unmanned.

4 - A dayglow paintscheme was applied. It was an “eyecatcher”.

Originally the aircraft serial numbers were painted white. This was unsatisfactory as they were not highly visible against the dayglow. For that reason they were changed to black lateron.

5 - A special system which is able to make in flight air-starts remotely. In fact several were successfully made over the years.

6 - Due to the high-rate of stall problems with the GE J79 3A engines the QF was repowered by the 3B version of this engine. This solved the stall-problems.

7 - A self-destruction device was mounted on the QF for emergency reasons. This device was remotely controlled

8 - A changed cockpit layout to support all typical QF-104 systems.

9 - Additional gun-bay and case storage fuel tanks.

10 - Optical (5) camera scoring system. Three camera’s were located in the nose radome and 2 could be found inside the left external fueltank.

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Pilot Notes:

The default nation for this plane is USAF "friendly plane".

Inside the QF-104A there is a folder named "For Mescalero Proving Grounds", if you want to use this aircraft with that mod simply replace the data.ini file. Now it will be a "red" target. :'(

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Installation:

Simply copy all the files in the respective directory of your game folder.

"User"\Saved Games\ThirdWire\StrikeFighters2

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Credits:

Original F-104A: Ajunaidr

Added 3D parts and Fuel Tanks: Spillone104

Textures : Spillone104

Decals : STORM and Spillone104

Fake pilot mod: FastCargo

INIs : Spillone104

Effects : Spillone104

Sounds : Spillone104

Beta testers : Starfighter2 and Paulopanz

Info and history: www.i-f-s.nl

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Legal stuff:

This mod is freeware. Commercial use is not allowed.

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Enjoy these bright orange planes and try to not pull the trigger too often.

Thanks ;-)