Who'da Thunk It

[+Fubar512]

So Don, what went on during your vacation? "Mostly dancing. Lots of dancing....."

[+Spectre_USA]

Um..... wow. I'm staying out of this one.

 

That would make 2 of us.

 

This thread took a hard left down Polk street, dinnit?

 

And it started so well, with the awesome Aardvark, how could it go so wrong?!?!

[+Fubar512]

LOL,

 

It's all in fun....we're all on the same team, and we occasionally feel the need to let off some steam.

[+Spectre_USA]

It's not unheard of, trust me on this.

 

I'm an admin on another forum that has threads go from zero to gay in 2 - 3 posts...

 

[serverandenforcer]

LOL,

 

It's all in fun....we're all on the same team, and we occasionally feel the need to let off some steam.

 

 

So, is it steam or seamen that you're letting off? I'm getting confused here. All this gheavy talk is not getting things straight for me.

[+column5]

So, is it steam or seamen that you're letting off? I'm getting confused here. All this gheavy talk is not getting things straight for me.

 

Both. When he needs to let of steam, he usually calls the Rear Admiral to get him to discharge some seamen.

[+Fubar512]

See? His gheyness knows no bounds.

[charlielima]

Um, ah? I downloaded the B Vark. Got Nicki's VX skin for it. I take it out for a hop occasionally.

I also copied the fruit bat pic for Mrs Lima. Stuff like that turns her screws.

This thread proves to me another good reason for me to strap on a SPAD and go wreck stuff.

:ph34r: CL

[+Julhelm]

Maybe this could be a reason to make a B that is somewhat more representative of the production version with the raised canopy and longer nose that Ginter book author Tommy Thomason talks about here:

 

The ready acceptance and lack of scholarship and critical thinking about many things put forth on the interweb doesn’t surprise me, particularly in this case, which is attributable to the success of the Navy’s campaign to smear the F-111B.

 

One of the half-truths was its poor performance in carrier trials accomplished aboard Coral Sea in July 1968. In fact, few new airplanes get much better than a barely passing grade from the NATC carrier suitability test pilots, with several deficiencies usually noted. In this case, the F-111B being evaluated was actually a prototype that did not have the carrier compatibility modifications like the raised cockpit shown below that were being incorporated- along with engine thrust, control system, and wing lift improvements- on the aircraft on the production line.

 

According to the respective SACs, the F-111B would be 4,000 lbs heavier than the F-14 on landing (only 8%, far less than most people would guess based on the poor reputation of the "SeaPig"). However, it approached 10 knots slower which meant it was actually easier on the arresting gear than the F-14 (ashore, landing ground roll was 21% less). The F-111B also did not have as significant a directional control problem on a single-engine waveoff, since the engines were not as far from the centerline of the aircraft as they were on the F-14.

 

This is my best guess at the production canopy. The windshield angle was reportedly increased to 30 degrees and the pilot's eye raised by three inches. All of the lines changes were accomplished with the escape capsule.

 

Note: No aircraft were completed with the raised canopy. 152714 and 5 had the longer nose.

 

For a complete and more-balanced history on the F-111B, order my monograph on the F-111B from Ginter Books: http://www.ginterbooks.com/NAVAL/NF41.htm

 

Here is the pic resized by me since in the original thread it's a huge 3000x3000 pixel pic:

 

[+JediMaster]

Speaking of bats...

 

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/.../launchbat.html

[+FastCargo]

But he's comparing a supposed production version of the B model vs what actually went into service with the Tomcat. All aircraft gain weight from supposed production weight to actual production weight unless features are eliminated or reduced. That 8% would have grown more than likely.

 

Also, that puts into question the 21% ground roll numbers...because the B model was a prototype again being compared to a production Tomcat.

 

Finally, no mention is made here on the actual air to air capabilities of the aircraft, in particular the fire control/radar system and close range bfm capabilities. One of the things about the Tomcat was the large wing glove area made it a surprisingly agile dogfighter. I doubt that claim would ever be made by the F-111. Also, and this is more in the I'm not sure arena, I was under the impression some compromises had been made in the radar area because of the short nose...which wasn't the case with the Tomcat.

 

However, take anything said on either side with a bit of salt. Politics has killed more than it's share of aircraft, no matter what capabilities they may have had.

 

FC

[+column5]

Also don't forget that the T41 was supposed to have been an interim engine only. So comparing the F-111B's performance to the F-14A--while perfectly realistic since that is how things worked out--was not necessarily the same comparison that influenced decisions at the time.

[+Julhelm]

It is unfair to compare the dogfighting capabilities of the F-111B against those of the F-14A when the F-111B was never supposed to be a dogfighter - It was only supposed to do fleet defence like the Missileer it replaced and not air superiority which emerged as a result of navy experience in Vietnam.

[+FastCargo]

But that doesn't matter.

 

If the author is going to compare the 2 aircraft (by the way, his arguments in the paragraph you quoted are based on carrier handling, which doesn't affect how good either aircraft is as a missiler or a dogfighter) then he needs to compare all their facets as a whole.

 

It could also be argued that the author is being unfair to compare a projected production model to another aircraft that did not exist yet.

 

Plenty of unfairness to go around.

 

FC

[+Julhelm]

Well the thing is, most people slag the F-111B for not being any good as a dogfighter compared to the F-14 when that was clearly not it's raison d'etre at all:

 

The schedule below may be helpful in understanding the demise of the F-111B as more than the Navy finally killing an overweight airplane imposed on it by Secretary of Defense McNamara. In order to counter the Russian bomber/cruise missile threat to the aircraft carrier, the admirals felt in the late 1950s that they needed a Fleet Air Defense "fighter" that could carry a large long-range radar and six big air-to-air missiles out to a holding point a long way from the carrier and loiter there for a long time. The good news was that they were going to get one, albeit as a junior partner to the Air Force. However, by the time the F-111B first flew, the Vietnam War had begun. Fleet Air Defense was still a high priority, but air-to-air superiority was now a day-to-day mission. By the end of 1967, new and arguably very capable Russian fighters had been unveiled at the Moscow Air Show, existing obsolescent MiGs had proved to be a handful over Vietnam, and a Grumman study had shown that the F-111B would not be very good at air-to-air combat. No surprise there - that was never supposed to be its raison d'etre. However, Hughes was well behind schedule with the Phoenix missile system. (One F-111B was mothballed for more than a year for lack of hardware.) The Navy felt that they had to deploy a new fighter with superior air-to-air capability as soon as possible, with Phoenix as an overload mission. Its development, given the Hughes status, wouldn't delay the availability of the Phoenix system to the fleet. There was no lack of unsolicited proposals from industry, with Grumman not shy about promoting their candidate and ultimately successful. The surviving F-111Bs were put to good use supporting development of the Phoenix system in the meantime. The last F-111B flight was in late 1971, more than three years after the production program was canceled.

[MKSheppard]

Another author also made many of the same points, quite a while before Tommy Thomason:

 

Illusions of Choice: The F-111 and the Problem of Weapons Acquisition Reform by Robert F. Coulam.

 

He makes a lot of good points; including the one where the USN IIRC had a F-111B dogfight with a F-4 while laden down with it's full warload of Phoenix AAMs -- that's six tons (!) of missiles, while the F-14A got to dogfight with the F-4 with a mere 2.2~ tons of weapons (4 x Sparrows and 2 x Sidewinders)

[MKSheppard]

I really have only one niggle with the F-111B as it is; it's missing the wet outboard pylons and is set up for air to air only; where the SAC shows a extra pair of outboard pylons and capability of a whole band of weapons:

 

[+FastCargo]

We've known about those pylons since before the model was improved.

 

The non rotating pylons were simply not modeled because their use was rare to non-existant.

 

We do research these kind of things.

 

As far as the cancellation goes, again, if the model no longer meets the new requirement because the circumstances have changed, then it's good that it was cancelled.

 

FC