streakeagle

I can't find a better image than your first color photo and the decal sheet. It looks like some kind of bird with its wings up and one foot extended forward. Kiwis don't have wings. On the decal sheet, it looks more like a Dodo bird.

This is another decal sheet for Hey Jude. Wolfpak Decals 72-112 - "Devil's Fork" (usaf-sig.org) There is an image of the decal sheet itself that kind of shows the small red logo that it mounted low on the left side. On the sheet it is next to the "Hey Jude" decal. You can see the logo on the intake ramp of the first color photo of 307. s-l1600.jpg (1139×1600) (ebayimg.com)

I would bet on it. I would love to see Hey Jude's skin on the Heatblur DCS F-4E despite being post Vietnam slatted variant <hint, hint>

Here is a photo from the same unit, but the image is too low of a quality to be useful. It also appears to be lacking TISEO. F-4E_of_the_421st_Tactical_Fighter_Squadron_at_DaNang.jpg (600×400) (wikimedia.org)

My F-4 Phantom book collection might have some other similarly marked F-4Es in it, but notably not "Hey Jude". Maybe even the other one in the above photo, but possibly the same photo. I have never seen many photos of this unit in my quest to find photos of "Hey Jude". However, I was able to find color profiles in the past, including "Hey Jude". These profiles were typically on Russian sites since they were mostly copied out of books and posted without permission.

I found the photo on my facebook account. The web page source is long gone, but here is the photo. This is the info from the webiste: Photo of "Hey Jude" from website of a guy commissioned to build a model of it for its pilot, Brigadier General (Ret.) Bob Baxter. Apparently, "Hey Jude" was part of an operational evaluation of TISEO over Vietnam in February of 1972.

The lower photo is a bird I struggled to find before. It is "Hey Jude", which was the box art for the Revell 1/32 F-4E in my childhood, H198. Revell 1/32 McDonnell Douglas F-4E Phantom II Hey Jude, H198 (oldmodelkits.com) Here is a modern decal sheet: F-4 Phantom Hey Jude Graphics Set – Callie Graphics (callie-graphics.com) I did find a photo or two, maybe I have them linked on my Facebook?

The MiG-19S was promised before the MiG-19P was ever released. It is kind of like waiting for the early F-14A and the AI J35 Draken from Heatblur. DCS developers have a habit of promising more than they can deliver in a reasonable amount of time. At least some eventually deliver, like RAZBAM and Heatblur. The MiG-17F is sorely needed for 1960s historical conflicts in Vietnam and Israel, both for AI opposition and PVP. But I will have more fun with the MiG-23, which is essentially a single engine, single seat F-4 Phantom with less drag, more power, and half the armament.

I have been waiting for this for so long. The Strike Fighters MiG-23 mods were limited by the available avionics. This will finally provide a decent, combat capable simulation of the MiG-23. I would have preferred either an earlier MiG-23MF or the final MiG-23MLD, but I will gladly take RAZBAM's MiG-23MLA whose version was selected because that is the aircraft the developers physically have available for inspection/study. It is a Cuban aircraft, so I don't know if it will be identical to a Soviet frontline MLA or be partially degraded as an export model despite not having an export designation. I need to check my MiG-23 book to see if it identifies any variations in the Cuban models.

Two things going on: It was designed to be modular/adaptable to needs. It also went through at least three revisions, block I, block II, and another upgrade that I did not have a name.

This doesn't answer any of your questions, but I thought this was a very informative sales-brochure from Northrop-Grumman: google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwiI-rCQ49WEAxW0RDABHYkYAVoQFnoECCkQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fdefense-arab.com%2Fvb%2Fattachments%2F61036%2F&usg=AOvVaw3-UqYWhEYhVEBzcohb5wUd&opi=89978449

Development has never really stopped. Some projects that were a long time in the making matured and have set a higher bar for SF mods. The new F-5 Freedom Fighter series is the one that comes to mind for me. It pretty much hits the limit of what can be done without game updates. There are many others who have been working on bits and pieces that uplift existing mods with new textures, updated avionics, etc. I would also look into anything and everything Ravenclaw has updated/replaced.

My goal was always to fly F-4 Phantoms in Vietnam, though I enjoyed many other aircraft and eras in flight sims. I started out the Jane's Fighters Anthology on a work laptop around 1998. I went back to college in 2000, so I bought a PC to allow me to do schoolwork at home, but set it up as a mid-range flight sim machine with Jane's USAF (and most of the other Jane's sims at that time). The graphics for Jane's USAF impressed me, particularly the nearly photo-real Nevada terrain. The cockpits and external models look pretty good. But then, I saw TK/Third Wire posting about their upcoming Strike Fighters Project 1 sim that featured the F-4 as one of the primary aircraft. I bought the half-finished/buggy Walmart edition as soon as I saw it on the shelf. I played the SF/WoX/SF2 series almost every day for quite a few years. Until TK had started dumbing down SF2 and finally abandoned it for the free-to-play tablet/phone games. At exactly that time, DCS World had recently released the P-51D Mustang and announced a crowd funded MiG-21bis. Beyond the MiG-21, DCS rapidly got the F-86, MiG-15, F-5, and UH-1. From that point on, DCS became my primary sim. I also migrated to flying in VR as well as flying lots of online multiplayer. I have had SF2 somewhat compatible with VR every now and then, but it cannot compare to the VR experience in DCS World. The F-4 Phantom is finally coming to DCS World, too. I very rarely startup SF2 anymore.

My father told me I couldn't learn to fly just by reading books, that I needed experience. When I was in the 5th grade, one of his friends had gotten his pilot license and started flying for the police department. First, I got a few minutes at the controls of a Piper Cherokee after we were already in the air, when everyone went up together. After that flight, the pilot and I went up in a Cessna 152, so I got 100% of the time at the controls. He taxied the Cessna 152 to the runway, then let me takeoff and fly for a bit. My takeoff was too steep, so he had me lower the nose a tad to avoid a stall. After I did some ovals and figure 8's, he took over to do some maneuvers like zero g stalls, falling leaf, etc. I didn't get to try landing. The same police pilot was going to take me up in the police helicopter. But the day that was supposed to happen, an upper level supervisor came to the field, so all I got was a nice lunch. I have had only one ride in a helo. I was hanging out the side door of a UH-1H flying nap-of-earth over the Hudson River. I would rather have gotten to try taking the controls, but it was still a great helo ride. When I joined the Civil Air Patrol in the 6th grade, they gave us some flight time in a Cessna 172. Each person got about 10-15 minutes on each flight. The ranking officer was an ex-Navy fighter pilot and he was the one taking us up. Both he and his son commented on the exceptional coordination of my turns with zero instruction. By the time I left the Civil Air Patrol in the 7th grade, I had maybe two to three hours total time at the controls. I don't recall doing any takeoffs or landings in the Civil Air Patrol. Fast forward to college: my father had met a young pilot flying cargo hops around Tampa Bay every day from 5 AM to 5 PM in a Piper Arrow that only had front seats. He had an empty seat and was more than happy to let me fly with him. So, I skipped classes and went to fly. He let me fly most of the route, including takeoffs and landings (there were multiple stops). He handled the radio calls. I had trouble steering/braking on the ground with the brake pedals: unlike before, I was now a licensed driver and instinctively tried to steer with the wheel and also had trouble using the pedals to steer while applying even or no pressure to the brakes. So, my biggest problem the entire day was slowing down after touchdown, when I would start inducing left/right oscillation. What impressed him was that we flew through several clouds and I had no problem flying by instruments. Other than a little oscillation trying to hold a particular altitude, I could stay on course and speed with a level bank. After that long day, plus a chance to fly out to the desert, land, and fly back to the airfield in San Diego while in the Navy, I have over 15 hours of stick time with several landings and even more takeoffs... none of it logged and no work toward getting a license. So, at about 10 years old with no formal training, I could fly visually from takeoff to a safe cruising altitude. By the time I was in college, I couldn't follow radio protocols and was very shaky at steering after touchdown, but could otherwise fly, including on instruments through clouds. I had zero flight time from 7th grade (1981) to college (1988). But I did have a Timex Sinclair 1000 (Sinclair ZX81 in Europe) that had a very basic flight simulator that was keyboard controlled and really slow update rate. Later, I had a Timex Sinclair 2068 (Sinclair Spectrum in Europe) that could use two Atari joysticks to fly an F-15 (Digital Integration's "Fighter Pilot" game) and an AH-64 Apache (Digital Integration's Tomahawk). While the graphics were crude, that forced you to fly by instruments rather than looking outside, which more than prepared me for flying a Piper on a cargo run. I could easily get off the ground, bore holes in the sky, and probably get back down on the ground without crashing in Cessnas and Pipers. But, I did not know how to communicate and had zero ability to use the charts and slide-rule tool to navigate. I did prove I could fly by beacons when provided the necessary information on the all-day cargo run. I wouldn't want to try to fly larger or faster aircraft without the opportunity to get a feel for the controls. But between my real-world experience in light civil aircraft and years of PC flight simming complete with rudder pedals and toe-brakes, I am confident I wouldn't do too bad in many fixed wing aircraft if I had to.There is a true story about a mechanic stealing an A-4 Skyhawk. He got it off the ground, did some aerobatics, and landed safely. His flight training/experience was being a decent glider pilot as a hobby. The military wouldn't let him become a pilot, so he decided to take the one chance he had to fly the Skyhawk. Most people would have been court-martialed and sent to prison. However, in this case, they decided that since his service record had been very good prior to this incident and he didn't damage the aircraft at all, that they would just discharge him immediately. He did have a lot of hours in gliders, but a 500 mph A-4 is a lot different than a glider. I would like to think that if he could pull that off, that I could have gotten an F-4 in the air, too. I don't think the landing would go as well, but who knows. Every chance I got to fly for real, I showed both a natural aptitude and a full understanding of what I was seeing both on the gauges and outside the aircraft. But there is one more part to my already long-winded story: my wife gave me an orientation flight as a gift one year. I had 30 minutes to try out flying a "sport" aircraft. The aircraft looked a lot like a Cessna, but was much smaller to meet the size/weight requirements for a fair-weather VFR day-only sport license. This was about 10 years ago, after years of flying flight sims. Because of its size and weight, it handled more like a large RC model than a Cessna. The controls were very light and easy to move. The cockpit was a modern "glass" cockpit with GPS navigation, real-time 3d maps, etc. The side-by-side seating was a little cramped with almost no headroom. The big difference was that as an older adult, I was now more concerned about overstressing the aircraft and flying smoothly/safely than having fun pushing the aircraft limits. So, unlike previous years, I flew more like a little old lady trying to slowly merge into high-speed 5-lane interstate traffic than someone who would have been willing to try to get an F-4 off the ground by myself. I am not the same confident/arrogant person I was during my college/Navy years, during which time I drove my 1974 Firebird and 1980 Corvette like I had a death wish. I am now fully aware of my mortality and how much pain a crash could cause as well as any financial penalties for totaling an aircraft and possibly damaging other people's property or even injuring/killing other people. But if I was in an F-4 that had rear seat controls, I would still try to fly the F-4 if given the chance with someone in the backseat to keep me from doing something too stupid. Of course, no one in their right mind would let me do that even if I were sitting in the backseat, so they could have full vision and full control.

You can't research military aircraft without stumbling on to his website. I was just on his site the other day and wondered if he was still alive and how much longer his site will stay up. I doubt he made any provisions for someone else to takeover. Which means another legendary site will most likely fade away to the wayback internet archive site.

This shows how the gun camera is mounted in a MiG-21bis, notice it obscures the view which is why the gun camera is often omitted in flight sim cockpits:

This is a real pic. Check out the clarity. This is the pic that convinced me the original posted pic was probably real: aircraft-gun-camera-004-jpg.129399 (699×555) (militaryimages.net)

I believe that is a real image. But there is no way to know when and where that image came from. There were quite a few countries that transitioned from MiG-21s to F-16s and/or that conducted exercises with allies that had F-16s. If it was from actual combat and it led to a kill, why not show the gun cam image of the F-16 getting hit? If you google MiG-21 gun camera film, you can find other examples that are very similar to this one. That is why I accept it as likely being real.

This can be an overdone stereo effect. Looking in a particular direction causes the sound to drop out. I remember experiencing this in Strike Fighters, but I don't remember what the fix was. I suspect something to do with the audio driver and settings for the PC (not within the game). But I really can't remember, so it could be some setting or ini entry in the game.

I love the effort you put into getting all of the details correct on the F-4. I hope Heatblur's F-4E cockpit will be as well researched and correct as your cockpits. I know the person that developed the analog pulse radar for the DCS A-4E-C free mod. He is working with Heatblur to get the APQ-120 correct on their F-4E. Up to now, no one has really modeled F-4 radar any better than Third Wire's Strike Fighters series. The Milviz F-4J/S, Milviz F-4E, and Simworks Studios F-4B were detailed with a lot more functionality, but Third Wire's simplified implementation was more accurate for actual combat employment.

It looks great, but it is early access, so a lot of things are missing and/or don't work as they should. I have two problems with this modules: 1. There isn't going to be an AI WSO back seater. 2. I can't remove the CFTs to make it more like an F-15C for air-to-air. Both of these facts were announced before I bought it, so I was not surprised. But after having the very useful AI RIO in the F-14 and the somewhat useful AI gunner in the Mi-24, I expect something similar for the F-15E. For some reason, the F-15C has never been made a full module, so I would very much like to be able to use an F-15E without CFTs as a slightly heavier substitute. In its present state, the cockpit and external model look amazing. When the avionics are fully functional and work correctly, it will make people who loved Jane's F-15 Strike Eagle very happy.

Nothing new. Fighter Ops comes to mind. But I can think of several other flight sim scams both civil and combat versions.

Check out the screen shots and videos for each version of Falcon on steam to appreciate how far PC combat flight simulators have come. Those old games pushed the limits of what could be done on a PC at the time, but now look little better than Atari home system and arcade games, complete with cheesy digital synthesizer music.

I would assume you already stumbled upon this, but it was great information with great photos about RAF Phantoms getting the ALE-40 around the time of the Falklands War: AN/ALE 40 :: David Gledhill (david-gledhill.co.uk)

With three different TO's resulting in the same cockpit images in the February 1979 manual, I wonder why there were three different TO's and when each one was initiated? But 1978 is absolutely the latest date it can be given a very early 1979 manual citing the changes.