Monday, April 21, 2008

Blast from the past.

http://www.youtube.com/v/z4KLXlE9ZU4

Luftwaffe Phantoms in da house!

Found here.
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20 comments:

Brandon said...

I loved that plane as a kid. It was second fiddle only to a Tomcat in my mind. I'd still exchange a personally valuable anatomical spheroid to get behind the stick of old Double Ugly.

12:37 PM, April 21, 2008
Anonymous said...

Ah, yes, the F-4 Phantom II. The United States Navy's proof that, if you stick a pair of J-79s in the back, you can in fact make a dump truck fly.

Also, that pilot is batshit insane.

12:39 PM, April 21, 2008
Anonymous said...

Oh my goodness, I love F-4s. Way to make my morning.

1:28 PM, April 21, 2008
Jeffro said...

The Blue Angels came to town when I was a kid. The F-4 has been imprinted as the jet fighter since.

Yeah, it's a brick, but it didn't seem like it at the airshow. Thanks for the memories.

2:41 PM, April 21, 2008
Matt G said...

Also, that pilot is batshit insane.

Took the words right out of my mouth.

Day-yum. That ol' boy was doing things at near-stall speed that I wouldn't have thought could be done with an F4. Not a lot of room for error at that altitude. Must have been a maestro of the throttle control.

3:18 PM, April 21, 2008
Ken said...

From the opening shot, I was sure we were going to see some rides get un-pimped. Still a great video, though.

I love the F-4 too. Years ago, I bought IAF because it was the only game in town with a flyable F-4 (for all I know, it still is).

4:04 PM, April 21, 2008
Anonymous said...

What a big, beautiful plane. (The Germans nicknamed it "The Flying Brick" and "The Iron Pig".)

Thanks, Tam!

(PS - can anybody read what's written on the nose? I can make out "Spirit of...something")

5:02 PM, April 21, 2008
Anonymous said...

I loved that plane too. I wanted to use F-4s in a skywriting business; no way to turn off the smoke though.

5:25 PM, April 21, 2008
Tam said...

"Also, that pilot is batshit insane."

Well, duh; he's a fighter pilot!

"You can't be careful on a skateboard, mister." :)

5:59 PM, April 21, 2008
Tam said...

For the record, you can keep your rock stars, supermodels, and quarterbacks. Fighter pilots have the coolest job ever in the history of mankind.

6:02 PM, April 21, 2008
Anonymous said...

And NAVY pilots are the coolest of the cool!!

In my wildest, craziest days I NEVER would have tried to park a cannon shell on a pool table!!

Word verification: kwsonwt. I think that is the sound the pilots upper digestive tract makes when he catches a wire...

DeDog

7:20 PM, April 21, 2008
Anonymous said...

"Never ask a man if he's a fighter pilot! If he is, he'll tell you. If he isn't, then don't embarrass him."

(I personally preferred the Navy airplanes in which the high-school dropout babysat the two college boys. Knowing this made it easier for me to sleep in flight.)

But yeah. I liked the Ol' Droop Snoot. It was sort of the 440 Roadrunner of the airplane world.

9:08 PM, April 21, 2008
Rabbit said...

A few years ago, the day before an airshow at DAL/Love Field, I was coming out of Bachmann Pawn and Gun and heard something big, fast, and heavy pushing a ton of air out of the way. I finally tracked the noise to an immaculate F4J painted in Nam-era green and tan camo, flaps out as far as they'd go, gear down, tailhook out, flying just above streetlight level with the nose up at about 45 degrees pushing hot smoky kerosene fumes out the back as it headed for the fence on the end of the runway. It had the crackheads and hookers scattering everywhichaway.

I bet if he'd cleaned up the flaps and raised the gear he could have climbed out at better than 350 knots before he got to the last row of landing lights inside the fence.

Years ago, going down I-30 between D and Ft.W., I saw a pair of Phantoms scissoring around the raised roadbed heading toward NAS Ft. Worth. You could look directly into the cockpit as they banked and see the pilot and RIO like they were sitting next to you- because they were.

Regards,
Rabbit.

Regards,
Rabbit.

11:45 PM, April 21, 2008
Anonymous said...

X-plane has a Phantom-and a Mustang. I like to fly my imaginary Phantom between the imaginary buildings of downtown Denver at Mach 1.5, because I can, and because I have an imaginary friend in the glass business.

12:16 AM, April 22, 2008
Anonymous said...

Tam,
With enough money, the Russians will put you through flight school to learn to fly the MIG-29, or possibly even the SU-27. After that, with another large pile of cash, they will sell you a MIG-29. 'Course, the feds would have heart failure when you try to bring it home! Supposedly, the Mig is considered to be the best low level dogfighter, when flown by a top pilot.

1:49 AM, April 22, 2008
Anonymous said...

Tam, you obviously knew I'd have a very long day at work and a long evening of bs before being able to relax and unwind finally so you posted that clip earlier just for me, right? Thanks.

Also-- For F4 fans, check out "Phantoms Over Vietnam." Interesting read if not high art.

And for any of you Luftwaffe/jet fighter/aviation buffs who haven't heard about those lads out in Everett, WA, check out www.stormbirds.com.

2:19 AM, April 22, 2008
Anonymous said...

Pilots who actually trusted that bird were nuts, but then most fighter pilots are by definition. :-)

I worked Avionics on it. The Central Air Data Computer, which provided data for everything from indicators, to autopilot, to bomb toss computations, to the variable inlet ramps for the engines, was a "computer" alright. A purely mechanical analog one.

It was a heavy gray box full of synchronous motors, shafts, potentiometers, switches, and cam lobes. It was a mechanical nightmare for which most adjustments in calibration were made with allen wrenches, not anything remotely electronic as we think of computers today.

Don't get me wrong -- I loved the bird, but I hated working on some of its systems and often wondered how much the pilots really knew about its innards.

From a maintenance standpoint it was a very poorly designed bird, particularly considering it's carrier use. High failure rate parts were hiddedn behind other major parts, such as the rear seat, that had to be removed for access. That back seat spent more time out of the bird than in it.

But I do miss it.

4:17 AM, April 22, 2008
Laughingdog said...

Actually, the German Air Force still flies these. One of the firearms instructors at my range is a German Air Force Officer and he flew these until he got transferred over to this country. While we used these for air-to-air combat decades ago, they still use them for missions similar to our A-10s. The key difference is that they are used to drop optical and laser guided (or maybe just one of those) bombs on tanks instead of shooting the living hell out of them.

11:39 AM, April 22, 2008
Anonymous said...

This is so cool! The F4 is still used at Pt. Mugu NAS as a remote tow vehicle for target drones. The RCTV are then landed on San Nic. Isl. and flown back by real piolits.

11:59 PM, April 26, 2008
Anonymous said...

I got to watch one of them do a high-power (i.e. max AB) run one time. Inside a van, with ear defender on, it was still mind-buggeringly loud.

12:14 AM, October 31, 2008

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