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The US Navy Says Goodbye to the Tomcat
jonerik writes "Though it's not being widely reported, this week marks the end of the line for the F-14 Tomcat in US Navy service. First flown in 1970, the Grumman F-14 Tomcat was easily one of the world's most powerful, advanced, and deadly aircraft for many years, capable of flying at Mach 2.3 and firing its half-dozen Mach 5 AIM-54 Phoenix air-to-air missiles at targets as much as 100 miles away. Having been gradually replaced during the last several years by the newer F/A-18E/F, the last of the aircraft in US service will be officially retired on Friday, September 22nd in a ceremony at Virginia's Oceana Naval Air Station. However, at least a few F-14s will continue to fly for a few more years: Iran — which took delivery of 79 aircraft before the overthrow of the Shah — still flies the plane, though only a small number (perhaps ten or twenty) are believed to still be in service due to a lack of spare parts and attrition."
But we'll never forget Sega's 2-degree-of-freedom arcade game After Burner II.
It came out one year later, had the same sprite-scaled love that Space Harrier great, and it had a soundtrack better than the movie that indirectly inspired it. When the enemy fighter appeared behind you, you could indeed "hit the brakes, he'll fly right by me" and blow the guy away. Suicide in any actual air-to-air encounter, but it made for great coin-op lovin'...
The pattern is full... but negative, Ghostrider, neither is the coin box in my basement arcade. Don't ask how I got it down got there, and I won't tell you you have to land until Stage 23.
The F-14 uses a variable sweep wing, the idea being that for maneuverability the wings are extended and for speed the wings are swept back.
Nice idea eh? The problem is there are six hydraulic actuators on each wing to make this happen. When one breaks, there's no way to tell which one is bad without pulling all six from the wing and putting each one on a test bench. Testing a single actuator takes about an hour... and Murphy states the bad actuator is the last one you test.
The F-18 may look like a lawn dart from hell, but at least it's relatively easier to work on.
A Human Right
Im an avionics tech crrently stationed at NAS Oceana, and im not sorry to see them go because of this. F-18 gear is way easier and faster to work on. Not to mention a lower failure rate. That being said, alot of the older guys and pilots are sad to see them go.
Rather like the F-4 "Phantom," in the late '60s and the '70s, the F-14 was probably the most idealized fighter for an entire generation of kids in the '80s. Something about the design - the graceful lines, or the swing wings, perhaps - just made it more romantic than either the F-15 or F-16 to my mind. I got to see one at an airshow once, afterburners on and all, which was a treat given that I don't live on the coast.
Children of the '90s have their F-22s, and F-117s, to admire, I suppose. For the rest, the postively ancient B-52 still lives.
I was sad to see the F-4 fade away over the course of the '80s, though I wasn't around for its heyday. The same with the F-111 - the last true fighter-bomber (as opposed to strike fighter) in U.S. service. I have to wonder if the "Tomcat" won't be the last pure air-combat-fighter/interceptor ever put into production for the U.S. armed forces.
The US navy at one point had at least 699 F14's in service or on order (that sounds incredibly high, is it a typo on fas.org?), at a per-copy cost of $38,000,000, plus maintainence costs with exceed procurement costs over the lifetime of each aircraft. So figure $56,000,000,000.
Now here's a little quiz for your flight-sim jockeys out there. Guess how many bogeys the F14 shot down 34 year run, in total? Guess before you read the answer.
Answer: 4 jets and 1 helicopter.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
Funny you should mention that. My former linear algebra teacher used to work for SPAWAR back in the 60s-70s. He spent years collecting data on (at that time) existing aircraft and applying it to various formulas (mainly least square matrices, which is why he brought it up) to estimate the GSH/flight. He determined that it would be a maintenance nightmare and recommended against it. They ignored him and made the jets anyway.
He cited that as the key reason why he decided to teach. He thought that once in awhile someone in class might actually listen to him.
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
US carrier groups have been pretty underutilized since WWII in terms of their capital cost (the Nimitz cost a couple of billion with a B, and I think she's seen action near Libya once and did some support during the first Gulf War, and thats about it). But the entire purpose of being the biggest guy on the block is that so your fighter aces can grow old and die without ever seeing combat. Every time Communist Russia thought the prospect of universal socialism could be achieved faster by rolling over Western Germany, every time a tinpot dictator thinks "Hmm, starving my people for the last couple of decades has given me enough tanks to crush my neighbor... sounds appealing", every time Kim Jon Quackpot gets tired of eating grass and thinks "Hey I could get some sweet kimchi if I could take a quick vacation in the burning remains of Seoul", they look to the horizon and see a distinct absence of US military ready to kick their ass. And they remember that that could change tomorrow if we had a reason to change it. And so their tanks stay parked collecting rust while they scavenge parts to bring a couple out to the parade ground.
Of course, some folks and even some nation-states occasionally decide "Eh, the Americans were probably kidding about actually using that whole military machine thing". Hiya, Saddam, tell me: how did that invasion of Kuwait go for you again?
Help poke pirates in the eyepatch, arr.
It's hard to find any grown man today who hasn't seen the classic man-flick "Top Gun."
e produce-if-they-were-mammals" would still follow orders. Additionally, I heard from one of the enlisted plane captains at Miramar at the time that Tom Cruise treated them like they were way low-class during filming. Way, way, uncool to treat the people responsible for the aircraft you are about to fly in like that. Apparently he's changed since then, but even so, I still consequently hate that movie, even more than most other chick-flicks.
Surely you jest. I saw it, and being in the Navy at the time, hated it, since it was nothing like the real Navy, and apparently a chick-flick. There are emotional issues, a love conflict, (boy-meets-girl, boy-loses-girl, boy-gets-girl-again story line,) the men-playing-volleyball scene, and the ending with the protagonist confronting personal demons and finding self-actualization. Take away the F-14s, and it is your stereotypical chick-flick. I would say all it needs is Meg Ryan, but she's already there.
To be fair, I am kind of biased. Most (definitely not all) of the Navy (and other military) pilots I have known followed orders to the tee to safely complete their mission, and would never act like Maverick, so the whole screenplay is bull. Even the pilots who were bigger-penises-than-supernovae-would-require-to-r
Answer: 4 jets and 1 helicopter [aerospaceweb.org].
Apparently the Iranians added substantially to that score during the first Gulf war. Ironically enough, and if your information on Tomact air victories in US service is reliable, that means that the majority of F-14 Tomcat victories were achieved by the air force of the Islamic Republic of Iranian. It took Iran a while to recover their capability to operate the Tomcat after the revolution but when they did the Tomcat had an easy time especially vs. Iraqi MiG-21s, MiG-23s and assorted helicopters since the Iraqis only got pretty low grade export variants from the Soviets and had nothing capable of matching the Tomcat on any level until they got MiG-25 and Mirage fighters with good radar warning receivers, modern intercept radars and the all important long range missiles. Of course all this happened while Saddam was still America's friend and <sarcasm> before he joined the axis-of-evil </sarcasm>. What is really amazing is that Iran still manages to operate the Tomcat today 27 years after the revolution without manufacturer support.
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
Second it is suicide only with older US aircraft....
...
Most older aircraft, yes, but it was possible and did happen with an F4:
Once again, he met the MiG-17 head-on, this time with an offset so he couldn't fire his guns. As he pulled up vertically he could again see his determined adversary a few yards away. Still gambling, Cunningham tried one more thing. He yanked the throttles back to idle and popped the speed brakes, in a desperate attempt to drop behind the MiG. But, in doing so, he had thrown away the Phantom's advantage, its superior climbing ability. And if he stalled out
The MiG shot out in front of Cunningham for the first time....
from this source