Alicatt
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Posts posted by Alicatt
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1. Started with LOMAC at the International Flight Sim Show at the Hilton in Birmingham in 2003. I had been looking after my mother who was dying of cancer and my brother had come home on leave to give me a break, so off I went met up with a good few flight sim online friends from Frugals Forums and sat drinking with Frugal and friends through the night, got about an hours sleep before having to go attend a lecture on LOMAC by Oleg.
Picked up a demo disk of LOMAC and awaitied it's release, I have one of the original numbered hard bound manuals for LOMAC, I followed through with Flaming Cliffs etc. and then with the release of DCS Blackshark it was an instant buy for me, so been here from the start :)
My mother passed away about a week after the flight Sim show, I still miss her.
2. On the news, one had crashed and they were trying to recover it from the sea, I was still more fixated on the EE Lightning and the Vulcan at that time ;)
3. It's got wings, it has got two BIG engines and it shoots missiles what's not to like??? :D First sim I had with the F14 in it was Birds of Prey, it was my go to aircraft in that sim, later Fleet Defender got hours of "simming"
4. Our cinema had long closed and the nearest one was over 100 miles away in Inverness, I was starting to put together a home cinema so my first viewing of Top Gun was at home with some friends and a good supply of Woods Navy Rum. The friends that were with me that night were the same ones that I went off to the airshows with, sadly most of them have slipped off their mortal coil now.
5. Never even seen a F14 up close never mind getting in one :(
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Fine, I'll admit it.
I tried really hard to look at the screen but there is a P-40 and a Clipped Wing Spitfire in the background. :megalol:
What screen?
:D
Is the Edge coming with Edge too?
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It does, but only because no exact time-frames were specified in the discussion before.
So, the Tomcat was 'utilized' by the US in Persian Gulf against Iran and around Taiwan and Korea? And it was not 'utilized' in the North Atlantic?
Not utilised in the North Atlantic?
requote:
Mike "Raz" AroneyWe participated in an exercise in 1982 named Northern Wedding, where we had NATO forces acting as adversaries along with the harsh weather of the North Sea. There was the likelihood of some real adversaries pitching into the fight; the Soviets weren’t going to be happy with American carriers that close to their turf. The Admiral was counting on a robust Soviet reaction, since he was whipping up the most provocative defense posture ever attempted with the Tomcat; he surmised the Soviet Bears would expect to encounter Tomcats at 200 miles from the carrier, making it simple for them to pinpoint the American ships. The plan was to surprise the Russians by intercepting their Bears at the unheard-of distance of 1000 miles, under a mission code-named “Sly Fox.” The package, consisting of Prowlers and tankers with the Toms, would fly under EMCON and keep their radars off, letting the Prowler pinpoint the Bears. At the intercept the supporting aircraft stripped off to let the F-14s slide upside the Bears. They were caught totally off-guard by the unexpected appearance of the American jets. As the Toms camped on the wing, or tight by the rear gunner’s blister, the Bears searched in vain over the cloud cover, trying to hunt down the carrier in thousands of square miles of stormy seas and confusing radar contacts. Sly Fox birds worked under total EMCON – no talk, radar emissions, TACAN, or datalinks. Those Bears really had to labour to find the ship.
I remember the exercise quite well as they used our local beach at Sinclair Bay for some of the landing exercises, and seeing the aircraft carrier parked on the horizon it looked huge from the shore.
Other Northern Wedding operations:
1986
http://www.usskidd.com/hist993.html
During amphibious landings at Larvik, Norway, KIDD simultaneously controlled flights of F-14 Tomcats, F-18 Hornets, and Marine Corps Harriers making intercepts on simulated "hostiles". She also conducted anti-submarine warfare exercises against Norwegian diesel submarines in concert with three Canadian frigates and provided fire support of the Marines on the beach along with IOWA. With the conclusion of the exercise, Amphibious Task Force Commander RADM Fogarty noted "If asked which cruiser I would like to have as our Anti-Air Warfare Commander, my answer would be USS KIDD!" KIDD was awarded the Battle Efficiency "E" for her excellent performance in Northern Wedding.Pic from operation Ocean Safari conducted in the North Atlantic during 1985
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It was this anecdote I was remembering from Tomcat Bye Bye BabyProbably has a lot to do with "Red Storm Rising" :)We participated in an exercise in 1982 named Northern Wedding, where we had NATO forces acting as adversaries along with the harsh weather of the North Sea. There was the likelihood of some real adversaries pitching into the fight; the Soviets weren’t going to be happy with American carriers that close to their turf. The Admiral was counting on a robust Soviet reaction, since he was whipping up the most provocative defense posture ever attempted with the Tomcat; he surmised the Soviet Bears would expect to encounter Tomcats at 200 miles from the carrier, making it simple for them to pinpoint the American ships. The plan was to surprise the Russians by intercepting their Bears at the unheard-of distance of 1000 miles, under a mission code-named “Sly Fox.” The package, consisting of Prowlers and tankers with the Toms, would fly under EMCON and keep their radars off, letting the Prowler pinpoint the Bears. At the intercept the supporting aircraft stripped off to let the F-14s slide upside the Bears. They were caught totally off-guard by the unexpected appearance of the American jets. As the Toms camped on the wing, or tight by the rear gunner’s blister, the Bears searched in vain over the cloud cover, trying to hunt down the carrier in thousands of square miles of stormy seas and confusing radar contacts. Sly Fox birds worked under total EMCON – no talk, radar emissions, TACAN, or datalinks. Those Bears really had to labor to find the ship.
Parsons, Dave; Hall, George; Lawson, Bob (2011-07-10). Grumman F-14 Tomcat: Bye - Bye Baby...!: Images & Reminiscences From 35 Years of Active Service (Kindle Locations 1165-1175). Motorbooks International. Kindle Edition.
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Also the Nimrod out of Kinloss and the Typhoons out of Lossie, my local airfield was Wick, it is situated between the A of Great and the N of Britain on that map.
We got a lot of different aircraft come visit us from all over the UK as we had a lot of low flying areas, and Wick was a diversionary airfield which the RAF used for touch 'n' goes.
I remember the Jaguar pilot that had to climb slightly to get over the road and my little mini van between Wick and Thurso, he rocked his wings as he disappeared over the next field... and the jet blast rocked my van :D
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Good find regarding the F-14s involvement in this theatre, frankly I find that fleet defence is a very important role for any aircraft based on land or sea in the GIUK Gap. Of course it would provide an excellent habitat for VEAO's Sea Harrier and Lynx modules as well.There is more to that than is in Wikipedia, I will have to search my books to get the full story as it does detail some of the tactics the F14 used to intercept the Bears etc. by sneaking up on them using emissions control ie. radar off...
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OR:
But a bit to the east so you get Murmansk, And probably not as big.
but the GIUK gap is a very important strategic area where Russia is concerned.
There are quite a few coastal airfields missing from that, but would love to see the GIUK as a theatre.
Wasn't there some confrontation with the F14 up north in this area?
Ahh...
Operation Northern Wedding and Ocean Safari typically brought at least one US Navy carrier into the Greenland-Iceland-United Kingdom (GIUK) gap during the exercise prompting considerable monitoring by Soviet surface ships, submarines and aircraft. Tomcats were utilized to provide around the clock fleet air defense intercepting not only Soviet Bear D aircraft, but Badger maritime strike as well as Bison, Cub and May surveillance aircraft that routinely tried to target the aircraft carrier battle group.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F-14_Tomcat_operational_history
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I'm fairly certain you're incorrect. There are separate wing sweep circuit breakers for left and right side, so if I'm reading the manual right, forcing asymmetric sweep should be possible.
For the flight test of the asymmetrical wing test they disconnected the systems for one wing and manually moved the wing to the required sweep and locked it there, the other wing was able to be swept by the cockpit sweep control. The two wings are interlinked to prevent asymmetrical settings happening.
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Ah, INS :) Of course it needs to be aligned - some guys discuss it here, they seem to know what they're taking about:
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/rec.aviation.military.naval/LDqxfDpiA64
Depending on what system is implemented (mechanical or ring-laser gyros) the accuracy of navigation will decrease during the flight more or less. I'd expect not much, though, it's usually a function of time, and mechanical forces (turbulence, maneuvering), so if a mission lasts less than a couple of hours it should stay fairly precise...
Nice find :)
Reading that reminds me of my GPS enabled telescope and what it does to find it's self and get an alignment.
From cold and no location it first downloads the tables from the GPS satellites and works out it's location, then it spins around 360degrees one way and then 360 the other way to get a location on magnetic north, then from the data downloaded from the GPS it works out true north, then does a tilt nodding up and down on north then east, south and west to find out how level it is. Once it has done all that it points at a star and you have to centre it and it does this another 2 to 4 times to get it's precision fix, after all that it is ready to look at the stars :)
Lucky you can do a "warm" start if you have parked it up properly then it just checks the stars and you are ready to go.
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Hi Guys,
LNS updated their facebook banner:
Also, it's a bit of vain picture...as this F-14B stares at itself in the mirror. ;)
-Nick
Well when you look this good how can one not help it :D
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This may sound stupid, but does the boat accelerates a bit when the aircraft is at full throttle just prior catapulting? :)
once the blast deflector goes up you have a balancing of the forces acting on the ship to accelerate it, however the section between the holding brace on the front oleo and the blast deflector will be under a slight bit of stretching force.
To put numbers on it, the F14 delivers around 55,600 lbs of thrust at full afterburner
The likes of the Carl Vinson CVN-70 weighs in around 226 912 000lbs so any acceleration from one or two F14s on the catapult will be negligible :)
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Flying Scholarship.
I see your location is Edinburgh, RAF Turnhouse was where I first flew, a Chipmunk with the RAF's introduction to flight with the Air Training Corps.
Loved that first 35 minute flight and set my goal on being a pilot in the RAF, alas it was not to be as my eyesight was not up to the standard required back then.
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Is there any book cheaper than "Grumman F-14 Tomcat: Shipborne Superfighter" that covers development and versions? And something that covers USN combat missions will be grest too.
Grumman F14 "Tomcat" by James Perry Stevenson in the Ace Aero Series Vol 25 ISBN-0-8168-0590-3 gives a lot of detail about the F14A and the book is from 1975, it is available on Amazon at a reasonable price too.
Amazon UK from £9.83 : http://www.amazon.co.uk/Grumman-F-14-Tomcat-Aero-25/dp/0816805903/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1429531764&sr=8-1&keywords=0816805903
Amazon.com from $1.81 http://www.amazon.com/Grumman-F-14-Tomcat-Aero-25/dp/0816805903/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1429531855&sr=8-1&keywords=0816805903
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The line for the Lancaster is over here behind me ;)
A short to whet your appetite while awaiting the landing of VEAO's Lancaster :)
The series is not bad, I have it on DVD :)
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Not only that, it was about the safety of the personnel, equipment and ship because the pilot did not have full control over his aircraft with such an asymmetric set up.
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Pages 39 & 40 are the the same image just on different pages. They will have to be combined in photoshop to give 1 picture due to page width.
Just checked. Several of those pages are 1 larger image but spread out on several pages.
Yes, I see that, but the image on page 37 which is the left hand side of the image on page 38 is only partial, I have tried downloading it again in case I got a corrupt download but it is still the same, for me at least.
Page 40 is the incomplete right hand side of page 39
Page37
Page40
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Just in case the VEAO guys or anyone else want to download them.
F-8F-2 SAC
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1pcH8c0wrpFTnFsdlBCeE53Vk0/view?usp=sharing
F-8F Manual
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1pcH8c0wrpFeWQ0Um9uT3lva0E/view?usp=sharing
Thanks for sharing them :thumbup:
I note that either I got a corrupt download or that pages 37 and 40 of the manual didn't come out properly showing only about 1/4 of the top of the pages
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The book says that they had to stop the test pilot, Sewell, from attempting it as he reckoned he could do it :pilotfly: :joystick:
Landing speed at 68 degree sweep was 195knots, it was outside the limits as to what the carrier could handle, at up to 50 degree sweep then the landing speed was greatly reduced as they could still use slats and flaps, still the landing speed was high at just over 150knots.
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NASA flight testing asymmetric flight, one wing locked at 20 degree sweep and the other was able to be moved with the manual control during flight.
they tested landing with it up to 50 degree sweep, even to carrier landing, but recconed there was not enough residual control authority at 68 sweep coupled with too high a landing speed to be carrier landed
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I'm pretty sure it's region free, I got mine from Amazon UK.
Yup, mine is region free too, and got it from Amazon UK as well. It was delivered from the US and it didn't get stopped at customs here in Belgium - that was more surprising!
Also just delivered today was ( just had to go open the door for the postie as I was writing the above) Tomcat! The F14 Story by Paul T. Gillcrist, had a quick flick through and lots and lots of lovely pics :D love the asymmetrical wing test, one wing at max sweep and the other at min looks kinda like a lame duck :)
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have to check, but the image is very grainy, watched part of it yesterday before the lads dragged me off for my stag do :D
I was watching it in my cinema (3.5m screen) and it shows up any imperfections, on the TV it looks better, so I don't think the source material is HD, but it could be that it is film stock that was used rather than digital.
Will have a better look tonight.
Audio in general is good, in 5.1 or stereo, but the cockpit audio is difficult to understand, thank goodness it is subtitled for the fight sequences.
Lots of deck cam footage showing landings and oops moments :)
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It dropped on my door step last week and have not had enough time to watch it yet :(I love the Speed and Angels, must have watched it 3 times by now :thumbup: -
Playing Steelbeasts with my son is quite rewarding when we are sharing an AFV in co-op mode but he is not interested in flight sims and my grandson is still too young tho he does love aircraft and DCS :)
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that has a certain trouser factor :)
Can hardly wait!
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I, for one, am looking forward to sitting in the back seat, it was my favourite in both Fleet Defender and Tornado.
Add me to the RIO list :)
Everyone's Stories
in DCS: F-14A & B
Posted
Thanks for that, Mum was a bit of a petrol head herself, only thing she didn't like was motorbikes and that was because she promised her father not to go on one, she kept that promise.
That was just the beginning, started the cinema project in the early 80s, now after moving home a few times I have my own cinema and can game in it too, :)
Not got any pics of DCS running in the cinema tho, but it does give a great feeling flying in there, the screen is 3.5m wide :D