_Hoss Posted December 5, 2023 Share Posted December 5, 2023 AN/ALQ-167..... No.... I did not... I did however work on the AN/DLQ-3B/C which was the precursor... that was in 1988, during Operation Preying Mantis.. they were programmed to deceive the Iranian F-14, F-4 RADARS... The ALQ-126 would not respond to RADARS, not in the Threat Library... They were never used as far as I know... not on our cruise anyway... I was in VA-94... Sempre Fortis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blaze1 Posted December 8, 2023 Share Posted December 8, 2023 On 12/5/2023 at 10:36 PM, _Hoss said: AN/ALQ-167..... No.... I did not... I did however work on the AN/DLQ-3B/C which was the precursor... that was in 1988, during Operation Preying Mantis.. they were programmed to deceive the Iranian F-14, F-4 RADARS... The ALQ-126 would not respond to RADARS, not in the Threat Library... They were never used as far as I know... not on our cruise anyway... I was in VA-94... Thanks. I'm not familiar with the AN/DLQ-3B/C, but the fuzzbuster system (early 80's I think) I mentioned was an RWR to detect CW emissions that the AN/ALR-45 couldn't. It was attached to the glareshield in the A-6. BTW You spoke about the ALQ-100, -126A and -126B. Was the only real difference between them frequency range and reliability or the -126B for example employ more advanced deceptive techniques the other two didn't? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_Hoss Posted December 8, 2023 Share Posted December 8, 2023 You are talking about the AN/ALR-67.... it replaced the AN/ALR-45/50 and 45F... the AN/ALR-45F could have its Threat Library updated via satellite. We got the new Program and programmed EEPROMs. Then the 67 came out... but it was exclusively an F/A-18 RWR. What you are talking about is urban legend..... The DLQ-3 was an early example of of the ALQ-167 https://man.fas.org/dod-101/sys/ac/equip/an-alq-167.htm I did not work on the ALQ-100s, they went in F-14s. The ALQ-126A was what I worked on most. It covered Cold War era early SAMs, I made the last WESTPAC with the A-7s in VA-94. The Hornets, had the ALQ-126B. The Alphas had old bandpass crystal detectors, old TWTs.... The ALQ-126B used solid state detectors, Solid State Low Band Input Amp instead of the TWT. There were no longer upper and lower deck inter connect cables. There was an interconnect at the rear that mated upper and lower decks. There is always a problem of repair parts becoming obsolete and hard to requisition. And yes, the freq. ranges got higher, along with updated deception techniques. Sempre Fortis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blaze1 Posted December 9, 2023 Share Posted December 9, 2023 (edited) By the AN/ALR-67 being "...exclusively an F/A-18 RWR", I assume you mean it's the only RWR the Hornet ever used, rather than no other jet using it? I don't think the fuzzbuster story is just a legend, but I should have been clearer in my post. There was an article with the vice-president/former vice-president of the Whistler company that manufactured the fuzzbusters, in this case the Whistler Q1000. The Navy bought a whole bunch of them for an absolute bargain, made some small modifications (which surprised the Whistler engineers), most notably drilling a hole precisely in the correct spot to disable the K-band antenna, because the Navy were interested in the X-band spectrum. The VP didn't really want to get involved, because there was far too much bureaucracy and time involved with the Navy for such a small order. A funny anecdote, the Navy wanted the items shipped in plain boxes rather than the standard, Whistler multicoloured design, but the President refused and said the best they could do was stencil "No Step" on the box to make it milspec. The Navy also sent them a ton of paperwork to fill and they just sent it all back as the whole ordeal was such a headache for a small order. Regarding the A-6 fuzzbuster, it wasn't really, at least the one I'm talking about. It was an urgent interim upgrade to detect CW emissions, most notably from the Hawk system. There were two pairs of lights on the glareshield, one for the pilot, the other for the B/N, but they were identical. Each indicator had a green and a yellow light, which alerted the crew to a CW emission from the left or right side of the jet. Edited December 9, 2023 by Blaze1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LanceCriminal86 Posted December 9, 2023 Share Posted December 9, 2023 32 minutes ago, Blaze1 said: By the AN/ALR-67 being "...exclusively an F/A-18 RWR", I assume you mean it's the only RWR the Hornet ever used, rather than no other jet using it? I don't think the fuzzbuster story is just a legend, but I should have been clearer in my post. There was an article with the vice-president/former vice-president of the Whistler company that manufactured the fuzzbusters, in this case the Whistler Q1000. The Navy bought a whole bunch of them for an absolute bargain, made some small modifications (which surprised the Whistler engineers), most notably drilling a hole precisely in the correct spot to disable the K-band antenna, because the Navy were interested in the X-band spectrum. The VP didn't really want to get involved, because there was far too much bureaucracy and time involved with the Navy for such a small order. A funny anecdote, the Navy wanted the items shipped in plain boxes rather than the standard, Whistler multicoloured design, but the President refused and said the best they could do was stencil "No Step" on the box to make it milspec. The Navy also sent them a ton of paperwork to fill and they just sent it all back as the whole ordeal was such a headache for a small order. Regarding the A-6 fuzzbuster, it wasn't really, at least the one I'm talking about. It was an urgent interim upgrade to detect CW emissions, most notably from the Hawk system. There were two pairs of lights on the glareshield, one for the pilot, the other for the B/N, but they were identical. Each indicator had a green and a yellow light, which alerted the crew to a CW emission from the left or right side of the jet. We've got pics around of the F-14 implementation, which I believe they borrowed/got from the A-6 community at Whidbey. I'd assume it was a similar or same model, granted I have no idea what actual model of radar detector they used. My understanding as well is they hit the PCB with a soldering iron to make it only work on the radar band or bands they wanted based on some of the anecdotes I read. Sounds like they just bought them from Radio Shack and wired/mounted them up, and when the SWIP Intruders came in they didn't need them anymore as the new RWR could properly detect the bands SA-6s, Hawks, etc. used. Oh hey, you can just see one here, looks like the same model in an Intruder, look directly left of the pilot's visor. Connie's 88/89 cruise: 1 Heatblur Rivet Counting Squad™ VF-11 and VF-31 1988 [WIP] VF-201 & VF-202 [WIP] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blaze1 Posted December 9, 2023 Share Posted December 9, 2023 Those are great pictures Lance thanks! I've never seen a picture of it fitted to the F-14 before. On the Intruder glareshield, you can just about distinguish one set of light point slightly more towards the pilot and then further to the right of it, another set of lights pointed at the B/N. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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