Looky here, ACEVAL/AIMVAL footage

[LanceCriminal86]

In case the link didn't work right, skip to 36:08

I've been looking to pics forever, but found footage instead. From above timestamp on is a Grumman film of ACEVAL/AIMVAL, including footage, interviews with crew, sideburns, and moustaches. 

The ACEVAL/AIMVAL crew were made up from VF-1 and VF-2 folks from the first cruise primarily, who were attached to VX-4 for the exercise. Roger Ball! has a pretty good section about the prep work as "Hawk" Smith was XO at TOPGUN at the time and helped prep the Blue Team Tomcat crews and the Navy/Marine side of the Red Team as well.

Big things to note in the vid, the pilots are wearing VTAS II helmets, and you can see the sensors along the edges of the canopy rail. These allowed for them to use the PLM on the throttle to get a lock while up to apparently 40 degrees off the nose. The F-15s in the exercise had them as well, but as seen neither the Navy nor Air Force chose to continue their use afterwards. Apparently cost being a big factor, the weight/bulk of the helmet being secondary. The third factor is that apparently VSL-HI mode gave the F-14 80-90% of the capability of VTAS without the need for the extra gear.

Other big discussion, TCS. Especially during the workups per Roger Ball! the Tomcats were absolutely flaying the F-5s alive because they were fighting as they actually would have, hammering them from far off by using TCS to get their VID and then firing.

Ultimately ACEVAL/AIMVAL is what triggered the AIM-120, the desire for launch/leave because the F-5Es with AIM-9Ls could still get face shots when the Tomcats and Eagles were forced to get visual ID and guide their Sparrows all the way.

 

 

Oh, and I found this coffee mug that just might be related to someone who was part of all this and CO of VF-2 around '82 and then CO of TOPGUN when Top Gun was filmed. Guess I have to do some Farris VX-4 ACEVAL/AIMVAL skins someday:

 

 

[IronMike]

Good stuff, Lance!

[Sideburns]

Cool stuff indeed, love hearing of the history of military tech development and testing.

[r4y30n]

I would love to see Ferris liveries, they’re so cool.

[LanceCriminal86]

8 hours ago, r4y30n said:

I would love to see Ferris liveries, they’re so cool.

They're on my list now, and will be perfect for the olderish Tomcat as they did used the TCS. I know they have been done but now I HAVE to make sure Capt Wilson's jet is in there, and of course everyone will want Hoser just because.

 

And I did finally sort out that the mug was indeed from the "Boomer" who was CO at TOP GUN when the article Top Guns was written that triggered the screenplay, and then when the screenplay was written he heavily was interviewed.

 

Boomer's callsign came from a very low/high speed pass over the Cubi Point O Club, and was the inspiration for Maverick's tower pass as well as his stories of flying F-8s and past cruises being the inspiration and basis of "Viper", as well as his mannerisms.

Edited October 9, 2022 by LanceCriminal86

[Quid]

Funny story from "Turk" Pentecost while at ACEVAL/AIMVAL involving Boomer:

"At the end of the pretest work-ups, we deployed, along with the Navy/Marine Gomers [REDFOR] and some Top Gunners, to Yuma for a couple of weeks on the ACMR [Air Combat Maneuver Range].  It was a terrific deployment with all the usual fighter pilot stuff, including a debrief, and nacho eating contest at Chretin's.  Inevitably, of course, somebody said "my skipper can out drink your skipper" and the fight was on.

After 3-4 shooters, Ruff and Falcon [J.W. Taylor] were pretty evenly matched until Boomer slipped twenty bucks to our waitress.  The slugfest continued with Ruff getting Jose Cuervo and Falcon slamming back tap water.  After another 3-5 rounds, Falcon looked about like he did when we walked in.  Ruff was about one shooter away from spending the night at the Chretin's [sic] with his face in his plate.

For 32 years, I've wondered if anyone ever told Ruff."

[LanceCriminal86]

12 minutes ago, Quid said:

Funny story from "Turk" Pentecost while at ACEVAL/AIMVAL involving Boomer:

"At the end of the pretest work-ups, we deployed, along with the Navy/Marine Gomers [REDFOR] and some Top Gunners, to Yuma for a couple of weeks on the ACMR [Air Combat Maneuver Range].  It was a terrific deployment with all the usual fighter pilot stuff, including a debrief, and nacho eating contest at Chretin's.  Inevitably, of course, somebody said "my skipper can out drink your skipper" and the fight was on.

After 3-4 shooters, Ruff and Falcon [J.W. Taylor] were pretty evenly matched until Boomer slipped twenty bucks to our waitress.  The slugfest continued with Ruff getting Jose Cuervo and Falcon slamming back tap water.  After another 3-5 rounds, Falcon looked about like he did when we walked in.  Ruff was about one shooter away from spending the night at the Chretin's [sic] with his face in his plate.

For 32 years, I've wondered if anyone ever told Ruff."

Where'd you find that? I'm looking for any more stuff about him, I already went through "Roger Ball!" with Hawk Smith's accounts.

[Quid]

23 minutes ago, LanceCriminal86 said:

Where'd you find that? I'm looking for any more stuff about him, I already went through "Roger Ball!" with Hawk Smith's accounts.

Archived from Tomcat-Sunset.  Both Hoser and Turk explained Boomer was the lead author of the final report from the exercise (Navy BLUFOR side) as well (also archived), to include corrections made to the report to the Joint Service Operational Requirements board after there had been some possible meddling.  That's about all I can find in my archive on Boomer WRT ACEVAL/AIMVAL.