It was almost five years ago to the day, wow, that long, I may still have had hair back then :). Anyway back to the topic, I recently purchased a copy of Jane’s American Fighting Aircraft Of The Twentieth Century and after consulting the entries for the Phantom II and Tomcat as well as the sources listed below I have the following figures for you to note.
Dimensions
Overall Length: (F-14) 61ft 11.9in (F-4) 57ft 7.1in (Buccaneer) 63ft 5in The Tomcat is 4ft 4.9in longer than the Phantom and 2ft 5in shorter than the Buccaneer.
Height: (F-14) 16ft (F-4) 16ft 1in (Buccaneer) 16ft 3in (Buccaneer wings folded) 16ft 6in The Tomcat is 1in shorter than the Phantom and 3in shorter than the Buccaneer.
Wingspan: (F-14 unswept) 64ft 1.5in (F-14 swept) 38ft 2.5in (F-14 overswept) 33ft 3.5in (F-4) 38ft 5in (F-4 wingtips folded) 27ft 6.5in (Buccaneer) 44ft (Buccaneer wings folded) 19ft 11in The Tomcat unswept is 25ft 8.5in wider than the Phantom and 20ft 1.5in wider than the Buccaneer & overswept 5ft 9in wider than the Phantom with wingtips folded and 13ft 7.5in wider than the Buccaneer folded.
Wheeltrack: (F-14) 16ft 5in (F-4) 17ft 10.5in (Buccaneer) 11ft 10.5in The Tomcat is 1ft 5.5in narrower than the Phantom and 4ft 7.5in wider than the Buccaneer.
Wheelbase: (F-14) 23ft 0.5in (F-4) 22ft 11.9in (Buccaneer) 20ft 8in The Tomcat is 1.4in greater than the Phantom and 2ft 4.5 in greater than the Buccaneer.
Weights
Empty: (F-14) 39,130ibs (F-4) 30,198ibs (Buccaneer) 30,000ibs* The Tomcat is 8,982ibs heavier than the Phantom and 9,130ibs heavier than the Buccaneer.
Take Off Weight:
(F-14 normal) 58,539ibs (F-4 normal) 46,000ibs (Buccaneer) N/A F-14 is 12,539ibs heavier than F-4.
(F-14 with 4 AIM7) 58,904ibs (F-14 with 6 AIM54) 69,790ibs (F-4 gross) 56,567ibs (Buccaneer) N/a The Tomcat is 2,337ibs heavier with AIM7s and 13,223ibs heavier than the Phantom with AIM54s.
Max Take Off Weight: (F-14) 74,348ibs (F-4) 54,600ibs (Buccaneer) 54,000ibs The Tomcat is 20,252ibs heavier than the Phantom and 19,748ibs heavier than the Buccaneer.
Landing Weight: (F-14) 51,830 ibs (F-4 Gross) 34,745ibs (Buccaneer) 39,000ibs The Tomcat is 17,085ibs heavier than the Phantom and 12,380ibs heavier than the Buccaneer.

According to various sources in 1976 HMS Ark Royal had two BS5 steam catapults of which the waste catapult was a ‘long stroke’ BS5a which was 199ft long and based on the figures above, able to launch a 56,000+ibs aircraft. It had four direct acting arrestor wires which could handle aircraft of 35,000+ibs. If these figures are correct, then HMS Ark Royal’s waste catapult could have launched an unarmed Tomcat, though you’d have to keep clear of the starboard wing! But it doesn’t look like the direct acting arrestor wires could have coped with the Tomcat’s landing weight. Leaving aside the compatability problems with HMS Ark Royal’s catapults, I think it unlikely whether they could have cross-decked. As a sidebar, the lifts on Audacious Class carriers were 54ft by 44ft (fore) and 54ft by 33ft (aft) able to handle 40,000ibs aircraft. Even with a folding nose radome it is difficult to imagine a Tomcat fitting onto either aircraft lift. So no Tomcats to replace the Phantom on HMS Ark Royal. Another book that has come into my possession since I first posted my thread on this subject is On Target Special No.4 HMS Ark Royal Fifty Years of Flight 1955-2005 by Denis J. Calvert and Gary Madgwick and illustrated by Jon Freeman. Again on the subject of the Tomcat there is no mention nor photographs of the Tomcat flying from the ship. There’s even a section titled ‘Visiting Aircraft’ which fails to show a Tomcat, though in fairness it doesn’t show A7 Corsairs and they were known to have cross-decked from HMS Ark Royal.

Interestingly for those following the ‘Fantasy CVA01 Fleet’ thread over in the Naval Aviation forum, according to the Navy Matters website (http://www.navy-matters.beedall.com) whilst CVA-01’s two 250ft long BS6 catapults could have handled a Tomcat with the ability to launch 70,000ibs aircraft (assuming compatibility with Tomcat nose wheel attachment point) the arrestor wires could still only handle 35,000ibs aircraft (though I suppose they could be upgraded) but apparently the lifts which could handle 40,000ibs aircraft were 71ft by 30ft suitable for Phantoms and Buccaneers but not Tomcats.

Figures in italics taken from McDonnell Douglas F-4k and F-4M Phantom II by Michael Burns. Figures for Blackburn Buccaneer are for S2 model and are taken from http://www.blackburn-buccaneer.co.uk except for those marked with an * which are taken from http://www.thunder-and-lightnings.co.uk.

http://forum.keypublishing.co.uk/showthread.php?t=44318

I started a thread on this some time ago based on info from a couple of books I read that claimed it happened. Unfortunately the thread went off on bit of a tagent and was never resolved.

Re Names: with the ’70’s fleet being centered around the ‘through-deck cruise’ would naming these ‘Queen Elizabeth, Duke of Edinburgh, Prince of Wales’ through Royal linage or famous ships ‘Queen Elizabeth, Prince of Wales & Duke of York’ in lieu of ‘Invincible, Illustrious & Ark Royal: or were the RN still planning/ hoping for a 50,000t carrier?

The Story goes that they weren’t given capital ship names so as to slip under the RAF’s radar so to speak, capital ships then as now meant aircraft carriers and they were decidedly ‘off the menu’ as far as the RAF were concerned. The first ship was therefore given the name Invincible because it was tradionally a cruiser name, not a carrier name. The ships themselves you’ll recall prior to the Falklands War were referred to officially at least as ‘Through Deck Cruisers’ and occasionally ‘Helicopter Carriers’, not ‘Aircraft Carriers’. The other two however were given carrier names Illustrious and Indomitable (renamed Ark Royal), possibly because by then the Sea Harrier had been ordered and the ships were all being built or had been approved so the RN could ‘come out of the closet’ so to speak.

My preferred choice would be to buy F-35Bs for the RAF as a Harrier replacement, and either Rafales or F/A-18Es off the shelf for the RN operating from CTOL carriers with some two seaters of whichever type to use as trainers/electronic warfare/air-to-air refuelling.
As for the deterrent I think the debate about whether to replace Trident is the wrong question. The question is whether to replace Trident’s replacement. At present there are still question marks in my mind that are still decades away from being resolved about the direction of travel of relations between Russia and the West and China and the West.
Lets not forget that China is a police state with nuclear weapons that can hit this country. And under Putin I still have some concerns about Russia. Then there’s also Syria, Iran, North Korea and possibly Pakistan falling to the Taliban. That said I would have no qualms about getting rid of nuclear weapons unilaterally if the above concerns were satisfied and we were only keeping them as a status symbol. Nor would I wouldn’t keep them just to bargain them away. Lets face it we’ve got them because France has them and their on a par with us in many ways. I’m happy for Britain to be the only non-nuclear permanent five member. Though I would put that money back into our forces to boost our conventional strike and intelligence gathering capabilities. As for Trident’s replacement? I’d buy a few more Astutes and equip each with nuclear-tipped cruise missiles as well as reintroducing tactical nuclear weapons like WE177 for use by RAF and FAA tactical jets.

You know, looking at that image of Cavour, I’m struck by how much the island resembles CVA-01’s. Remove the for’ad funnel and stretch the hull. Possibly insurt a mid section from a Nimitz class carrier and finally superimpose an image of Eagle or Ark Royal’s Carrier deck in colour and from the same or a similar angle (using some photo manip software to alter the angle of the deck) and hey presto. What does everyone else think?

– The Alaskan taxiway was a way to fix this, but it seems dubious whether this would have worked operationally, especially in heavy weather
– Focus on North Atlantic operations meant CVA-01 couldn’t sustain operations for long: only 2,200t of aviation fuel vs. 2,500t-4,000t, range of 6,000nm vs. 8,000nm @20knots

Could I ask, firstly how the Alaskan taxiway would have effected a CVA-01 if we’d had at least one in the Falklands War. And Secondly on the subject of air ops, just what does that break down as in terms of numbers of sorties as well as number of day(s) CVA-01 could have mounted ops for?

I’m curious why the RNs F4Ks didn’t carry gun pods whilst the RAFs F4Ms did. Were the pods introduced post Ark Royal? Or was it something to do with carrier ops? By the way I’m not a fan of long nose Phantoms like the F4E on asthetic grounds.

Shouldn’t this be in ‘historic’ forum?
Best carrier based fighter of the period was the Phantom, second was the Sea Vixen.
The latter despite being batted back and forth for 12 years between the RN, RAF, and the Air Ministry was an extremely modern and capable aircraft sytems wise, even if airframe was getting on and strictly subsonic.

Since we seem to have opened this up to include British Naval fighters, what about the Scimitar? It started life as a day interceptor but was ultimately used as a strike fighter. Also wasn’t there talk about a supersonic Sea Vixen?