alfakilo, what all can you tell us about the radars in the two aircraft? Specifically I’m referring to the NASARR radar in the F-104G and the AN/APQ-120 in the F-4E.

I’m not so much asking about how the two sets compared to each other, but just general information on the various modes they included, how capable they were of tracking targets, what ranges they could acquire various airborne targets at, etc.

To begin with, the F-104s that I flew were trainers, not operational aircraft. As such, the radar did not have any improvements that others may have had.

The F-104G radar was a dual function set…it could function in both air-to-air (A2A) and ground attack (A2G) modes. Generally speaking, the German aircraft were used in the A2G mode.

The A2A radar was a simple pulse system optimized for higher altitude work. It was significantly affected by ground clutter at lower altitudes (below 5000′). We could search out to 40nm and lock on at a max of 20nm. In the beginning, this was good performance for that time.

Radar acquisition depended on target size, altitude, and operator proficiency. It was a manual operation requiring a fair amount of heads down time. Once locked on, the set was pretty good about maintaining the lock as long as the target was within the radar scan pattern.

The F-4E radar was quite a bit better in A2A mode…and the pilot did not have to operate the set. Target acquisition depended again on size, altitude, and operator proficiency…I would say that on average the F-4E capability was easily 2-3 times better than the F-104 (acquisition and lock on range).

The F-4E pilot could also manually lock the radar using a boresight “auto-acquisition” feature that worked well for ranges less than 5nm and in a visual maneuvering environment.

The F-104 had a nifty feature where the lead computing gunsight could be slaved to the radar antenna angle…with a lock on, the gunsight would point to where the target was…this allowed us to possibly visually acquire the target at longer ranges than would otherwise be the case.

Both aircraft had an A2G capability (both for navigation and attack). I would give the edge here to the F-104 radar…but much of this depended on operator proficiency. It wasn’t unusual for us to win A2G bombing competitions where the radar was used to deliver practice nuclear weapons.

In some of the pictures, the rudders seem to be displaced ‘inwards’…I wonder why. Dual function as speedbrake?

What altitude did you top out at?

The TF was 600 lbs of fuel lighter?

750 KIAS was with tip tanks?

Memories fade with time…but somewhere around 25000′, I think. The TF internal fuel was around 1500lbs less than the F.

I think we flew this sortie clean. The TF was a little slower on the top end, probably due to the extra canopy drag. The single seat models could reach 800KIAS, but I think the TF would only make it out to around 750.

Is it correct that you could put a Starfighter into an irrecoverable flat spin?

Correct.

If yes, I think hitting the rudder in such “zero airspeed” situation could easily end hanging on the parachute.

The F-104 rudder was not as powerful as a flight control as in other fighters. In this case, the thing to avoid was elevator movement…pulling back on the stick. Without excessive angle of attack, the aircraft won’t stall…and without a stall, there will be no spin.

We neutralized the stick and rudder and let the jet fall off on its own…once nose low, the speed increased rapidly for the pullout. This pullout had to be flown correctly as well…some pilots were alarmed by the vertical dive and wanted to pullout too quickly. Doing so risked stalling the jet, and that was a definite no-no.

the 104’s 400 kt, 60 degree climb out (was that you again?)

Sorry, not me!

The closest thing to this that I did was the vertical demonstration that was in the first air-to-air training mission in our fighter weapons school syllabus. We flew this in the TF (two-seater) with the instructor in the back seat. All of the other syllabus missions were flown in the F. The reason for the TF was to make sure that the student was proficient enough to fly without an instructor.

While the students in the FWS were experienced in the F-104 (and often had more hours in the jet than I did), they were not necessarily experienced in flying to the edges of the performance envelope (high and slow speed). This TF sortie took them to the high and slow speed boundaries…I jokingly referred to it as the “O Ye of Little Faith” ride, sort of as a result of the misgivings that some of the students had about the mission.

After takeoff, we would fly down to the maneuvering area south of Phoenix (Gila Bend) and start off with tactical formation maneuvers where the student practiced flying hard turns while maintaining 4-5gs. Once we had burned off some fuel, we would then go for the last two maneuvers…the high speed dive and slow speed climb.

The purpose of the high speed dive was to get the student to the maximum IAS that the TF could reach. We started a 30 degree dive from around 20,000′ and typically could reach around 750KIAS before we leveled off at 5000′. We would then immediately pull into the vertical and climb at a 90 degree angle until the airspeed went to zero. As the jet ran out of speed, the instructor made sure the student didn’t make any mistakes with the flight controls…the jet would fall off into a nose low attitude where we would recover.

Most guys did fine on the ride. Some were apprehensive about going to those speeds, probably an outcome of attitudes that arose out of the jet’s reputation in Germany. The objective was to show that the jet was an honest airplane and wouldn’t bite unless treated poorly.

Care to comment on the performance increase if a modern engine such as the 26,500 lbs thrust F414-EDE (similar size) were installed?

I don’t know that much would be gained from this. No doubt high altitude performance might improve a little in terms of time to accelerate…but the speed limits would still be pretty much the same.

Same for low altitude. The additional thrust would allow us to sustain a max rate turn a little better and do this at higher altitudes. I have no idea about fuel consumption in these newer engines.

Yeah well- Fox News. :rolleyes: I’ve learned to expect blatant falsities and absurd sensationalism from them. They’re like the US equivalent of the Daily Mail.

Since when has this become a political forum?

I was under the impression for F-4 was underpowered… perhaps from all the reading about the Eagle and its high thrust to weight ratio.

If we are simply comparing thrust to weight values, then I suppose one could suggest that the F-4 was “underpowered”. Using that same thinking and including the F-22 in the mix, we could then label the F-15 the same way.

When I think of a fighter as being underpowered, I recall some of the early jets where engine performance never reached what had been expected. For its time, I don’t consider the F-4 in that category.

I enjoyed your “High Altitude” article in the Zipper. Very little is written about high altitude flight except for the SR-71. What was the profile you flew to reach 73,000 ft?

I never attempted such a maneuver in the F-104 or F-4. In fact, I don’t even know anyone who did…it just wasn’t something we thought about. The highest I ever got was 50,000′ and I did that in a T-38 while I was still in pilot training…at the time, it was the “cool” thing to do. In retrospect, kinda dumb too.

Zoom climbs were best initiated from about 40,000 and M2.0 according to the flight manual.