The story of the wave breaking over the elevator, I had that happen to me with a hornet on the Kitty Hawk it really sucked.

@@mike28003 Was the aircraft written-off? This guy said the F-14’s canopy was open when the wave splashed over the whole plane, total write-off. I wonder if they salvage the engines after a depot-level inspection.

@@LRRPFco52 fortunately in my case it wasn't a write off but there was a real in depth inspection and replacing all the cockpit components.

@@mike28003 How did they handle the movement and inspection of that bird post-incident? Were you guys able to do all that in the hangar deck?

@@LRRPFco52 the bird was already being taken in to hanger for some maintenance issue so we just did the inspection and replaced stuff at the same time as fixing the original issue.

There's a great Aircrew Interview with one of the initial Grumman F-14 test pilots who said the F-14 was built from the start to be multirole, but the senior Navy fighter pilot community insisted it only be used for Fleet Air Defense/A2A. He has a lot of unique insights into the F-14 I had never heard before. Here's a pic of one of the early test Tomcats with the whale tail and orange/white paint scheme, with 14 Mk.82 retards, 2 AIM-7s, and 2 AIM-9s: upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e6/F-14A_Tomcat_prototype_during_armament_tests_c1973.JPEG

@@LRRPFco52 what fuel tanks are those?

@@eatthisvr6 I honestly don't know. I remember some of those pics from the 1970s and something is telling me I know, but I haven't thought about it since maybe 1980. There were very few pics of them in the early aviation geek books of the day, then the change to the standard F-14 EFTs.

75 vacuum

@@LRRPFco52 Hi can you direct me to that interview, if you're still around to see this?

Can't help wonder if it's because of Top Gun but it certainly is sexy...

if you ever get a chance to see one up close DO IT! in person they are something else and are a lot bigger than most people think. as far as good looking jets go its Tomcat Flanker Sabre in that order

@@Snuckster2 I've actually had the pleasure of sitting in more than a few line F-14A's back in the late 70's

Eeeh I prefer medium to small size fighters for looks, which is why the F-15 and F-14 aren't really appealing to me.

It's gorgeous, no denying that. You may call me sick, perverted or right(!) but there's something about the Phantom (especially an S in VF-161 colours)...

Thanks. 😎

You're welcome, Michael. We appreciate the feedback.

I would love to hear from F14D pilots. Sadly I don't think there was to many. They only made the D for around a 1 year or so. Almost 500 of the close to 700 F14s were A models. So I think pilots who actually flew the D version is kinda rare

Welcome, Joel! Plenty more exciting content to come...

Thanks for the feedback, Rodney--that is exactly the approach we try to take so it's nice to hear it's coming through.

@@FighterPilotPodcast Hey, Jell-O, I've noticed that the hard-core DCS players argue about the 'best' fighter just like real fighter pilots. =)

@@DJones476 No surprise.

Excellent !! Many thanks !!

Right? Wikipedia lists the weapon's one and only operational employment...

I felt a moab that exploded about 30 miles away. Mini earthquake

@@FighterPilotPodcast Officially though....doesn't mean...you know...

Thanks!

I concur, this was a fun episode to listen to with all the banter and smack talk about the "C's". I would love to hear an episode over the craziest verifiable Sea Stories and the winner gets a podcast shirt. Just hearing about the F-14 breakage would be hysterical.

@@HabitualButtonPusher Great idea! We will consider it...

Once in awhile you have to cut loose a little!

The Fighter Pilot Podcast Competely Agree. Keep up the good work!

Thanks for the suggestion. As both of those guys ended up flying F/A-18s I think they understood the immense costs involved in keeping the F-14 flying, relative to the newer jets.

@@FighterPilotPodcast I guess its akin to keeping your sexy old sports car alive vs. having the dealership fix your new car less often under warranty, plus all the nice new features and comforts it has. It might not be *as* good, but it frees up a lot of Sundays under the hood.

The Tomcat was killed by that lovely human being Dick Cheney, look into it and try to tell me with a straight face it wasn't political.

You're welcome, Bama!

You're welcome. I trust someone looked at the math and it did not pencil out. Akin to remodeling a house: sometimes it's better to demolish and rebuild anew.

@@FighterPilotPodcast It wasn't cheap to remanufacture an F-14. I think I read it was around at least $20million to rebuild an old F-14 but who knows that means in REAL cash because those numbers fluctuate depending on how people calculate the figures. In the mid-1980s, it was claimed the Tomcat was a $30million-$35million plane and the F-18 wasn't significantly cheaper in spite of a much higher production rate for that plane (which makes you wonder if Grumman was losing a TON of money staying in the airframe business or was MD cooking its books and charging more on the F-18?). At any rate, by the time the F-14 was retired they were claiming $65million-$68million a plane BUT someone may have adjusted for inflation (post-2006) which sounds realistic. About $35million is what you read in contemporary mid-1980s books. The classic Hornet (A-D) was about $30million a plane. The F-18 Super Hornet they never claimed was less than $75million a plane (late 1990s) and it's probably more than that now. Boeing may be throwing in things for free on the Super Hornet to keep the Navy business. It's cut-throat right now and it would NOT be out of the question for the Pentagon to throw all its business at ONE contractor (Lockheed, which would be the WORST thing for US military aviation, Lockheed's been a DISASTER for large tactical planes and the maintenance and flying costs for the F-22 and F-35 are terrible; the Navy foolishly threw away Grumman's services and put all the "carrier money pot" into MD in the early 1990s) for fighters and give it all to Lockheed as stupid as that would be. They had ZERO problems forcing Grumman out of the airframe business in the 1990s and even MD couldn't stay independent (the failure of their civilian airline business bankrupted MD) and was absorbed by Boeing! Grumman was claiming they could "zero-time" the F-14 airframes and it would be essentially a new plane but I don't think it quite works out that way. There are always stressed components but everybody seems to only concentrate on the wings and the reality (as the Air Force found with a few F-15s that broke up in flight because of failed longerons) is that other parts of the airframe are constantly under stress. There is a reason why they only guarantee 6000 or 8000 SAFE flight hours for these machines. Sometimes, this thing called reality kicks in! You'd be better off building a plane new and incorporating new technology and manufacturing techniques to reduce maintenance and prolong frame life than trying to band-aid that onto an existing 10-15 year-old airframe that may be half flight time-expired already. That old plane's metal has been stressed repeatedly and unless you an examine the frame all over with an X-ray machine and microscope you may never knew where it's already cracking.

All the tooling was probably destroyed.

This episode had such a favorable response we ended up making a whole podcast dedicated to the F-14: the "F-14 Tomcast."

@@FighterPilotPodcast So many good podcasts to go through. Each one is so informative and eye opening. I am catching up as quickly as I can. Great job you guys have done.

I'm trying to get him to come back for a bonus session--maybe we'll get it out of him yet!

Sweet, thanks for the extra detail.

Michael Powell it’s a natural progression due to gravity.

@@FighterPilotPodcast Not only that, Michel, but if you read Robert L. Shaw's _Fighter Combat: Tactics and Maneuvering_ you will learn about techniques for dealing with multiple bandits. One of these is masking your own fighter with surrounding terrain (radar clutter/hot desert floor, for instance) in order to make missile evasion easier. As Pete 'Boomer' Bonanni would say, you trade altitude for airspeed, and airspeed for altitude.

I know, but DCS it's a sim. In reality a pilot should avoid the dogfight and concentrate on his target/duty, the fuel, the survival of crew and plane. Dogfight is only the Ultima Ratio, after a BVR engagement.

@@SUP_Bigans True. No fighter pilot suits up and says, "Y'know... I hope I get into a dogfight today!" That would be like a gangbanger saying, "I hope I get into a _knife_ fight today."

Charlie is in reference to the F/A-18C (Charlie), and for the other either 1: They hold it or 2: They better be wearing diapers because modern fighters don't have piss tubes like the fighters of old.

Its true as a matter of fact Tomcat pilot Assadollah Adeli with his RIO Mohammad Masbough Shot down 3 close formation Mig 23s with one Phoenix missile. Their only kills during the 8 years war but by God were they good ones.

@@kasrakhatir 3 MiG 23's with one shot... holy hell I wish footage of that existed!!

Anytime more aircraft can be built (and in this case sold overseas, you are correct), it brings the per aircraft cost down. Same for the F-15, -16, -18, etc...

Thanks, Bill.

The C model of the F/A-18 Hornet.

@@FighterPilotPodcast thanks for letting me know.

He went for the "mystery" component.

Agreed on the art & tech--particularly for the early 70s when it was fielded, but by the mid 00's it was rather expensive.

Flex is a great guy. He was a RIO in the F-14 as I recall, not a pilot.

Saw snort giving a lecture, h ex said when his dad was working for Grumman, he would have the Grumman test pilots over to the house for cocktails, and snort said the test pilots always said the F14 was a 13 g airplane. Guess it was tougher than advertised.

Snort made the ‘Cat dance.

That expression means breaking the arresting gear contraption.

I don't recall them saying that--what was the context?

@@FighterPilotPodcast He was talking about the story of the RIO passing out at Top Gun when the pilot pulled 10 gs.

@@Angus_Gibson It could mean that the wings were set to move automatically but I'll have to ask SYFH.

@@FighterPilotPodcast Loved this podcast. Perfect whetting of the appetite before the Tomcat drops on DCS tomorrow. I've been waiting on a true, non-arcade, F-14 sim since I was in grade school. I played Jane's Fighter's Anthology back in the 90s. So the wait has been over 2 decades in the making for me.

@@FighterPilotPodcast Good thing... I thought Angus meant it literally. As in metal fatigue.

I went to f14 school in Millington Tennessee with you guys

@@williamrussellmorley hope to see you here William, You know most of Iranians don't want war or any trouble,

The driving factors in this aircraft's fate were cost and Iran.

@@FighterPilotPodcast something possible to expand on? I'm genuinely interested. Thx

@@Yoshimurha Possibly. Would need to find the authority on the subject...

@@FighterPilotPodcast would be an intersting topic to cover. Hope to hear it. It was me who emailed to C.Lemone concerning the same topic. Thx for an interesting podcast/channel. Hope hearing more about the faith of the iconic F14 and the reasning behind it. Cheers👌

In DCS?

​@@FighterPilotPodcast Yeah. Fortunately, I'm not Iranian. Although, if they let me fly a Tomcat I might convert :P Just been trying to fix this Gulf of Sidra mission I made a while ago. Updates wrecked it. Will repost it tomorrow if you're feeling bored...

Closer to 47,000lbs. The Ge 110-400 puts out 23,500 lbs. You can find the Flight Manual through a google search to verify. It wasn’t until recently that versions of the 110 made +29,000 lbs of thrust.

@@williamkillingsworth2619 Barely better than 1 even on the D. She swole but she also fat.

aaronchase38 The Miramar Air museum must not have ended up with one. Don’t know why.

Thought we discussed the variable inlet ramps--did we not?

The Fighter Pilot Podcast don’t think so! Touched on the glove vanes but not the inlet ramps! Was just curious no biggie! I know the spike on black bird is to keep shock wave out of there engines. Was just curious how other fighters keep super sonic air out of there engines!

@@wileybird69 Must have been a previous episode. It's difficult to keep track now.

www.reddit.com/r/aviation/comments/9vxmig/til_the_f14_had_highspeed_glove_vanes_mounted_to/

True.

Yes.