A Critical Analysis of the RAF Air Superiority Campaign in India, Burma and Malaya in 1941-45

[XBe02Drvr]

The US fighter that hasn't been really mentioned as being available to combat the Mig in this timeframe is the F8 Crusader, an often overlooked gem

A land based version without the extra weight needed to meet the needs of carrier operation, would have been a real performer,

Do away with that awkward wing tilt mechanism, lengthen the nose strut slightly, give it lower pressure, higher speed tires, reduce the shock strut pressures, and remove the wing fold mechanism, and you've got a lighter, stronger, more durable machine with even more impressive ACM potential.
USAF style landings would have done away with the F8's Achilles heel, which was landing gear failures on the flight deck. The real killer was the in-flight arrestment, which seemed to happen more often to F8s, probably due to the spool-up lag of the J57 and the backside of power curve behavior of the airframe, tending to in-close waveoffs. An in-flight just about guaranteed a gear collapse.
Cheers,
Wes

 

[XBe02Drvr]

VERDAN computers as fitted to the Vigilante, colloquially referred to as 'Very Effective Replacement for a Dumb Ass Navigator'!

By the time the Viges entered my world, they were old, tired, beat-to-crap machines and those computers had come to be known as "Very Effective Resistance to Damned Aggressive Navigators"!
The real challenge to the "testicular fortitude" of the hostage (oops, I meant Radar Attack Navigator) in the Vige was that huge periscope lens right in the face, giving a forward facing view under the belly from just forward of the tail hook. Used for low level visual navigation, it also gave the RAN an up close and personal view of the fantail and deckedge ramp coming aboard. It was optical, and could not be turned off or shuttered. I've sat in the RAN seat in a hangar queen while my fellow TDs who ran the RA5 sim gave me the tour, and watched through the periscope as the mechs up forward changed out a nose gear door actuator.
Cheers,
Wes

 

[MIflyer]

NAA proposed a interceptor version of the A-5. They would add a third J-79 in the bomb tunnel.

By the way, the 102 and 106 were quite good a maneuvering. 102's were noted for their ability to even turn inside a T-33A.

 

[XBe02Drvr]

NAA proposed a interceptor version of the A-5. They would add a third J-79 in the bomb tunnel.

Where did they propose to put the fuel? The wings are too thin to provide much volume, and the center engine with its intake duct would displace most of the available fuselage volume the Vige had for fuel. And you'd have the same center engine intake duct problem the 727 had, but at 2.5 X the Mach number. On the 727 simulator I worked on, #2 ran .3 EPR lower than 1 and 3. And Boeing seems to have done a better job with the S duct than any other pretender to that throne.
Cheers,
Wes

 

[Glider]

What year F-104 vs what year Mig 21??

Saying you would take a Mig 21 is like saying you would take a Corvette as a sports racing car. A 1954 six cylinder automatic corvette or a 1959 283 cu in V-8 manual Corvette or a 1964 327 cu in with disk brakes and independent suspension?

Mig 21 with the Tumansky R-11 or the R-13 or the R-25???
What avionics?
Etc.

Take your pick. Mig21fl vs 104C or a Mig21bis vs an F104G

It's worth remembering that the US took the threat of the Mig 21 seriously enough to develop the F5E as cost is also a factor for a lot of countries.

 

[Schweik]

How does the F5 stack up? I know it is 2nd tier but that is another pretty little bird.

The whole sub-genre of cheaper 2nd tier Fighters in smaller countries around the world is also quite interesting. Older Frontline Fighters find themselves in that niche as well of course (like the MiG 21).

Seems like there's a lot of really good little trainer / fighter / attack aircraft that qualify as 2nd tier Fighters. BAE hawk, Alphajet, Aero L 39, Macchi 339, Yak 130. and the F5 fits in there right? Did anyone ever use the F 20?

Which other good ones did I miss that are still around and in service?

 

[Schweik]

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A-4 Skyhawk is another favorite of mine though I don't think those are in use any more anywhere...

 

[MIflyer]

I was not on the F/A-5 design team. I have warned them about that, but they just won't listen.

The third J-79 was not supposed to do much for speed but it supposedly boost climb rate and acceleration. As for fuel, the stock RA-5C had a range on internal fuel of 3000 miles. One would think that an interceptor version would not need that much range. I believe that it was for USAF use, to replace the F-106.

The A-5 did have one reasonably successful spin-off: the Mig-25.

As for the F-104, it was probably the most effective aircraft we had in Vietnam. When the 104's were flying the Migs were not.

 

[Schweik]

If that's true why didn't they send a lot more to Vietnam?

 

[MIflyer]

The USAF had very few F-104's. Aside from that, it was not good for anything but air to air. The few they had went to the ANG very early.

The CF-104G's were not even intended for air to air. They were supposed to deliver nukes and had no guns. When the RCAF got out of the nuke delivery business they spent a lot of money putting guns in their 104's.

 

[Schweik]

Was reading about rolling thunder, US lost 47 aircraft vs 12 MiGs (claimed) in 8 months of 1966. Damn! Sounds like the F4 was a step behind too, at least until after Top Gun etc.

Needed tactics developed to leverage their advantages

 

[Schweik]

Just ran across this Corporate mercenary air force for hire which has an impressive fleet of light attack /advanced trainer type military aircraft, including MiG 21s, A-4 Skyhawks, L 39 etc. The things you can buy these days...

Draken International - Wikipedia

 

[Milosh]

Was reading about rolling thunder, US lost 47 aircraft vs 12 MiGs (claimed) in 8 months of 1966. Damn! Sounds like the F4 was a step behind too, at least until after Top Gun etc.

Needed tactics developed to leverage their advantages

How many were lost in A2A combat and how many were lost to ground defenses?

 

[XBe02Drvr]

The third J-79 was not supposed to do much for speed but it supposedly boost climb rate and acceleration. As for fuel, the stock RA-5C had a range on internal fuel of 3000 miles.

That range was with 3 or 4 "plug and play" fuel cans in the bomb bay tunnel. The original A3J bomber had to omit a couple of those to make room for the ordnance payload. A limited quantity of fuel was in the wing tanks, but they were awful thin, and there was a large fuselage tank between the fwd end of the bomb bay and the RAN cockpit. A centrally located turbojet with intake duct and afterburner would have displaced all of that. With such a longitudinally distributed fuel system, naturally fuel burn had to be carefully programmed for CG reasons.
The Vige depended on its sleek profile for its performance, and anything that disturbed that profile made a serious dent in its speed, acceleration, and climb. For night photography they could carry a pair of photoflash pods that looked like small low drag drop tanks but could light up the sky like Hiroshima, for 1/100,000th of a second, and cost .5 Mach. Even the slender, streamlined, photo recon "canoe" under the belly made the RA5 slower than the A3J by a significant amount. I can't imagine how a huge variable geometry ramp intake could feed the center engine without a huge drag penalty, especially at high Mach.
Cheers,
Wes

 

[XBe02Drvr]

Was reading about rolling thunder, US lost 47 aircraft vs 12 MiGs (claimed) in 8 months of 1966.

Heavily laden fighter bombers in tight formation, often no top cover, and depending on ECM to warn of attacks. Camouflaged Mig 17s using optical gunsights, radar rangefinders off, vectored by sophisticated GCI operators to make stern attacks from 6 o'clock low. Like the colonists at Lexington and Concord, they didn't "play by the rules". Many of those victims never knew what hit them.
Cheers,
Wes

 

[Shortround6]

Take your pick. Mig21fl vs 104C or a Mig21bis vs an F104G

It's worth remembering that the US took the threat of the Mig 21 seriously enough to develop the F5E as cost is also a factor for a lot of countries.

The F-104C first flew in July of 1958 and started to be issued to the first user squadron in Sept of 1958. Only 77 were built.

There were problems with the J-79 engine and 24 planes (and 9 pilots) were lost over 5 years at which point GE instituted a modification plan for the engine.
Only 4 squadrons had ever been equipped with the 104C which was the first version to be a nuclear strike fighter.
Their deployment to Vietnam was one squadron at a time (they did rotate a couple of the squadrons) I am not going to retype everything. See Joe Baugher's web page for his account.
Lockheed F-104C Starfighter

Just their appearance deterred the Mig 17s and 19s from attacking, or so he claims. There appears to have been very little actual contact/combat.

Just so we are on the same page this is a Mig-21F, the type that went into service in 1959

This is a Mig-21FL

The FL as opposed to the F had a bigger nose cone with all weather radar instead of a ranging radar. The guns had disappeared (but the was an optional gun pod/pack that could be fitted under the fuselage. The FL got the later R-13 (? some sources say no) engine ( two more stages in the lower pressure compressor) 2 extra hard points under the wing.
The FL model (for export?) doesn't fly until until 1965? the earlier Russian all weather interceptor flew in 1961. Note the much larger vertical fin.

One web site lists 4 generations of Russian Mig 21s and 3 generations of Chinese ones and a few other countries production really confuses what was available when.

The 104G started production deliveries in May of 1961. There were a number of European factories/assembly points and there were different roll put dates.

 

[Glider]

My understanding is that the R13 was introduced with the PFMA version as it had extra hardpoints under the wing and could carry three drop tanks and two Atoll missiles. This didn't do its power to weight ratio any favours hence the need for an engine that weighed less than the R11 and had increased power.
The earliest PFMA's had the R11 and the R13 was introduced as quickly as possible.
The PFMA was virtually identical to the MF which was widely used and exported.

 

[Shortround6]

I will try to continue the discussion of the Migs vs the century series here:

Mig-21 vs the F-104 (and the century series)

 

[GrauGeist]

Seriously...WTF does all these SEA combat jets have to do with the CBI Theater (41-45)?

Or should we start a random discussion about why the Fokker D.VII had a superior flight profile over Allied types in the midst and make it go full circle?

 

[UnderPressure]

I wanna check only one, was RAF able to maintain air superiority in the battle of Imphal?
I know that it was in the middle of the allied counterattack, but at the same time it was also the last offensive oparation of the CBI theater by the Japanese army.So, I think that it is very important which one has air superiority at that time.