Exterior Lights

A couple of people have suggested that I do a post on exterior lights. As it happens, I've done bits and pieces on the subject so herewith a summary of what I know so far. At the moment, it's a work in progress. Comments, additions, and corrections are welcome.

Note that the colors refer to the tint of the clear plastic cover over the light bub, not the bulb itself.

An overview of lights on the wing in the 1950s:

Position/Navigation/Running Lights

These are the standard red (left wingtip), green (right wingtip), white (tail) lights. On some late 1940s and 1950s Navy airplanes, there is a separate orange tail light. This appears to be a holdover from a pre-World War II CAA (the forerunner of the FAA) requirement for separate orange and white tail lights that would flash alternately (white-orange-white- orange) to improve visibility at night. Those on the AD Skyraider were on both sides of the fin and viewable from the rear.

Anti-collision Lights

As a result of the midair collision of two civil airliners over the Grand Canyon in 1956, the CAA required anti-collision lights (rotating or flashing beacons) on aircraft for which type certificate applications were submitted after 1 April 1957. (Presumably, there was also a retrofit requirement.) My understanding is that the armed services were not obligated to comply, but they had midair collision concerns of their own so they were added. (When the Israelis got used A-4 Skyhawks, they were amused that they came with a red police-car gumball light.) Note that the anti-collision lights on the A3J Vigilante were retractable.

On aircraft with a long service life like the AD Skyraider, anti-collision lights were a retrofit. Blue-painted ones generally didn't have the anti-collision light on the top of the vertical fin while gray/white ones did.

On some air-refueling tankers the anti-collision light on the bottom of the fuselage was green instead of red to differentiate them at night from other airplanes in the vicinity.

Approach Lights

These were provided for the Landing Signal Officer's benefit in judging the orientation of an approaching aircraft at night. See:
http://thanlont.blogspot.com/2012/04/night-carrier-landings-in-beginning.html
http://thanlont.blogspot.com/2012/11/approach-lights-redux.html

Recognition Lights

These were added at some point in the early 1940s for IFF (Identification Friend or Foe) and signaling purposes. They consisted of three lights, red/green/amber (lenses, not bulbs), on the fuselage belly or under the right wing and a white light on the top of the fuselage (I'm not sure how standard the white light was).

The lights could be separately turned on and off and also used to flash a Morse code signal with a "key" switch.

Landing and Taxi Lights

Some aircraft were fitted with landing and/or taxi lights. The first F4U Corsairs had a retractable light under the left wing but it disappeared early on in production. (It was not, as some would have you believe, replaced by a light in the wing leading edge. That was the approach light and it had been there since the XF4U-1)

Formation Lights

At some point in the 1940s, formation lights were instituted for use at night. At least at first, these were blue lights "embedded" in the upper surface of the outboard wing panels along with one on the top of the fuselage, often described as a "section light". These are notable on the Vought F4U and Grumman F6F, TBF, and F8F. For the latter, see http://tailhooktopics.blogspot.com/2013/02/f8f-formation-lights.html

In the 1950s, it appears that the night formation lighting for jets no longer included the blue lights embedded in the surface of the wings. Instead, the navigation lights were used in conjunction with white lights on the top and bottom of the fuselage. This is a USAF diagram for an F-84:

The formation lights were subsequently small amber rectangles on the side of the fuselage, sometimes along with a light on each wingtip separate from the position lights. The placement may have been more dictated by what location was convenient than by a standard. For example, the F4D had two lights on each side of the fuselage:

The F8U had two lights on the fuselage and also another formation light on the wingtip, but the latter was either red or green rather than amber:

The F3H, on the other hand, made do with one light on the side of the fuselage forward of the wing and one on the aft edge of the wing tip (according to the flight manual, it was amber but it's possible that it was red and green consistent with the position-light color).

For some reason, these small amber lights were not used on the F4H Phantom. Instead, they had "join-up" lights on the wing tip trailing edge that were the same color as the position lights and flush white "fuselage" lights, one on top of the fuselage and one on the bottom of the engine intake forward of the wing. When the F-4Js were modified to the F-4S configuration, the so-called "slime" lights were added; these were larger and more numerous than the amber lights and appeared to be yellow when not lit in daylight and a glow-stick green when lit at night, like those on this F-18.

Refueling Stores

Buddy tanks had lights to signal the receiving pilot. See http://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2015/06/things-under-wings-inflight-refueling.html

Early U.S. Navy Ejection Seat

Up until the late 1950s, each airplane company building carrier-based jets for the U.S. Navy was  responsible for providing the ejection seat in accordance with a Navy-furnished specification. (See http://thanlont.blogspot.com/2011/02/transition-to-martin-baker-ejection.html)

The specification reflected some of the features developed by Martin-Baker, the most notable being the use of a face curtain for the final step of ejecting. (There originally was a preparatory step, which in part served as a safety to assure the pilot seating on the seat that it would not fire accidentally.)

The Navy tested the contractor seats by ejecting them from the rear compartment of a Douglas JD.

This is an early Douglas seat with a separate seat bucket inside the seat frame.

This is a Grumman seat photographed by the Navy test unit in July 1949. Note the large headrest and "figure-8" face curtain handle.

While taking a closer look at pictures of the F9F-3, I was surprised to see that the ejection seats in ones taken in 1949 appeared to have a different headrest than later Panthers: the bottom of the cushion was notably lower. The shoulder harness attachment to the seat also appeared to be lower as a result. While the headrest was not the same as in the picture above, it was similar in terms of the size of the cushion behind the pilot's head.

The F9F-3s used to carrier qualify pilots on Boxer in 1949 definitely appear to have the larger headrest. I can't be sure about the ones that deployed with the air group on Valley Forge. For more on the F9F-3, see http://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2012/01/f9f-3-panther.html

Obscureco F11F Detail Set

The Grumman F11F was a gorgeous carrier-based day fighter. Like it's propeller-driven equivalent, the F8F Bearcat, the timing was wrong. The F8F couldn't compete with jets (except in rate of climb contests) and the F11F wasn't as fast as the Vought F8U or have the endurance (for a more complete F11F story, see chapter 13 in http://www.amazon.com/dp/1580071104).

Once upon a time, Hasegawa produced a 1/72 scale F11F kit. Paul Boyer did it justice as he has so many other kits, only in this case was presented with one with a relatively low degree of difficulty.

The kit is a little deficient on cockpit interior and wheel well detail. Obscureco has responded to that with one of their excellent detail sets. The parts are very thin and well detailed.

1. Instrument shroud
2. Cockpit tub
3. Ejection seat
4. Rear Cockpit bulkhead
5. Cockpit detail, fuselage under sliding canopy
6. Sliding canopy shear web structure
7. Instrument panel
8. Nose wheel well
9. Left cockpit sidewall
10. Right cockpit sidewall
11. Ejection seat headrest
12. Control column
13. Left main gear well rear wall
14. Right main gear well rear wall
15. Left main gear center wall
16. Right main gear center wall
17. Left main gear front bulkhead
18. Right main gear front bulkhead

I haven't had a chance to dry fit it yet. Generally, cockpit detail sets run up against the fact that the thickness of the plastic forming the side of the kit fuselage is much thicker from a scale standpoint than the skin of the actual aircraft (also see http://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2012/09/fitting-in.html). One hint in this case is the kit instruction to "Sand the sidewalls as thin as possible". They are already pretty thin.

The kit does not provide the prominent antenna under the aft part of the canopy on some F11Fs (or maybe the part provided is not a good representation; in any event it should be curved and not flat).

However, this particular antenna wasn't present in many F11Fs.

I am dubious about the accuracy of parts 13 and 14. A good part of the main landing gear wheel well was taken up by structure that resembles a can lying on its side. I don't think this is accurately represented by the large flat parts provided.

Note that the above is one of many, many Don Hinton F11F walkaround pictures that can be found here: http://www.philsaeronauticalstuff.com/f11f/f11f.html

However, the compete F11F he photographed (as opposed to the cockpit section preceding that series) has a black instrument panel. I'm pretty sure that it should be dark gull gray with black instruments like the cockpit section.

Although it's not currently on the Obscureco website (http://www.obscureco.com/products.html), it can be ordered as OBS72026 for $17 plus shipping as shown on the Purchasing Line on the website.

One build note I made on the kit once upon a time was changes necessary to make the main landing gear fit correctly in the well and together:

For a couple of the blog posts I've devoted to the Tiger, see http://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2010/11/f11f-tiger.html and http://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2014/10/f11f-tiger.html

 

Lockheed P-80A Carrier Trials Mea Culpa

Well this is embarrassing. Once upon a time, I wrote about the Lockheed P-80A carrier trial aboard FDR with this illustration.

I posted the page here along with additional information and photographs: http://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2011/11/lockheed-p-80a-carrier-trials.html

Yesterday, while providing information to a friend who was writing a book on Landing Signal Officers, I had the opportunity to review the picture I used to establish the presence of the barrier guard in front of the windscreen:

There appears to be a mast in front of the windscreen.

This is another from the same event:

It's a crop from a fairly high resolution scan of an 8x10 picture. There is clearly no mast on the airplane and I suspect that there never was.  What looks like a mast on the first picture is likely something on the superstructure of the island. It is also much taller than it needs to be for the purpose and there doesn't appear to be any supporting structure, particularly desirable for such a tall, thin guard.

Not proof, but it is not present in any of the other pictures taken of this airplane during shore-based testing.

I had concluded that it was a barrier guard (or strictly speaking, a Davis barrier* activator) necessary in the event of a collapsed nose gear) because I was expecting to see one. A scabbed-on guard had been added to the McDonnell FH-1 for its carrier trials accomplished three months earlier and was standard equipment on Navy carrier-based jets until the advent of the angled deck.

My guess is that the P-80 trials were accomplished without a barrier activator by the simple expedient of keeping the deck clear, sort of an early version of the angled deck. But, see Gerald Asher's comment below.

*For a gouge on the difference between the standard barrier, the Davis barrier, and the barricade, see http://thanlont.blogspot.com/2010/10/barriers-and-barricades-one-more-time.html

Grumman F9F Nose Cone Variations

Roy Stafford called my attention to an F9F nose cone change that I hadn't noticed. As often happens, the subsequent research generated enough illustrations for a post.

The original F9F Panther nose cone had a small inlet on each side.

Early during the Korean War, there were incidents of F9F nose cones blowing off following strafing runs. It was unexpected, since the Navy had experienced nothing untoward when evaluating the Panther's 20mm guns. And Grumman didn't either when the Navy asked it to evaluate the problem, right up until the last flight of the planned test program. On that one, Corky Meyer serendipitously got the residual gun-gas conditions just right and blew his nose off, rather far away from Grumman and out over the water, as it happened.

The result was the addition of a vent in the aft end of the nose cone.

The modification was rushed out to the fleet, which accounts for the zinc-chromate primed hood over the new vent in the photo of an F9F-2 above.

This configuration was carried forward to the F9F-5.

Note that the Panther in the above picture is fitted with the barricade deflector in front of the two inboard 20mm cannons.

This is neither an antenna or a handle used to pull the nose cone open as some have speculated. It was added in conjunction with the addition of the barricade forward of the existing barriers on carriers during the Korean War. It kept the inboard barrels from being snagged by the barricade straps during an engagement, which would likely have resulted in the airplane being slewed into the island or the catwalk. (For more on the barricade versus the barrier, see http://thanlont.blogspot.com/2010/10/barriers-and-barricades-one-more-time.html)

The Cougars had a different gun-gas vent. The small inlet and hooded vent were replaced by two open vents, one above the other. (The fairing on the underside of the nose covers an antenna introduced on the F9F-8 and retrofitted to some F9Fs).

The final change was the addition of an in-flight refueling probe.

Douglas A3D-2 (A-3B) Skywarrior Canopy

Celestial navigation is the means of determining one's position on the surface of the earth solely by reference to the position of the sun, moon, planets, or stars. Even into the jet age, it was used by navigators to at least verify a position established by other means. On an airplane, it required a viewing port at which a sextant could be employed to measure the height above the horizon of a selected celestial body.

Kollsman developed the periscope sextant in the late 1940s for high-speed, pressurized airplanes. It featured a small port and sextant mount in the top of the fuselage. When sights were to be taken, the periscope sextant was inserted into the mount. The tip stuck out about an inch above the skin on the airplane.

The port was located in the right-rear clear panel of the canopy.

The crewman using the sextant (see HERE) would sit on the seat at the right rear of the cockpit.

Note that the illustration shows the mount but not the sextant, which was normally stored when not in use.

The last 21 A3D (A-3B) bombers were delivered with a built-in sextant station located over the rearward facing seat (the periscope bubble is protected with a red cover).

These also had the DECM tail in lieu of the 20 mm turret.

Note that the fourth-man seat was relocated at some point.

 I'm not sure that these airplanes also had the right-hand sextant position (at least one did), but for sure it was retained as a backup, at least initially, on most bombers that were retrofitted with the left-hand sextant installation.

Note that there are photographs of A-3Bs with the left-hand canopy sextant installation and the 20mm turret, so it wasn't a retrofit associated with the DECM tail.

At some point, the fourth crew seat was relocated to be over the entry/escape hatch.

I had thought that later KA-3Bs lost the right-hand sextant port but there are several examples with as well as without.  The same is true for the EKA-3Bs since there was at least one with both:

As it happens, this is BuNo 147658 from the block of bombers delivered with the built-in sextant at the rearward-facing seat, which suggests that that the right-hand port was not deleted at the time.

What looks like a Venetian blind in the right-rear clear panel of some A3D-2 (A-3B) bomber/tankers is actually the sense antenna for the AN/ARN-59 DF system. There was a similar but much less prominent antenna in this location for the AN/ARR-15 MHF radio receiver in very early A3Ds. As to its exact configuration...

My overall post on the A3D Skywarrior, Bomber and Versions, is here: http://tailspintopics.blogspot.com/2010/09/mighty-skywarrior.html

Grumman A-6B Iron Hand

29 January 2016: Still refining and correcting...

Thanks to Mick Roth and Rick Morgan, who generously provided most of the information and many of the illustrations for this post and then patiently answered my questions. However, this is still a work in progress and subject to their review (and comments from others for that matter).

The escalating air battle during the Vietnam War resulting in the introduction of the big SA-2 Guideline surface-to-air missile (SAM) by the North Vietnamese.

Various counters to it were successively employed by the Air Force and the Navy including electronic warning, evasive maneuvers, jamming, and anti-radiation missiles (ARM). The latter was the most satisfying, because—if successful—it resulted in the destruction of the SAM-site radar. However, the original ARM (the Shrike, which was based on the Sparrow air-to-air missile) had less range than the SAM, making an attack on a SAM site too much of a fair fight.

The solution was the repurposing of the U.S. Navy's big ship-based SAM, the RIM-66/SM-1 Standard Missile, from anti-aircraft to anti SAM-site radar.

Since it was a bit big (pushing 1,400 lbs) for the little A4D Skyhawk then being used for the Iron Hand missions, the resulting AGM-78 Standard ARM missile was to be carried by modified Grumman Intruders, designated A-6B. As the mission equipment, tactics, and missile evolved to be more effective, the A-6Bs were continuously updated. From a modelers standpoint, there were four different configurations (see http://rickmorganbooks.com/a-6b-standard-arm.html for a more detailed and less informal description of airplane and missile).

Mod 0 Early: As shown on the following picture of a test-bed NA-6A, the main external configuration feature was the addition of APS-107A/B* elongated-diamond homing antennas on each side of the upper part of the radome and the lower side of each engine nacelle along with wing and stabilizer tip antennas. Several other small antennas are also circled. The BDA (Bomb Damage Assessment) aft antenna and right side ER-142 DF antenna wouldn't be visible in this picture; the forward BDA antenna and the left side ER-142 antenna could be hidden behind the crew ladder.  Note the LAU-77A/A adapter on the outboard pylon (it is missing the DECM boom that would be on the A-6Bs) that was used to configure it to carry the Standard ARM missile

* The APS-107B was part of the Mod 0 Update. It allowed the employment of the AGM-78B/C/D missiles in addition to the AGM-78A. There was no external change from a modelers standpoint

The APS-107A/B homing antenna:

Forward fuselage antennas:

 There was also an aft BDA stub antenna under the aft fuselage.

Forward facing wingtip antenna:

Mick Roth

Rearward facing stabilator-tip antenna.

The combination of the wing and stabilizer-tip antennas provided 360-degree warning coverage.

Mod 0 Late: The major change was the replacement of the APS-107B with the ALR-55 and the ER-142 with the ALR-57, which was identified as the Mod O/1 Update.

US Navy photo via Tony Thornborough annotated by Mick Roth

The system changes did not affect the external antenna configuration or location with the exception of the Mod O and O Update diamond antennas when the APS-107 system was replaced. These might have been left in place, removed and covered by a blanking plate, or in at least one instance, the engine nacelle antennas were left in place and a radome without antennas installed.

Here the antennas have been removed and covered with a blanking plate.

The most obvious difference between the Mod 0 cockpit and that of an A-6A bomber's was the addition of a row of threat warning lights at the top of the instrument panel, a radar warning instrument for both the pilot and the bombardier/navigator, and the replacement of the B/N's attack-radar control stick (that radar had been removed) with a missile control panel.

Mod 1: This version featured a radome festooned with small antennas and a rudder modified with even more that covered the aft quadrant:

Bruce Trombecky via Mick Roth

The bottom of the rudder was modified to add a bulge that terminated in a faceted antenna mount/fairing; the position light was raised up over it.

The Mod 1 had a different wingtip antenna mount/fairing with an aft antenna added to provide 360-degree coverage without the need for an antenna on the stabilator tip.

 Mick Roth

 

 Photos from Squadron/Signal A-6 Walk Around, Mick Roth captions

The B/N center console reverted back to one more similar to the standard A-6 bomber's, However, the hand controller (slew stick) was only used for Standard ARM and APS-118 functions since the APQ-112 attack radar had been removed from Mod 0 and Mod 1 A-6Bs.

 There were only five Mod 1 A-6Bs: 149955, 151591, 151820, and 152616/7

PAT/ARM: These final versions of the A-6B were only distinguishable from the basic A-6A by the BDA (Battle Damage Assessment) antennas that were retained. They also got back their all-weather attack radar capability. Only three were so modified: 155628/29/30

Masumi Wada as annotated by Mick Roth

 The AGM-78:

National Museum of the United States Air Force

At some point after 1971, the A-6B ejection seats would have been changed from the GRU-5 to the GRU-7:

The major difference is the parachute housing, which changed from a metal "sugar scoop" to a plastic container.

Obscuro provides a 1/72 conversion for the A-6B Mod 1. See HERE. Unfortunately, it does not include the rudder modification but that's no hill for a stepper. Note that the pedestal provided was for the Mod 0 cockpit, not the Mod 1

Darren Roberts (Steel Beach Accessories) is planning to offer 1/48 and 1/32 A-6B conversions.

AGM-78 missiles are available from Eduard in 1/72 and 1/48. They are also reportedly included in the Hasegawa 1/48th Weapon Set and F-4G Wild Weasel kit. A 1/32 AGM-78 is available from AMS Resins but you have to contact Harold directly.