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F16CrewChief β My First Jet, 78-0014
Published: 2009-11-19 00:28:57 +0000 UTC; Views: 2768; Favourites: 27; Downloads: 57
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This is the first F-16 I crewed in my time in the USAF.F-16A-1-CF, 78-0014 assigned to the 310th TFTS, 58th TTW seen on the Luke AFB ramp in October 1983.
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Comments: 87
So as a crewchief you're asigned to multiples acft?
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duriing my career, I was assigned six F-16's as the dedicated crew chief. If my jet was not on the flying schedule, I would work another jet. My duties changed as I progressed in rank...
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ohhhhhhhh, didn't know that.....do you miss it?
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Sometimes. I am happy I am no longer in the military, but we had some fun too.
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Oh man, those were the days when the USAF were filling bases with Vipers. Now theyΒ΄re starting to be hard-to-come-by
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In the 80's and 1990's they were everywhere!
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Thanks. That was my baby!
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Never forget the first bird, eh?
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No sir. That airplane was a major pain in the butt! But it was mine...
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Really?
You mean difficult to fly [since it was your first] or actually...troublesome?
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No. I did not fly it. I was the crew chief of it. Being an early version (the 14th production acft built) it had a lot of growing paoins both structurally and some system issues. The F100PW200 could be troblesome as well.
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Oh...nice work
First examples of these aircrafts [not the F-16 specifically, most or all of them] always have problems?
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Anything new has problems when first fielded...
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Altough is not good, I think it's a bit "normal"...part of the products' evolution. Like the saying, the road to success is paved with failure [some 
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Your welcome. go USAF.
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Nice shot! It's a lovely plane. I've only ever seen one of these and it looked quite small. It must give you a feeling of pride to look at "your" planes.
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Thank you! I seem to remember that I shot this right after it roilled out of the paint barn after getting a new coat of paint. If you notice the base of the pitot tube is black. This was from earlier times when the Block-1 F-16's had totally black radomes!
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You're welcome! Black radomes seem quite common, I'm not sure why.
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[link] is Block 1 F-16B with the original Black radome. I flew in this jet in 1984.
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Must have been quite an experience!
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It was. We dropped two SUU 20's worth of bombs and made four hot gun passes!
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Lot so of Gs, I expect.
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Kind of. When in the air to ground mode, the acft is limited to six G's.When in a clean config, the limit is 9 G's. I have done that once!
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I gather one really feels 9 Gs!
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Yeah it is pretty intense w/ tunnel vision.
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Interesting. I still nurse a hope of going up with our guys once as a reporter/photog. We'll see.
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Press real hard for the ride. It is worth it!!!!
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Thanks, I'll do what I can!
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They did not last long on the F-16's They were too visible in the ACM area.
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I'm surprised that something that small would be visible in ACM. You'd think they were tearing around the sky and not noticing a small black bump. Shows what I know!
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The radome was very visible during ACM. The rapidly changed the color to grey.
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That does make sense.
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