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F-16 A, B, C, MLU


Frank00

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Yeah but which PW. If it is J-001 it could be PW-200 or PW-220E. Either is a horrible unreliable maintenance heavy engine and I can't stand them, but just curious which it is.

To whom it may concern,

I am an idiot, unfortunately for the world, I have a internet connection and a fondness for beer....apologies for that.

Thank you for you patience.

 

 

Many people don't want the truth, they want constant reassurance that whatever misconception/fallacies they believe in are true..

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I'm no expert, I wish. Do you have any more info on the photo? I tried to go to the website on it but could not find it nor any context about it.

To whom it may concern,

I am an idiot, unfortunately for the world, I have a internet connection and a fondness for beer....apologies for that.

Thank you for you patience.

 

 

Many people don't want the truth, they want constant reassurance that whatever misconception/fallacies they believe in are true..

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To whom it may concern,

I am an idiot, unfortunately for the world, I have a internet connection and a fondness for beer....apologies for that.

Thank you for you patience.

 

 

Many people don't want the truth, they want constant reassurance that whatever misconception/fallacies they believe in are true..

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direct PDF link to accident report

http://www.airforcemag.com/AircraftAccidentReports/Documents/2017/040517_F16_Andrews.pdf


Edited by mvsgas

To whom it may concern,

I am an idiot, unfortunately for the world, I have a internet connection and a fondness for beer....apologies for that.

Thank you for you patience.

 

 

Many people don't want the truth, they want constant reassurance that whatever misconception/fallacies they believe in are true..

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There is a question that bothers me since quite some time. It seems the US Air Force never uses external power during startup of their birds. While of course I know that they all have autonomous startup capability, in the European air forces it is standard procedure to always use ex power when available. It makes sense to power up all systems without engines running. So what are the procedures and reasons in the US?

 

The only times we use external power at startup is when doing engine testing and with a functional check flight. So not a standard procedure for all European countries

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There is a question that bothers me since quite some time. It seems the US Air Force never uses external power during startup of their birds. While of course I know that they all have autonomous startup capability, in the European air forces it is standard procedure to always use ex power when available. It makes sense to power up all systems without engines running. So what are the procedures and reasons in the US?

 

On US aircraft they've done away with having to use external sources of either air or power in order to start the aircraft, since it's just another thing that can and usually will break when you absolutely do NOT need it to. It introduces complexity into the mix that you don't need to have.

 

Also, I don't know of any modern-day, main-line aircraft in western europe that needs external power or inputs in order to start. Sure, you might have some of the smaller trainers and such that might need it, but aircraft like the F16, SAAB Gripen, Tornado or Typhoons doesn't require it. Also don't think that the Rafale or the Mirage 2000 needs it.

 

During my year working on the Vipers in RNorAF, we NEVER used any external hookups on startup unless it was when we had to hook the jet up to a testrig in order to do some testing on the ECS. External ground-power was used during the morning electrical checks, and there are provisions for using a Huffer in order to do testing on the ground as well as hydraulic hookups for testing purposes, but they're not used to start or launch the aircraft with.

 

This holds especially true on ground-air, because the receptacle is VERY close to the intake on the Viper, which is not a place you want to be in when the engine is started.

Regards

Fjordmonkey

Clustermunitions is just another way of saying that you don't like someone.

 

I used to like people, then people ruined that for me.

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Mainsail, ShadowXP,

 

Tell me some stories about working A models. I never worked on them (besides in training).

For example:

When I was on 310th FS, in Luke AFB (1997-2000) working block 42 we where having all kinds of problems with the PW-220. AB no lights, stalls, bad pins and collars inspections, exhaust coming of in flight, etc. At one point, we had to take all the engine out and send them to engine back shop to get NDI. We did not fly for two weeks. So engine back shop was working very hard. We we started to fly, one of the jets from the 63rd FS came back and they found a spray can wedge between the exhaust liner, all the way back to the convergent nozzle. Luckily, it did not burn through.

To whom it may concern,

I am an idiot, unfortunately for the world, I have a internet connection and a fondness for beer....apologies for that.

Thank you for you patience.

 

 

Many people don't want the truth, they want constant reassurance that whatever misconception/fallacies they believe in are true..

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Well, we really didn't have much issues with the 220's of the older OCU-jets (pre-MLU), but one of the other crews had a 220 (not the 220E which the MLU's had) compressor-stalled immediately after starting it, probably during either SEC or BUC-checks. We were in a shelter a few hundred meters away, and the boom that came out of the other shelter was hilariously loud even for us. The aircraft had belched out a very nice fireball out of the intake as well, and if I remember correctly the issue was due to a faulty fuel-controller.

 

Apart from that, we didn't have much engine-issues. I think the worst issues we had during my year in was that they found oil in the EPU-system, which effectively grounded the entire F-16 fleet in Norway for the better parts of two weeks.

 

Other issues were minor. Fuel-leaks (I'm looking at you, 658!!!), ECS-problems on 279 while on deployment to Banak AFB, and we had one jet returning to base not soon after takeoff due to a broken shaft in one of the hydraulic pumps on board. That last one was "fun" to receive, as the hyd-oil reservoir emptied itself inside the aircraft. REALLY fun to clean that one...

 

Was a bit more fun happening at Banak, like a shredded ventral fin and shrapnel in the left stab, plus a palm-size piece of shrapnel missing the Flare-magazine by about an inch after the jet had done a bombing-run.

 

Sitting on RS15 the night the Russian submarine Kursk sank, however, was intense...

Regards

Fjordmonkey

Clustermunitions is just another way of saying that you don't like someone.

 

I used to like people, then people ruined that for me.

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The reservoir emptied inside the aircraft? That sucks! How did that happened?

To whom it may concern,

I am an idiot, unfortunately for the world, I have a internet connection and a fondness for beer....apologies for that.

Thank you for you patience.

 

 

Many people don't want the truth, they want constant reassurance that whatever misconception/fallacies they believe in are true..

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The reservoir emptied inside the aircraft? That sucks! How did that happened?

 

Shaft from the gearbox to the pump itself snapped and started flopping around. I didn't get a close look at the damage, but I did help clean the aircraft before it was pulled into the heavy maint' hangar. I really pity the guy that had to climb inside the engine-compartment and do cleanup there :P

Regards

Fjordmonkey

Clustermunitions is just another way of saying that you don't like someone.

 

I used to like people, then people ruined that for me.

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Oh, crap, it emptied into the engine bay!! :megalol:

That really sucks

 

We got Lucky twice in Aviano AB

- Once 355 (my jet) B system pump shaft broke on landing roll, when the pilot was taxiing, B system drop to zero, We had to rush to tow him out of EOR. The funny thing is I have a terrible accent ( I'm from Puerto Rico) an so was the driver. We could not understand the tower and they did not understand us. So at one point they just would tell us to hold or go.

 

-Anyway, the second time we where at Al Udeid, and one aircraft PTO stop working on landing final. He lost all Hydraulic and power. EPU came on, but he still had good engine so he just landed. Turn out it was the engine gear box, the plate where the PTO shaft bolts to. That was really luck because he just flew for 8 hours over Iraq.


Edited by mvsgas

To whom it may concern,

I am an idiot, unfortunately for the world, I have a internet connection and a fondness for beer....apologies for that.

Thank you for you patience.

 

 

Many people don't want the truth, they want constant reassurance that whatever misconception/fallacies they believe in are true..

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Oh, crap, it emptied into the engine bay!! :megalol:

That really sucks

 

We got Lucky twice in Aviano AB

- Once 355 (my jet) B system pump shaft broke on landing roll, when the pilot was taxiing, B system drop to zero, We had to rush to tow him out of EOR. The funny thing is I have a terrible accent ( I'm from Puerto Rico) an so was the driver. We could not understand the tower and they did not understand us. So at one point the just would tell us to hold or go.

 

-Anyway, the second time we where at Al Udeid, and one aircraft PTO stop working on landing final. He lost all Hydraulic and power. EPU came on, but he still had good engine so he just landed. Turn out it was the engine gear box, the plate where the PTO shaft bolts to. That was really luck because he just flew for 8 hours over Iraq.

 

Yikes! PTO-failure is no joke at all!

 

We did have somewhat of an incident when we were at Banak as well. My jet had an intermittent ECS-fault, so in order to clear it we had to tie the jet down and do a full AB groundrun. The problem is that the tiedown was situated so that it pointed the nozzle straight at an earth embankment about 6 meters away. And the soil up there is fine sand, almost like desert-sand.....

 

Well, the dustcloud rose 100-150 meters into the air, and rained sand down onto the entire flightline, including onto/into aircraft. We had two gun-failures the next day, one of which could have been very bad as the round didn't as much as fire as just pop loose and jam inside the barrel. On the next revolution of the gun, the round coming into the barrel got pushed into a jammed round, telescoped into the casing and then essentially jamming the entire gun while it being under full hydraulic load. NOT pretty, and the pilot did get a bit ashen when the EoD-crew told him that he had flown back to the airfield with two live 20mm HEI-rounds stuck in the barrel while having a hyd-leak from the gun-breech assembly due to the gun jamming mechanically. Very glad I didn't handle that aircraft that day, as cleaning hydraulic fluid is hell enough. You do NOT need it to be worse by introducing gunpowder-residue and gunpowder into the mix...

 

The other gun-fault was where a round came out of the chute and wrapped itself around the guiding-lug on the breech-side of the mechanism like a banana.

Regards

Fjordmonkey

Clustermunitions is just another way of saying that you don't like someone.

 

I used to like people, then people ruined that for me.

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Wow! I never thought about how fast that guns spins. You hear about it, you know the numbers, but it never quite registers. But when you see it tear itself apart, the force and the speed it has, it puts it in perspective quickly.

Got to go to work, talk to you later.

To whom it may concern,

I am an idiot, unfortunately for the world, I have a internet connection and a fondness for beer....apologies for that.

Thank you for you patience.

 

 

Many people don't want the truth, they want constant reassurance that whatever misconception/fallacies they believe in are true..

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Also, I don't know of any modern-day, main-line aircraft in western europe that needs external power external power

 

Well I did not say that it is needed. I know that modern aircraft can operate autonomous, but here in the German Air Force ex power is used whenever available during startup. And I am quite sure the procedures in other nations who use the same airframes are very similar. It is therefore very interesting to hear that this is such an "absurd" thing for the F-16. Seems to be quite a different design.

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Well I did not say that it is needed. I know that modern aircraft can operate autonomous, but here in the German Air Force ex power is used whenever available during startup. And I am quite sure the procedures in other nations who use the same airframes are very similar. It is therefore very interesting to hear that this is such an "absurd" thing for the F-16. Seems to be quite a different design.

 

Interesting!

 

I knew that the old Luftverteidigungdiesels (F-4F Phantom II) used a Huffer-cart to start, but didn't know that the Luftwaffe also used auxillary power on the Eurofighters and Tornados. :)

Regards

Fjordmonkey

Clustermunitions is just another way of saying that you don't like someone.

 

I used to like people, then people ruined that for me.

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Yeah, the F-4 was oldschool :-)

 

To explain things a bit more: Of course both the Tornado and the Eurofighter have an APU and do not require any external hookups for anything. In the Eurofighter the APU generator can supply the entire electrical system and may run up to 4 hours. But as said it is normal procedure to power up the aircraft with external supply so the pilot can prepare all the systems without engines or APU running. Only during excercices in foreign countries, where ex power is sometimes not available, the internal systems are used.

 

I got some insight in the F-18 in Switzerland but would also love to learn more about the F-16. Such an iconic aircraft and so small!


Edited by Drotik
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I got some insight in the F-18 in Switzerland but would also love to learn more about the F-16. Such an iconic aircraft and so small!

 

The Viper is extremely small, which makes working on it somewhat interesting. There's a few things on it that's so insanely hard to reach that you've got to be something of a contortionist in order to reach them (I'm looking at you, 3/8" bolt that holds the righthand ventral-fin panel on!!). Hell, just doing a SOAP-check (taking an oil-sample from the engine for analysis) after every flight is something you do by feel alone. Of course, cramming your arm halfway up an engine-bay that's filled almost to the fuselage with pipes and hot metal is never really all that fun, and I've got the scars to prove it on my right foream, heh.

 

You also have to be very aware when you move around it when you're doing your checks after startup, as with all military aircraft, but especially so because of the small size. I mean, the stabs move over a meter when you go for full deflection, and they also move through 3000psi of force. Getting slapped by one can kill you very easily. The flaperons inboard on the wing is also something most groundcrew will get slapped by, so you quickly learn to wear a helmet so that it takes most of the force from the bonk and not your head. Still hurts, however.

 

There's a lot you can bump your head on due to the small size, and on the old Block 10-birds there's an antenna underneath the intake that is notorious for this. The main landing gear doors are also something that you'll hit yourself on and they're pointy enough in places to draw blood if you hit them with sufficient speed.

 

One thing I specifically remember as the worst about working on it was that due to age, some of the jets seeped fuel from the panels on the back of the aircraft when it performed BFM. This, coupled with the often-wet weather up at Bodø MAS here in Norway ment that the aircraft came in wet and thus extremely slippery. I have done a triple-WTF off the aircraft because of the combination of aviation-fuel on metal that then gets soaked in water. Not fun when it's about 2 meters down to the concrete floor of the shelter, heh...

 

I still miss my time with them, though, even though they were frustrating birds to work on from time to time.

Regards

Fjordmonkey

Clustermunitions is just another way of saying that you don't like someone.

 

I used to like people, then people ruined that for me.

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Thank you for the information! During my training I did some work on the old F-104, the G model. Of course her last flight was long ago but the majority of the systems were functional. I still like the aircraft but you could see that she was designed a long time ago. You need a screwdriver for all external panels, circuit breakers are all over the place and there are the infamous leading edges on the wings.

 

Once I had the task to change a hydraulic pump, that was an experience! The hyd pumps are mounted on the right side directly on the engine (there is no PTO shaft with secondary power system, the accessories are fitted on the engine itself) and you have to squeeze your entire upper body in the engine compartment. Took me two days to remove six nuts and we had to build a special tool to fasten them again.

 

The Eurofighter on the other hand is the complete opposite. It was designed with easy maintenance in mind. All panels are accessible without tools, checking engine oil and filters is easy. There is a pressure gauge fitted on to the tires! Engine change is laughable easy. But the icing on the cake is the Maintenance Data Panel. A small display on the outside where you have access to nearly all the systems. Hydraulics, fuel, armament etc, you can check and control almost everything without someone in the cockpit. I really fell in love with the aircraft, you get the feeling that someone actually thought during development.

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The Eurofighter sounds like a dream, although I really wish I still lived in Bodø since I then could be involved with the Starfighter-program up there. They got good old 637, a TF-104G, flying again a few years back.

 

I liked how easy it was to change the engine on the Viper as well. The engine itself hangs from two bolts and a rail mounted to the fuselage, and removing it is simple if somewhat tedious due to having to undo about 200 screws that holds the bathtub (large panel on the underside of the rear fuselage) and the 150is bolts that holds both the ventral fins to the fuselage. After undoing a bucketload of fasteners and such that holds things like the main fuel-pipe attached to the engines, you can easily pull the engine out and onto its sled.

 

I think the quickest engine-change I was involved in was about 3 hours, but I know they can be swapped out faster than that if need be.

 

The thing I liked the least as an F-16 Groundie was to clean the bird. THAT was hell...

Regards

Fjordmonkey

Clustermunitions is just another way of saying that you don't like someone.

 

I used to like people, then people ruined that for me.

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See, this is fun. I just crack open a beer and reading old mechanics stories.

Shadow,

I still got a big scar on my head form a AIM-9M, know the feeling.

I hated checking the chip detector on the PW, which one was the one inboard, was it for 2 and 3 bearing? And doing the PDU bottom bolt cotter key, heated that one also.

To whom it may concern,

I am an idiot, unfortunately for the world, I have a internet connection and a fondness for beer....apologies for that.

Thank you for you patience.

 

 

Many people don't want the truth, they want constant reassurance that whatever misconception/fallacies they believe in are true..

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They got good old 637, a TF-104G, flying again a few years back.

 

It was planned for her to visit Germany for the 60th anniversary of our Air Force (since the restructuring after WW II) but the visit was denied by our authorities due to safety regulations. It would be a dream to see a flying Starfighter, in the videos I've seen she looks magnificent.

 

USAF F-16s from Spangdhalem AFB visit us every now and then. I hope I can get a closer look next year.


Edited by Drotik
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See, this is fun. I just crack open a beer and reading old mechanics stories.

Shadow,

I still got a big scar on my head form a AIM-9M, know the feeling.

I hated checking the chip detector on the PW, which one was the one inboard, was it for 2 and 3 bearing? And doing the PDU bottom bolt cotter key, heated that one also.

 

Never had to fiddle with the PDU, as that was Light Maint' territory :D And I'm damn glad for that! Never bumped into the Nine-Mike, but I did put my shoulder into the back end of the fins on the Penguin Antiship-missile (you might know it as the AGM-119, although I'm not sure if the USAF uses them). Not pleasant!

 

Can't remember which of the three chippies on my side that was the most hellish to remove, inspect and reinstall (might have been the one for fuel since that was the highest up in the bay). Been too long since I worked on the birds :( But I know that losing one and having it drop into the engine bay is something no Crewchief will thank you for. I was training an FNG on the flight line who managed to do that, and he can thank the higher powers for that the detector right next to one of the fire-doors and as such was easy to get to. Stern words were spoken very loudly, and both the FNG and me got a nice little run around the shelter as punishment. The FNG for ****ing up, me for being in charge of the FNG :P

 

Same guy who I had to whack over the head with my maglite (he had a helmet on) when he tried to go in front of the wing tank when he was going in to do his checks in the wheel-well. He ****ed up so many times and was generally unsafe on the jet, so we ended up sending him back to ground-school for another month before he was allowed to do his checkout-test. Among the things he managed to do was to forget to remove the pitot-cover before a pitot-heat test (I got it off in time, but we had to call out QA in order to make sure it was OK), forgot to remove the chaff/flare-pin, almost removed the EPU-pin BEFORE startup (that would have been fun!), forgot the arming-pin in a live Nine-mike etc. He wasn't very well liked, but he ended up at least OK after his trip back to ground-school and extensive drilling by the rest of us.

 

I think the single most hated task on the Viper except cleaning it was towing it in the summer. SOP was to lower the canopy onto the rail but not to engage the locks, and when you have to tow the aircraft 3-4km from the shelter it's in and to the heavy maintenance hangar, you're dripping with sweat. Can't imagine how it would be to do that at lets say Nellis or heaven forbid Baghram!

 

Drotik: I haven't gotten to see her myself even though she did land and stay at an airfield near me for a while. Hoping to get to see her next year when she resumes flying. Also hoping to make it to one of the continental airshows next year, since most airshows here in Norway are pretty boring. Would love to see the Eurofighter close up.

Regards

Fjordmonkey

Clustermunitions is just another way of saying that you don't like someone.

 

I used to like people, then people ruined that for me.

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