Sometime in the 1980's I attended a meeting at Boscombe Down to discuss heavy weight and single engined landing limitations for the UK Phantoms. Don Headley represented the BAE test pilots and I guess there were Flight test and Aerodynamics reps from BAe as well, but I can't remember who they were. My only reason for being chosen to attend was because, at the time, I understood the flight systems and the workings of the flap and BLC system and the associated 7th/12th stage bleed. It was intended to try and test various combinations of settings to allow approaches to be flown, potentially I think, even in reheat. I remember expressing some concern about some of the tests being proposed and Don Headley put me firmly back in my Flight Systems box. He pointed out that my concerns were based on the behaviour of the Buccaneer which could really bite if you reduced blowing pressures too far and in practice, the Phantom was much more benign. The main reason for the difference was that Phantom primarily 'blew' the leading edge of the wing and if blowing pressures were reduced, and the slits became unchoked, the aircraft would pitch nose down. Buccaneer on the other hand primarily blew the trailing edge of the wing and if BLC pressures fell too low, the aircraft pitched nose up which was the last thing you needed when low and slow and close to the ground. At the time the prospects of hot weather trials for UK Phantoms were pretty slim and Don probably did not want me to prejudice the chances of going on an interesting, if high risk, flight trial in an exotic location. I cant remember if or where the trials ever took place but in the back of my mind, I think it might have been Akrotiri
One minor deviation from this thread was that it fascinated me what you could hear on a Phantom engine run. I can remember the Rolls Royce rep pointing out to me when the engine changed from 7th to 12th stage bleed and vice versa you could hear it quite clearly among all the other racket from the engines when stood alongside wearing ear defenders.
Walbut