Just found this site by accident. Never knew it existed! This has brought back many memories of the F4. It was possibly the F4 that made me want to join the RAF, as I vividly remember watching the Simon Dee show when he went for a supersonic flight in one of the first Tooms to be delivered to the UK and I was awestruck. The thing looked like it shouldn't have flown at all. I arrived at 228OCU in '74 as an Nav Inst mech after training. The aircrew I remember are Middy Hopper (my mate married his daughter Liz), Nick Ireland, Bob Prest, Arthur Vine (I was strapping Arthur in once and he made the wry comment after watching some Luftwaffe Tooms taxy in that he'd been fighting the buggers 30 years earlier, I think he flew Tempests) and Mike Shaw who was OC at the time and I remember him as a very nice bloke.
The chief in charge of my line shift was the amazing Jock Hickey. Jock was one of the great characters of the RAF, they seemed to die out towards the end of my service. If I remember correctly he was banned from the mess for not wearing a tie in the bar. When his ban ran out he turned up wearing a tie and nothing else. Banned again. We used to chain the back mudgard of his bike to the bike rack so that we could see him come crashing off it after he'd gone 5 yards. Sadly I believe Jock died a few years ago.
Other characters I remember vaguely were Master Pilot Egan, who was taken up for a jolly in a twin sticker before he retired and apparently flew it like an expert. Which I suppose he was. There was an aircrew guy with a beard on 41 which I always thought odd, how did his mask fit? And another aircrew guy with an eye patch, which really fills you with confidence.
Also at the time Bob Prest was flying on the OCU, the hit 'Oh, We're Going to Jamaica' via coconut airways was doing the rounds, which of course led to him being dubbed Coconut Airways One by us. I don't think he appreciated it. We all thought that Bob had seen to many Bond movies as he used to pose around in a black TR6 and was never without his designer shades.
There were also a couple of US Marine exchange navs there at the time who were really great guys. One of them had been filmed doing a wheels up in an F4 somewhere in the states. The other guy had flown his twin sticker after the stude pilot had flaked out after pulling some ridiculous amount of 'G'. That was one bent aircraft when it came back. I believe one of the characteristics of the Toom was that it pitched up as it came back through Mach 1 and he was already heaving some as it happened.
CO's I remember were a guy called Allison, I think he was replaced by a guy called Clark who was a really nice bloke. I also remember one of the Wg Cdrs there was called Danny Lavender, maybe OC29? We said hello at some beer call or other and finished up spending the rest of the night talking about flying (I fly gliders and George Lee the then World Glider champ was a Toom pilot) Top bloke.
The F4 was a cogs and knobs kite, it was pre IC electronics which made it interesting to work on. You could actually figure out faults without plugging the bloody thing into a computer. I used to alternate between working out on the line where my main raison d'etre was to run up and align the INAS before the crew arrived, and working in the shed which was more interesting technically but not as much of an adrenaline rush as standing next to 2 speys when they are winding up and you are 'Man 1'. Some of the boxes were a pain to get to, I remember the rear bang seat had to come out if you wanted to change the Weapons Computer, and a lot of time was spent upside down inside the rear cockpit which was the only way to get at some of the stuff with any degree of success. The rate gyro's needed an enormous panel taking off inside the wheel well which was a real pain of a job. Another bad one was harmonising the ODU for gun shoots. There was a device called the BIL (Boresight something or other) which had to be fitted into the nose gear compartment. There were 2 bolts holding it place, the bottom bolt was easy to fix but the top one needed the fingers of a child to squirm through the pipes to get your hands on it. Sometimes the thread would just start immediately, other times you would be there for 15 minutes without any luck, grinding the skin off your hands. As a result, most alignments were done without the top bolt in place, so some of the ex pole stirrers here may now have a new excuse for not hitting the banner..........oddly enough, in later years I was at 30 MU, Sealand and my job was to refurbish and repair ODU's, including the little joke thing that was fitted to Navy Tooms, the OSA. You would have been better off with a chinagraph cross on the windscreen. So I suppose as I was the only guy in the RAF doing that job that most of the jocks here have at some time or other looked through one of my lovingly rebuilt masterpieces...!
Prangs I remember were the CO being killed just before I arrived. Hit a crop sprayer. Several jets came down during my time there but as I remember, all the crews banged out safely. One that springs to mind is a jet that lost it's outer wing, maybe in a mid air. One that I saw was XV415 that crashed after a roller. I was strapping somebody in and I glanced up as it lifted off, there was obviously something wrong as it was leaving a trail of crap behind it, then two parachutes appeared. I remember thinking that they must be dropping flares, you just never expect to see a plane crash. It slowly rolled and crashed into the Witham round about Tatty Bridge. Apparently bits of it came to rest in an old dear's garden and when the fire crews got there they realised she was as deaf as a post. 'An aircraft has just set your garden on fire' shouts head fire person into her ear, 'Oh, I thought I could hear the dog barking' says old lady.
I was there in '76 when the Queen came to visit, can't remember why now but it was that blazing hot summer and her plane was late. Guys were flaking out all over the parade ground because no one had the wit to stand everyone at the easy and relax for a while. As I remember a jock called Dave Roome was the officer who was standing right in front of me on the parade ground. He was trying to say to us out of the corner of his mouth 'Sway on your balls lads, keep the circulation going'. I whispered back 'Well if you're going to flake out sir, fall forwards not backwards because your scabbard is pointing directly at my balls.' Some of the guys were making soft farmyard sounds to try and set Dave's shoulders shaking but he stood stalwartly, defender of the realm.
Anyway, some great memories on here, glad to see the plumbers are still shirty! (would that be Graham Marriot perchance?....) It's about 5 years since I last poled a glider around, as something called Golf came into my life. Also my son lives in Oz now and the yearly trek out there cattle class is enough flying for anybody. But I would like to leave you with a little tale of synchronicity...Since leaving the mob some years ago I became a professional musician, yes you say, a natural progression from aircraft engineer, but I digress. I became aware of a custom guitar maker called Neil Morgan who makes the most superb instruments. I finished up getting to know Neil and have done the Wembley Guitar show with him. He's not a musician by trade, he's a senior 747 captain. Which I thought closed some kind of circle. Strange uh?
Right, now I must search out the Lightning and Harrier threads.
