Javelin!

[Conan the Librarian]

Just wondering if anybody has anything nice, or otherwise, to say about the Javelin? Tales and anecdotes, apocryphal or not, would be most welcome.

Conan

[jabberwok]

I would guess Waterman didn't say anything nice when his tailplane came off.. :ooh:

[Conan the Librarian]

Think that was the elevators that departed due to flutter wasn't it? I also heard that there was a mid air with a Hunter near Wooton under Edge in 56 I think. don't know if all got away with it.

Conan

[Alex Crawford]

Hi,

There's also the incident when a Javelin forced an Indonesian C-130 to crash in 1964.

Alex

[Archimedes]

Shortly after the 'Did you fly the Vulcan?' thread opened on Mil Aircrew, someone started a thread there on the Javelin. It didn't get a huge number of replies, but it might have some interesting things there, if you can find it.

I would provide a helpful link, but the search function refuses to believe that anything existed before late 2005 whenever I use - others seem to have more success, though...

Edit: A bit of lateral thinking and computer jiggery pokery later.....

Try here: http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?t=115325&highlight=Javelin

[Conan the Librarian]

Archimedes, you are a gentleman. I did search for "Javelin" before starting this thread, but found little, so here we are I suppose. I will pootle off and have a look at your link now.

If anybody has any memories of the Dragmaster, or wants to make a contribution, then please go ahead.


Conan


LATE NEWS Since this post, the original Javelin thread has miraculously reappeared in the Mil forum. Suggest you add anything there as it is a much more setablished thread.

[chevvron]

Weren't javelins deployed to Kenya in the '60's when Rhodesia declared UDI? Must have been their last operational role; shortly after there were several parked at Halton for apprenti to play with.

[Warped Factor]

When I was a Staff Cadet on 12 AEF in the late 70s the Boss, S/L JR "Jock" Ritchie AFC, was ex Javelins and he used to tell some great stories.

The one that sticks in the mind was when operating out of Tengah in the 60s during the confrontation in Borneo.

Went along the lines of not being allowed to use live weapons so resorted to lighting the 'burners at low level, the noise sounding like bombs were being dropped and at least hopefully scaring those on the ground.

PPRuNe Radar was there and heard most of the stories as well, he might remember a bit better than me.

WF.

[ORAC]

Worked with a Sqn Ldr Bob Bonas, an ex Javelin nav. He had two favourite stories.

First was "Operation sweet Relief". They had just started tanking and a trial was required to develop a means of the crew being able to reieve themselves on long trips. Somebody came up with the idea of a sheath with a tube running to a bag in the leg pocket of the flying suit and it was deemed that a couple of hot water bottles would do. Off toddle Bob and pilot down to boots and they buy a couple of kiddies bottles, Capt Pugwash or some such.

They then proceed to fly several trips. Problem, they have such well trained bladders they couldn't go. Eventually, it was decided that the situation had to be forced and they sat drinking copious amounts of coffee until they were full. They then slushed their way out to the jet and got airborne.

At last Bob had success and felt water start to flow. Unfortunately the tube had come out of his hot water bottle and gone down his flying boot and he quickly felt a warm fuzzy feeling. And once you start you can't stop, and he had drunk rather a lot of coffee....

The walk back to the sqn was described as a sort of step, slurp, squish, step, slurp, squish.....

The second was concerning the layout of the control runs. Apparently, the nav could reach down the side of the cockpit and grab the control runs on their way to the rear of the aircraft. It was not unknown for a nav, on a boring trip, to give them a quick jerk. "Did you feel that?" the pilot would ask. "No, what?" The nav would answer, before doing it again a few minutes later. Leading to the pilot eventually recovering to report a control restriction.

I always wondered how many techie hours were spent investigating javelin control restrictions so that navs could get back on the ground a bit sooner.

It was also, IIRC, known as the dragmaster. Constant speed, variable noise.

[henry crun]

Orac: I believe the nav had to undo a panel on the side of the cockpit to gain access to the control rods.
What followed depended on how adventuresome he felt. :}

It was a little like the Venom3 where the power/manual control for the ailerons was between the two seats.
If the nav got fed up with aeros you would suddenly find yourself in manual halfway round a roll, with the stick damn near solid.

[Malcolm G O Payne]

33 squadron did a detachment to Cyprus in the early 60s. On the night before departure back to the UK there was surreptitious activity around one aircraft when a drop-tank was lowered and the space inside the fairing around the tank was filled with all kinds of goodies and alchohol. The tank was returned to the aircraft and all went well until the aircraft arrived, I think, at Orange, in France. When the landing gear was to be lowered there was a problem and the decision was made to fly to a desolate area and the drop-tanks were jettisoned. Some-how, no-one from the squadron was interested in going to the drop site1

[PPRuNe Radar]

Warped Factor

Those were the days .... wish I could remember half the stories we were told by one of the most unassuming pilots (but definitely the most brilliant hands on flyer) I have ever known.

The stories I remember were of him being able to bounce and camera gun every NATO fighter/bomber in sight during his days on the Jav, all except the Buccaneer. All he could ever get in his gunsight of them was the top of the tail. If he depressed the nose any lower, then he'd hit the ground. :)

He also flew in the Paris airshow, and had to land without nose gear in Borneo (I think), or maybe he did that at Paris :} .... the stories all run in to one after so long.

I never did find out what he got the AFC for .... but he was a fantastic role model and as one of his 'urchins', I am sure he is up there and proud of what we all achieved. (Even if 3 of us ended up in ATC :p )

His spirit and esprit de corps lives on in another cut from the same cloth ..... Wholigan

Fare thee well .... Bravo 25 ... the Boss

[ORAC]

Bob also told a story of the javelin Sqn in Malta. The wine/brandy in malta was dire (marsovan?, Chisk Blue label? It´s a long time ago). So they had a couple of wing tanks scoured out and used to fly it to Cyprus, get them filled and fly it home. The aircraft would get to Cyprus OK, but the prevailing headwinds made getting home a bit iffy on internal fuel, so they´d wait till the met forecast said calm air or a tailwind before departing.

As the story went, everything was fine till the met man got it wrong and the crew didn´t realise till past the point of no return and ran out of fuel about 40nm short of Luqa. Crew declared a double engine failure, cause unknown, ejected, and were picked up safely. Not sure what happened to the met man..

[Gainesy]

Hmm, if they'd just decanted the fuel into bottles and quaffed that, it would probably taste better than Cypriot brandy. Alternatively put the Keo stuff in the tanks and you'd probably have the first supersonic Javelin.

Remember the first bunch of Harriers to visit Cyprus. One diverted into a French base on the way home with aileron restrictions. Cause was a few cartons of, by then, mangled and bent ciggies.

[Mac the Knife]

ORAC, it was (is?) Marsovin - you're right, the cheap stuff was awful, quite the most headache inducing wine I've ever had - we used to joke about the one grape that went into every 1000 gallons!

Cisk was the beer - not bad.

:ok:

PS: The brandy was OK

[Blacksheep]

Ah! - the delights of The Gut. A bottle of Cisk was known as a Bluey the other beer being something like "Hopleaf" and known as a Hoppy. A mate once asked me to bring some Marsovin back from a Luqa detachment for him. The Customs Oficer at Lyneham asked me if it was for my own consumption and not to be caught out I said "Of course!" He replied that it should be marked "For external use only" He was absoutely right - which is why we called it 'Screech" and only drank it on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, mixed 50-50 with lemonade.

[Cornish Jack]

Blacksheep
Yes, the 'joys' of screech. We had a flight engineer who was 'addicted' to screech and used to head to his favourite watering hole in 'the Gut' as soon as possible after arrival. I recall waking up one morning to find him asleep on his knees, resting his head on the bed!! One of screech's qualities was it's anaesthetic effect - at least for a little while!
Apologies for the continuing thread creep, but have had some vivid flashbacks of 'the Gut', the Gyppo Queen and (famously) the Sparrow - also, surprisingly, the tea rooms under the Opera House with their Edwardian style 'hostesses'.
Nostalgia rocks!!:ok:

[ORAC]

IIRC there was an occasion in Cyprus when an Italian Gina (G91) arrived for the weekend and, for some reason, came to grief off the side of the runway on departure. Crew were OK and, next day, departed for home via Larnaca.

The airframe was left where it was awaiting the, presumed, Italian, BOI and salvage crew. When nothing had been heard after a few days, a message was sent to their base asking for disposal instructions for airframe XXXX. This evoked a dead pan reply from the Italians that there must be a mistake, that aircraft had been struck off charge and scrapped about a year previously.

It, reportedly, transpired that the base had, instead of using it as a gate guard or scrapping it had kept it as an unofficlal hack, fudging fuel figures on other sorties to fuel it, and drew lots to see who got to use it at the weekends. All going smoothly till said incident. The airframe was subsequently removed to the fire dump and nothing more heard from the Italians....

[jabberwok]

Two of the Javelins that ended up at Halton.
Front aircraft is 7749M which may have been XA821.
http://www.homepages.mcb.net/bones/WebPix/7749m.jpg

[Blacksheep]

Aaah, more nostalgia.

They were often used by I.Fitt.NI Apprenti to do autopilot checks and we E.Fitt.A Apprenti were forever changing inverters for them. T'were amazing some of the places where Glosters managed to hide the electrical bits, I'm sure glad I went to Vulcans where you could at least see the bits you were working on instead of doing it all by feel. :)

[USE THE RUDDERS]

My ex ATC co used to be a Javelin pilot in the 50's/60's used to tell us stories of the rocket attacks they used to carry out in the Malaya campaign.

He sadly passed away a few years back.

[sled dog]

" Rocket Attacks " with a Javelin ? I never saw rockets fitted to the Dragmaster during my eight years with them :cool:

[NutherA2]

[quote=Conan the Librarian]anything nice, or otherwise, to say about the Javelin?

My own assessment was that the Javelin might have served as a good Night/All Weather fighter, if only the the airframe had been stronger, the engines more reliable and if it had been fitted with a better radar.:}

[The Saw]

Theres a Jav at Gloucester Airport opposite the pub, it used to be at RAF Innsworth but was removed and refurbished some time ago. Still looks a beast

[trilander]

Do not know if it still there but used to be a Jav at RAF Stafford guarding the gate. Also an old Bloodhound missile next to it.

Wonder if the Buccaner was developed from a Jav?

[henry crun]

trilander: No connection there at all according to the books I have.

Javelin was a Gloster project from the word go to specification F.4/48.

Roy Boot, an aircraft designer for Blackburn at Brough, had already drawn up his initial design B.103 when naval staff issued Requirement NA.39 in 1953.

B.103 eventually became the Buccaneer.

[Argonautical]

trilander

The RAF Stafford Javelin has long gone, the gate guardian is now a Harrier.

[Alex Crawford]

Hi,

I have a special interest in all aircraft produced by Glosters. I think the Javelin has it's own place in the RAF's history as it achieved a number of firsts as well as being the last operational aircraft built by Glosters.

I have been carrying out some research into the aircraft with the intention of publishing my results. I have enjoyed the various posts about the Javelin and would like to hear from anyone who can provide some stories/anecdotes about their experiences with the aircraft.

Any help appreciated.

Regards,

Alex

[ALock]

A couple of nice Jav air to air shots here:

http://www.25squadron.org.uk

Check out the site as one ex Jav driver has still got his pilots notes :ok:

Understand the Mk9 became a 'beast' when the engines had reheat!!!

I wasn't at Tengah (1967 ish) but is it true that so many Jav's were knackered by then that they only had enough aircraft to keep one squadron going in the Far East? 60 and 64 simply became just 60. (or the other way around). Still 74 with their Lightnings came to the rescue when the Jav's finally expired. Was 60 the last Jav squadron?

[sled dog]

64 Sqdn disbanded at Tengah June 1967, followed by 60 Sqdn in April 1968, also at Tengah.:{

[Four Wings]

I was working in Aden (non-military) in the mid 60s at the time of Rhodesia's UDI. The story was that 111 Sqdn (Hunters) were ordered to Zambia for the military 'confrontation' then expected. The Hunters, as ground attack a/c and 111 as experienced in the art (Radfan etc) were the right choice. However a number of 111 pilots had left to fly the Rhodesian Hunters. I understood that many among 111's remaining pilots intimated their extreme reluctance to go on the new assignment. Hence (with a degree of sympathy from higher up) the RAF sent the Javelins, everybody knowing that as high altitude all weather interceptors they were about as wrong a choice of a/c for any 'confrontation' that could be made.

[lightningmate]

Four Wings

Treble-One exchanged their Hunters for Lightnings well before the mid-60s and the Sqn was never employed in the RADFAN ops. Are you really sure you were in Aden in the mid-60s?

lm

[chevvron]

Taxying out at Farnborough with Hugh Field as p.i.c. in the prototype Edgely Optica. Nugget 14 called final; Hugh said 'that sounds like Denny Dennison'; 'it is' I said. 'Last met him when we were flying Javelins in Malaya' says Hugh.
Told Denny I'd flown with Hugh; 'last saw him flying Javelins in Malaya ' says Denny!

[Four Wings]

Sorry my memory has obviously failed me - so what was the Hunter Squadron in Aden in those days? As for me: I was Shell Distict Sales Manager South Arabia and Yemen, living in Aden Oct 64 - Jul 67, with many a tale to tell!

[sled dog]

The Khormaksar Hunter Wing comprised nbrs 8 / 43 / 208 Squadrons

[sled dog]

Four wings

The Javelins that went to Zambia were from 29 Sqdn, then at Akrotiri, in December 1965. Six month detachtment, i believe.