Tanking

[Justin Cyder-Belvoir]

I recall that that the FJ guys enjoyed the flexibility the Vulcan crews offered when they were changed to the tanking role.

Do you, the drivers, have a preference for a heavy jet to sit behind and tank?

[wiggy]

Best? Easiest? The C-130......but always happy to see any tanker, be it a Victor, Vulcan, VC-10, KC-135 or Herc......

[Dengue_Dude]

And what's wrong with a Tri*? We had LOTS of fuel !

[wiggy]

Oh, sorry, because of my age I just missed out on receiving off the Tri - a grey moment, no offence intended......

[soddim]

Enjoyed the stability of the Vulcan but the ability to refuel in heavy turbulence is greatly enhanced by boom refuelling. Having said that, the flexibility of probe and drogue using either of two wing hoses or centreline on the Victor gave a greater redundancy as did the number of tankers on every tanking plan. The Tristar, of course, offers long legs to three accompanied fast jets and carries pax/freight at the same time but lose one and three fast jets don't make destination on time or the CAP does not get manned.

[US Herk]

My favourite tanker is the one who is there when I need him!

Having done both - stiff boom & probe/drogue - it's probably quite obvious when I say it's far easier to accomplish a contact with boom, but far easier to stay in contact on probe/drogue.

Flexibility and attitude of tanker crews is far more important than the equipment.

[K.Whyjelly]

And what's wrong with a Tri*? We had LOTS of fuel !



Thats cos you never left the ground (tech tri* again) and made it to the prodding zone

[Dengue_Dude]

Ah well, that's 'cos I was flying them when they were relatively new, my last flight on one was in 1993 - they worked quite well then.

We were always told that they were only really a stop-gap until a dedicated tanker came along . . . hmmm.

The best receiver of all was the E3D, it sucked better than Linda Lovelace, took lots of juice which meant we could go home early for tea and stickies :)

[soddim]

We did try to rapidly empty tankers when called upon in the good old days when the F4 was our grown up toy. A late night call for trade was often answered in order to help a Victor crew to get to their night-flying supper. A 3-bag F4 on each wing hose at 36,000ft needed reheat to fill to full and selection of wing dump at the same time depleted the Victor's load in double-quick time. For some reason the Victor crews were not allowed to dump fuel but we were.

[exgroundcrew]

It makes me feel old when no-one mentions the original tanker squadrons 90 and 214. It was in 1961 we converted from bomber role to tanker. Originally just for the V force but we rapidly (after testing the engines with AVTER instead of AVTAG) started to refuel the fighters including the Lightning. I have vivid memories of Valiants returning with the fighters "donkey conk" the probe stuck in our drogue. No major problem because they were designed to sheer off, we just tied a red ribbon around it and posted it back to the receivers squadron with appropriate comments added.

An interesting point - the Lightning had some special anti-freezing agent added to its fuel and a special rig was developed to automatically mix the required amount in a 500 gallon tank between the bowser and the Valiant. This was an exceptionally useless piece of kit, so eventually we unbolted the inspection panel and with a five gallon bucket poured in the anti-freeze and with a broken paddle just stirred it up a bit and passed it to the Valiant. One day while I was on this stirring duty a passing engineering officer called out "excuse me Sergeant, what are you doing?", I replied "mixing the fuel Sir". "I thought this machine was designed to do that automatically" was his reply, "That's correct" I said " and I would like to me the $$£""$^^ idiot who designed it". "You are speaking to him" was the response.

[nipva]

USN Skywarriors were also v. comfortable donors.
Out of interest, what do others consider to be the worst? For me it has to be the white-knuckle ride of a Lightning sitting squarely in the wing vortex of a Buccaneer tanker.

[sonicstomp]

Have seen a variety of tankers from boom to basket from lots of different units - can't beat a UK tri or vc10 - its not about the refuelling equipment its about the attitude and flexibility of the crew.....

......having said that a basket is a lot easier to stay on than the boom, but we get a much better flow rate on the boom - 6 and 2 3's I guess.....

[Art Field]

Going back a bit, when the Navy had Sea Vixens, my captain on Valiants was the Tiny Mathews(I do not remember how many t's) of subsequent Vulcan at Tehran fame. Having refuelled a Vixen he was offered a prod on the pod on his wing. The noise combined with the airflow effect on the Valiants wing of the jet wash was terrifying, we had full aileron trim on and still the aircraft lurched about like a bucking bronco. I have made or watched well over 1000 contacts but that was the worst

[BEagle]

Probably the most difficult was the KC-135 with the wretched 'boom-drogue adapter'....:eek: Particularly if you were flying a Q-fit F4 and hadn't had any dual or even a brief - just sent off on a Q scramble having been told "It's just another tanker"....:rolleyes:

I still have a tape (and now a DVD clip!) of a certain Irish Wing Commander prodding in a VC10K.....against a kiwi A-4. It looked a lot less tricky then Art's Valiant vs. Sea Vixen experience!

[Gainesy]

Here you go Art, stumbled across this today while looking for some pics.

http://www.seavixen.org/resources/4269/assets/images/Copy%20of%20899%20FR%20Valiant%20plugged%20in.jpg

Its in a WAFU website Sea Vixen. Royal Navy. Carrier Jet. - Home (http://www.seavixen.org) quite complimentary about your Captain.

[Wee Jock McPlop]

Being a keen young man back in the 80s, I asked Stu T+ on 74 Sqn how difficult/easy it was to do AAR. He simply said "try taking a running f..k at a rolling donut and you'll find out"!!

Pretty apt description me thinks. But I took him at his word and did not take up his suggestion:eek:

WJMcP

[Art Field]

Gainsay.

Thanks for digging that out. It all looks serene from the outside, all arms and legs on the inside!

[ian16th]

Gainsay,

Thanks for that. I've wanted a copy of that picture for years. If you can send a better quality copy of it, please contact me with a private message.

I was on 214 Sqdn at that time and I remember the picture being up in the crew room with various 'balloons' from the Sea Vixen with comments about 'Please don't suck too hard' etc.

As an aside, see the thread 'Valiant XD869 - Crash at Marham 1959'. The Crew Chief that was killed in that crash, Bob Sewell, was the Crew Chief of XD858 the A/C suckling the Sea Vixen, he took the fatal flight because of the other Crew Chief being ill.

[Runaway Gun]

Does anyone have a copy of the photo of the VC-10 taking gas from the RNZAF A4K please?

Yes, that is the right way around...

[BEagle]

No, but I have the video!
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a341/nw969/Internet/zxzxz.jpg

Only 1 copy of the video existed and the 'owner' used to keep it locked away, as it would undoubtedly have been a career-compromising event if it ever leaked out into the public domain.

One day he put it on in the crewroom.... After we began to watch, his PA came in to tell him that the Stn Cdr wanted him on the phone. So out he rushed, leaving us watching the movie.

There was then a brief flurry of activity as the war team fetched the 'portable' VCR we used when chasing the Soviets. Plus some cables and a blank tape. Tape-to-tape transfer safely completed, then back to hide the evidence in the war room, before taking our seats in the crewroom pretending that nothing had happened.

A few minutes later the 'owner' came back, rewound and ejected the tape when it had finished, then went to lock it safely away again......

I bumped into him at a reunion dinner many years later - he didn't know even then that his tape had been copied! And where there's one copy, there may be more.... But I know that mine was the only copy made from the original.

And before anyone asks, yes, I do have a DVD copy and no, I won't put it on yooftube or send any copies to anyone else.

[Pontius Navigator]

Thats cos you never left the ground (tech tri* again) and made it to the prodding zone

As the man on the other thread said, 8 posts in and bitchin betty strikes again.

[Gainesy]

IAN16th,
Sorry, I don't have a better quality copy, as I said, I found it on the Sea Vixen website, perhaps they could organise one for you? (Actually I was looking for a pic of the Valiant's somewhat weird control column).

Art, yep, a fast shutter speed can cover a host of evils!

Talking of wacky plugging, anybody got a vid of the RNZAF A-4s doing a barrel roll while plugged in? Can't remember the aero team's name.

[Romeo Oscar Golf]

Out of interest, what do others consider to be the worst? For me it has to be the white-knuckle ride of a Lightning sitting squarely in the wing vortex of a Buccaneer tanker.


Something like this?

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v150/roghead/refuel.jpg

[Whoosh1999]

IMHO, The VC10 was the best: the ability to tank two at a time from a stable platform, with a great flexible crew was worth its weight in AVTUR. i always used to chuckle when arriving at a KC-10 after the US Navy had been there - the drogue always looked rather well used! Brings to mind...... nuf said! :}

[billynospares]

I have seen a photo of a Tristar plugged into a Bucc !!! Bet that was fully illegal but fun

[brit bus driver]

Not illegal...apparently a Boscombe flight trial....compatability and all that.

I have a copy somewhere, but bu99ered if I know how to upload it!!

[Runaway Gun]

Beagle, the Staish wants you on the phone.....

Who do we bribe to watch this video?

[BEagle]

I gave my word that I wouldn't let it out of my sight.

Sorry, but I keep my word.

[Runaway Gun]

Doh !! And a British Thief's word is his bond. Careful, they'll send you to Australia... :ok:

[Tourist]

BUgle.

If you aren't willing to show it, why mention you had it?

To be smug?
So we know how clever/important you were?

[BEagle]

Does anyone have a copy of the photo of the VC-10 taking gas from the RNZAF A4K please?

Anwering the query. So do one!

Top tip for the rum, bum and lash folk - don't let your grown ups drive your little grey boats down to the antipodes, in case they drive those cocktail party machines into the only rocks for hundreds of miles in any direction...:hmm:

[Tourist]

Big fan of Rum, and not averse to giving a little bit of lash a try. Never fancied the bum though.
I find it interesting, however, that you obviously consider them an unsplittable group.
A quick search of your previous posts makes it very clear that they are something of an obsession with you.

You have used the phrase "rum, bum and the lash" or varients thereof (rum bum and baccy etc) 36 times in the last 3 years alone.

methinks he doth protest too much............?

With my, admittedly totally untrained at profiling, Freudian head on, I have to surmise that one of your early fumbles was with a sailor who got a bit rough with you after drinking his tot?

[L J R]

Did the A-4 do his little looping number?, I'm sure the VC-10 would have got most of the way up before falling out.....



...and yes (I mean NO to the KC-135 BDA).....

My second go at that ballet dance (I mean Rumba!) was with the Staish on my wing doing his first!! - I was considered 'experienced', having done it on the day prior!

[cheese bobcat]

All this talk about tanking and videos reminds me that I have a video, taken professionally from a Dominie at that euphoric time after the Falklands, of a Vulcan (50 Sqn) inflight refuelling a variety of aircraft including another Vulcan (not me). I have always been meaning to have it transcribed (?) to DVD but have just been too lazy. If anybody's interested, let me know and I'll get my thumb out and have it sorted.

Although there is a soundtrack, mostly just air rushing through the aircraft, there's no speech until after Vulcan rather c*cks up a contact and moves back about a foot or two and rushes in regardless. A voice is heard in the background "He's not pi**ing about, is he?"

[Jambo Jet]

mNtmNkan4wY

Nice dusk tanking sortie down south, bit of a bust HDU too.

[VictorPilot]

I think I have that pic, I was in the Tristar at the time. Will look for it!!

[VictorPilot]

Think I have one of that too....

[orca]

Best tanker? Easy really, he's the fellow who comes to get you when you've pushed the fuel to stay on task for that extra couple (or so, gusting 20) minutes to get the job done....it's very humbling indeed to hear that there's no more gas in theatre but 'random callsign 12 is hauling the mail up the boulevard to try to get to you'.

Let's not forget the C2 fellows who give you the snap to the tex when your BPM is in the low two hundreds. Absolute gentlemen.

Worst tanker? No such thing. From Transall to Extender, they're all, genuinely, my heroes.

[27mm]

Around '83 or so a Vulcan tanker arrived in RAFG for us F4 mates to play with I recall closing up to stabilised pos, when both my Nav and I realised that the HDU housing scabbed on the lower rear fuselage was what looked like half a garden shed! Tanking from her was straightforward, but the affil at LL afterward was anything but - enormous fun!

[BEagle]

It was known as the 'MFI wardrobe', I understand.

You're right about LL affil in RAFG! Did that once (in a bomber, not a tanker) and thought how skilled the F4 crews must be working in that awful 'Ruhr clag'. We had a target to reach, they had to stop us. We 'bombed' the target, then went back to Wilders only to find that they'd pulled out of low level due to the vis!

Good times!

[Fortissimo]

The Vulcan was a brilliant tanker - I remember being told that the rabbit hutch round the HDU meant that the trade of aircraft carpenter had been reactivated! The other benefit was that the Vulcan crews had clearly missed out on the Victor OCU training on how to find alto/cirro-stratus to hide in, useful angles of bank for inducing the leans, and 10 infallible methods for dropping the chicks at the furthest end of the towline while pointing in the opposite direction to that requested....

C130 was probably the easiest in the F4, especially at low level. Does anyone else recall the "If you get behind me you can have some gas" affil in the FI, before plugging in at 1000ft?

Agree with Beags though - the Q-fit F4 v KC-135/BDA at FL30O was definitely in the 'demanding' category.

[Fintastic]

KC-10 with wing pods, a rare beastie, more gas than the North Sea and as smoooooth as silk! Beautiful!:ok:

[NutherA2]

Probably the most difficult was the KC-135 with the wretched ‘boom-drogue adapter’


I’d drink to that, Beags; in August 1972 I didn’t know that this machinery existed & the briefing was simply to tell me on which towline I could find one and to see what it was like. The first couple of contacts didn’t work out as the drogue seemed to move away at the last moment; at this stage I noticed somebody looking out of the 135’s rear window & asked what he was doing. Response was “That’s the boom operator, Sir, he’s trying to help you make contact”. When I replied “Please ask him to stop doing that” , the situation improved no end........:ugh:

[Jay Tyock]

A chorus of agreement there I'd say from across the RAF. The boom was a nightmare on anything but the smoothest of days and I vividly remember my probe tip disappearing up over the intake on thankfully only one occasion. As well as the helpful boom operator, the crew sometimes had a nasty habit of finessing their nav up the towline; with the length of the extended boom any roll was alarmingly amplified!!

The brief for a first stab against a 135 was like a horror movie. How the solid 'basket' could break the canopy or nosecone, how the hose could snap off and end up dangling down the engine intake , etc..... Not surprising then that we were all a little reticent when the Tri* cancelled.

I'd take any drogue over that thing any day: VC10, Tri*, KC10 wing and C/L, Herc wing and C/L to name all the ones I saw.

Twos up on a Canadian KC130's wing hoses was a bit hairy too. If your backseater tells you not to look at something, it's for a good reason!

[BEagle]

The brief for a first stab against a 135 was like a horror movie.

Lucky you - a brief! I was just told "It's just like any other tanker" before my first encounter with that BDA abortion... On a live Q-scramble with 8 missiles and 3 tanks as well.....

The boom-bitch kept moving the bloody thing every time I missed - and I couldn't understand a word she was saying in any case. But at least when I finally did make contact after asking "Will you stop moving the damn thing!" the transfer rate was pretty good.

Whereas the KC-10 centreline hose (again without a brief) was a piece of wee wee!

[ZH875]

It was known as the 'MFI wardrobe', I understand.

The groundcrew simply called it 'The Skip'


I liked it because it replaced the dratted ECM cans, having a Skip meant no more Water/Glycol running down my arms.....:(

[27mm]

Tanking Tonkas from an RSAF KE-3A was also interesting. The basket and hose assembly were almost wingtip mounted. The hose was a lot shorter than normal ones and this meant sitting well close to the tanker itself. The hose was prone to "whip" on contact or disconnect. The drogue basket was weighted with a hefty lump of metal; the combination of this and the hose length meant that anything other than a dead centre contact would result in hose whip and the heavy drogue bouncing off your jet's nose; in the case of the Tonka, this could and did sometimes result in either a bent or broken AOA probe.

[Ali Qadoo]

Ah, the joys of short hose tanking on the KC-135. During the 3 years I spent on exchange with l’Armée de l’Air that was all we ever had apart from the odd occasion when we were lucky enough to get the chance to refuel from a VC-10 or KC 10.

You did eventually get used to it and its many traps for the unwary, but by far the most terrifying trips I ever did in my life involved checking out convexees to clear them to lead a pair to the tanker at night. Gawd knows who the genius was who designed the syllabus but as the check pilot, you had the joy of flying night close formation on young Bloggs while he carried out the intercept to get himself in behind at the right time and place without bumping into anyone who was leaving the tanker and then get you both safely into echelon starboard. Why they couldn’t have done a couple more trips in the 2-sticker is beyond me. The bad news was that as number 2 you had to put your radar into standby to avoid co-channel interference (not that looking into the tube while flying night close is an awfully good move), so the only way to get an idea of where you were in the process was from a sneaky look in at the air-to-air tacan distance to the tanker and the odd glance at the INAS distance to the racetrack datum in the HUD. Needless to say, as soon as the weather got a bit ropey and he had to use the radar most of the way in, Bloggs’s SA would start to crumble and all niceties of keeping things smooth for the wingman would disappear while he tried to sort out the intercept geometry, keep to the timing and not roll out in front of the tanker etc.

On one night, that quiet little voice that tells you that things ain’t going quite as they should do prompted me to look up and see that we were practically level with the tanker, which was getting very, very big in the windscreen very, very quickly and I just about had time to react before the inevitable happened. At the same moment, Bloggs spots the tanker too, rolls towards me, shuts the throttle and stuffs the boards out – thanks a f*cking bunch, mate. Amazingly enough, and more by luck than judgement, I avoided hitting either him or the tanker. The debrief, shall we say, was somewhat one-sided and I admit that later that evening I partook of strong drink.

The short hose sometimes caught out the experienced guys too. On a very rough night during the Balkans do, one of the lads from our wing was refuelling over the Adriatic, got very high and out of position to such an extent that the hose whipped, taking off the end of his probe (and maybe the basket too, but memory fails me) which then went down the intake with inevitable consequences for a single-engined aircraft. Luckily, he survived the MB let-down with nothing worse than a stiff neck and was fished out of the sea by an Italian warship.

[BEagle]

Well, Ali, your instruction must have paid off well! During 99% of the FAF refuelling I did from the VC10, the receivers turned up at the right place spot on time. Over Turkey / Iraq, even without A/A TACAN, you'd be wondering where they were and the next second they'd appear in their F1s or Jags exactly on time - and exactly where they said they'd be!!

More than could be said of certain RAF receiver crews; some squadrons were excellent, but the turkeys who all set their time hack 39 sec slow at briefing....:mad: It seems they'd used the time from a PC, believing it to be accurate....:suspect:

[Ali Qadoo]

Beags,

The guys who were really impressive were the French Jag mates. The Mirage 2000 had a PD radar that would get you in to 160 metres on an unlit target, a very good INAS and an IFF interrogator to help find the tanker and loads of spare thrust and lift when you got there. Apart from TACAN and INAS, the Jags had none of the above, but however claggy the weather and even at night they seemed to find the tanker dead on time every time as you rightly said.

[ian16th]

Can an aged former 'Fairy' ask a question here?

During my time on 214 Sqdn, Feb 59 to Oct 62, we were doing trials with a Rebecca/Eureka Mk X system. The Eureka X transponder was in the tanker and the Rebecca X in the receiver. This worked on a frequency of about 1,000 MHz and was to assist receivers to find the tankers.

Working at 4 times the frequency of the regular Rebecca IV and DME, it had a much shorter minimum range.

When I left 214, the trials were still ongoing. Did anything operational ever come from it?

[wiggy]

"How the solid 'basket' could break the canopy or nosecone, how the hose could snap off and end up dangling down the engine intake , etc..... "

That brought back unhappy memories......the b****er could certainly bend the top corner of the fixed portion of the intake Ramp on an F-4 ...:ouch: :ouch: :sad::sad:

[60024]

Italian B707 tankers on the port hose could be a little tricky in a Tonka, since the pod was just about at the wingtip, so your 'reference' was somewhere on the distant horizon........ but far preferable to a BDA anyday (which usually resulted in an airborne CSAS Bite:eek:)

[Busta]

Gosh, where to start.

My benchmark was the jolly old Victor, we always knew we would get an excellent service; notwithstanding that a wing hose at the top of the height bracket in "Q" fit (F4) was interesting; having to tickle a burner made the transfer rate almost negative.

The best transfer rates were, Vulcan, Victor centre, Albert and KC10 centre.

The most flexible were the Vulcans and Alberts ( particularly in FI - lovely LL tanking!)

The most obstructive was the VC10, they seemed to have combined the most restrictive of AAR and truck rules,not to mention the bloody dihedral!

The KC 135 was just hilarious!

There are two sorts of pilot, those who've spoked ? and those who are going to.

[Busta]

Sorry, forgot the Tristar; not too bad apart from the advice I got over the ether one day whilst in contact and transferring which suggested I should move forward 3 feet! I recall I mentioned that they should learn how to land the bloody thing.

Some things don't matter very much, most things don't matter at all.

Wrong thread but M2's funeral was an excellent occasion, Ripon Cathedral was filled to bursting, triffic eulogy by DiM Jones, nice F3 reheat over the mess at Leeming and a very tasteful finger 4 missing man by the hawks, well done by all concerned, Pete would have approved.

[Jay Tyock]

The stories were probably recycled 'Blah Jet' stories anyway. Scared the b-jesus out of me anyway, I can tell you! Thank goodness for the modified weak-link probe tip is all I can say.

[ShortFatOne]

The great thing (not) about tanking in a 'rod was that you had 13 other experts nad part-time comedians on board!

Remember being sat on the flight deck step dreading my 'go' whilst the other poor sod slashed in, out and all about when, on his 4th or 5th attempt, with the sound of the basket banging and scraping down the fuse, 2 of the knockers appear on the flight deck with a basket and hose attached asking what to do with it now they had finally caught the f*@k!ng thing. The poor sod in the left seat nearly fainted.

[flyboy007]

Busta,

The reason you may have been asked to move up a few feet is because the refuel valve cycles if you're on the cusp, and the fuel flow stops and starts. A couple of feet closer makes that issue go away.
I wouldn't take it too personally.