Boom Operator tales especially in support of test activities

[chopper2004]

Confessions Of A USAF KC-135 'Flying Gas Station' Boom Operator

It gets interesting halfway down the page,

cheers

[Tankertrashnav]

Very interesting - on trips to Offutt I tried to get a trip on a KC 135 to observe boom refuelling at close hand, but it never happened. The view is certainly better than the restricted one we had through the rear-view periscope on the Victor.

The Navy hates using the boom-basket setup and call it "The Iron Maiden" as it is hard to plug into and can damage the aircraft if it bashes around.

I always assumed that just hanging a hose on the end of a boom would result in a "hard hose" and that confirms it. Broken probes must be quite common.

[smujsmith]

Chopper 2004,

" gets interesting halfway down the page, "

A very interesting read right down the page IMHOp. Thanks very much for posting an interesting link. We used to see a lot of KC135 activity near us, out of Fairford. Great aircraft doing a great job.

Smudge

[ORAC]

Broken probes were indeed very common, which is why the list of cleared platforms was very short on the BDU. The Lightning, for example, couldn't use it - they left more than enough frangible tips in the Victor hose basket.

IIRC, in order to let the basket clear the ground on take-off with the boom stowed the hose length attached was limited to 20 feet, and hence very stiff.

[Easy Street]

The Navy hates using the boom-basket setup and call it "The Iron Maiden" as it is hard to plug into

Just to correct the smutty humour a little from personal experience, the iron maiden is very easy to plug into because the basket doesn't get affected by the receiver's bow wave to any appreciable extent: the hose is indeed quite hard . The piloting technique used is quite different to a traditional hose-and-drogue, where you line up in the waiting position, pick a reference ahead of you on the tanker and try to ignore the basket as you move forward into contact. With the iron maiden you look at the basket a lot more (if not all the time, then most of it) and fly the probe directly in. The difficulty comes in staying in and this is where the iron maiden is unforgiving: the acceptable range of movement is only a couple of feet in each direction, beyond which probe damage is a serious risk , a task made all the more challenging as fuel mass increases and some throttle-juggling around the max dry / min reheat power 'jump' becomes necessary. You quickly learn how long it takes for a reheat selection to take effect: "min reheat on the left... pause... pause... handful of power off the right before shooting forward and ripping the probe tip off"!

The traditional set-up is a more satisfying courtship: difficult to get in, but most flexible and enjoyable thereafter

[D-IFF_ident]

Not a bad read - but for a real insight into the world of KC-...s - see The Adventures of Rex the Wonder Engineer:

http://www.afforums.com/index.php?th...ngineer.15323/