F-104G Starfighter - Inside The Cockpit

a big thank you to my patreon and channel supporters who make insider cockpit possible and especially mark who is sponsoring this particular episode with his support he's a big fan of the f-104 ever since he was young building model kits of this very aircraft and if you want to learn more about supporting the channel head on over to patreon or the youtube membership page links in the description below the korean war was still in full swing when the lockheed cooperation decided it wanted to push north american back off the throne lockheed's p-80 shooting star had been well comfortably replaced by the f-86 saber now the weapon of choice against soviet mig-15s lockheed proactively approached the air force with a brand new design and after a short competition was granted a development contract in 53. only a year later in march 1954 the first prototype took to the sky little did anyone know at the time that a star had been born [Music] hello everyone and welcome back to military aviation history this is the lockheed f-104 starfighter it's a u.s american single-engine supersonic interceptor later on a multi-role aircraft introduced into the armed forces in the late 1950s and it remained in service in some countries all the way into the new millennium now this aircraft is operated by a single pilot is 16.6 meters in length has a wingspan of 6.6 meters and a height of 4.1 meters this already gives it that very aggressive sort of trail brazing look and it quickly becomes obvious that speed was at the heart of the design now empty it weighs around 6 300 kilograms and goes all the way up to 30 000 kilograms at maximum takeoff so let's have a closer look and then jump inside this one found here in germany at the flukery after schleichteim near munich so what we'll do now is a bit of a walk around around the aircraft we'll start on a starboard side of the nose walk away all around the aircraft and i'll show out i'll show you guys the most important stuff first up up front we have the pedostatic tube that allows for measurements of the aircraft speed it's far out from the actual aircraft essentially to allow more accurate measurements of supersonic speed as we walk over to the glass fiber radome here we are presented with what essentially would be housing the radar system now initially when the starfighter was designed radar was not on the table just yet because air-to-air missiles weren't on the table just yet but with development of the aircraft it became obvious that the capability was needed to fire those sort of weapons so a early rca radar system was installed in the aircraft which allowed for air-to-air missiles to be fired at enemy aircraft eventually this was changed to the f-15 radar system because that radar system also expanded the role of the aircraft to the multi-role domain and in fact it's quite interesting because the f-15 radar system was then when since again split into two areas one was for dedicated air-to-air platform and the other one was for multi-raw radar system and if you want to have a closer look at what the radar actually looks like here we have it this is an f-15 radar system yes i know it sounds also like the aircraft but there was also a radar system that had the same name as we move back towards the aircraft we of course presented with the cockpit here it's the hinged outboard canopy here that goes towards the port side of the aircraft and the same would be done with the access maintenance access panels from here to here for the electrical system and the flight computers as well as the ammunition supply which we have from right here all the way through there here you can see the arrow compartment supplying the m61 20 millimeter gatling gun that the f-104 starfighter uses you can see how the shells were supposed to be sorted into the ammo compartment have a closer look at the flight computer compartment and how these could be removed from the aircraft to be taken out for maintenance we also have the circuit breakers and the liquid oxygen and here we actually have an example of a flight computer that would be housed up top just behind the pilot now this is quite quite heavy actually um really substantial these are actually quite nicely installed in the way that the ports on the bottom of the flight computer are individually modeled to each station and the size of these flight computers are also different so there's never a chance that you actually put the wrong flight computer in the wrong wrong port all right moving up front to the back actually sorry of the aircraft we have the emergency ram air turbine right here we have the starboard inlet for the engine and then we move on to the wing now it's a mid-wing cantilever design that we have here low aspect ratio and up front we have leading edge flaps they're a little bit like slots or slats but they are mechanically operated and they don't have a leak between the lower and upper surface the wing itself as i said wingspan 6.6 meters and this gives the aircraft a wing loading of around about 510 kilograms per square meter which is quite high actually but it wasn't supposed to be a turner yeah but it was still very maneuverable don't think that turning and maneuverability is the same thing because it is not the aircraft was quite maneuverable here we have a wingtip tank for extra fuel in case it was needed to extend the range of the aircraft and then we come to a very interesting aspect of the aircraft and this is the aileron what's so special about the airline you might ask well this one is irreversible which means that there is no direct link between the control surface and the control stick inside the cockpit this one is hydraulically operated and control feel of in the aircraft is generated in the inside the cockpit by a series of cams and springs so the pilot actually feels some resistance as he's pulling that stick now you might say that sounds a little bit like a fly-by-wire it's not it's an earlier system that cannot really be compared uh to fly by wire however early on in the actually in the late 1970s in germany uh a starfighter was used to experiment with fly by wire and an extra control surface was added just behind the ammunition supply there it looks actually like a little bit of a tail um that was added there to experiment with fly-by-wire which eventually would then be used in the panavia tornadoes and of course also the eurofighter then we come to the flaps again very special these are blown flaps and they are fit air by having a air bleed from the compressor here we can see a demonstration of the blown flap or boundary layer control system air is bled from the compressor and injected by a duct running along the flap into the upper airflow from the slot between the wing and the flap you can see the airflow here via the clever use of a high-tech tool known as a stick with strings this injection of air from the compressor delays the boundary layer separation from the wing meaning you increase your maximum angle of attack before the stall it automatically activates after a deflection of 15 degrees and together with the leading edge flaps allows the starfighters with its very short wing to land at a lower speed than it would usually have to pilots have to be careful though if they reduce throttle to idle the air injection stops which is not something that you would want if you are at low speed like during a landing here we can also have another look at the leading edge flap with both flaps deflected it's a good demonstration here on how the curvature of the wing is increased and then we come to the creme de la creme of any aircraft it's the air brake i love myself a good air brake here we go there are of course two in the aircraft one on each side down here we have the compartment for the drag chute and we have an arrester hook and as we move towards the rear of the aircraft we can have a nice look at the variable exhaust nozzle that we have here and then we pan over all the way up top to the horizontal and vertical stabilizer we have the rudder and then we have that one massive one piece elevated that the aircraft has what is interesting about the f-104 g that we have right here is that the tail is slightly bigger than on the earlier versions and this is because the trainer versions of this aircraft already had this larger tail and eventually it was realized that maybe installing this one to the aircraft for the single uh seat variants will be beneficial as well the port side air brake right here then we kind of have a look at some of the hydraulical system and the hydraulic filters there and then we move around here we have a nice look also at one of the underwing hardpoints where you could install bombs or rockets or in fact drop tanks as well another wingtip tank right here this would also be the station for the air-to-air missiles if they were installed not in this aircraft as you can see at the moment normally it would be the aim-9 signed winder which was sort of the earliest iteration of air-to-air missiles that we had now we can't really pass this way so we're going to go viral the panavia tornado here walking under the variable sweep wing this tornado actually saw service in afghanistan but this is not a feature on the tornado so we'll stick with the starfighter another look at the engine of the aircraft and then we come up front here we have the refuel panning panel that goes right there and then of course we have a look at the ms-6120 millimeter revolving gatling gun this one has been deactivated this actually is quite interesting because you have a quick access panel that is right here which you can see opened uh to allow easy adjustment of the gun and then if you want to actually have access to the barrel assembly you have these quick access screws that uh you have to open one after the other there's they go all the way around all the way to the bottom that takes a little bit more time so having done that we'll go a little bit further up front there would be the optional installation of a refueling probe that could be mounted right about here around here the luftwaffe the west german luftwaffe never used this system even though it had it available however there are pictures of other air forces like the italian air force using them and then as we move up front we come to the last piece of the puzzle we have the ir seeker just in front of the windscreen for the pilot that is that little bulge that you can see right there and then inside of the cockpit would also be the gun camera so that rounds us up on the walk around we'll go into a little bit more detail on some of the systems that we saw and then we'll jump inside the power hose of this one was the general electric j79 you had the ge11 and the g11a uh difference is the anti-icing system and the front engine frame struts but never mind those these uh engines produce ten thousand pounds of force on military thrust and fifty thousand eight hundred pounds of force on full afterburner it's a 17-stage actual flow compressor uh three-stage turbine with a pressure ratio of 12 to 1. the f-104 is one of the earliest aircraft to actually use a variable area exhaust nozzle meaning the rear outlet cone could actually change in diameter the engine also features an automatic system reducing the chance of a compressor store by varying the vane angle at the inlet to manipulate the volume of air passing into the engine for the european production of the engine the engines were also produced locally in germany belgium and italy german f-104s would also receive a modified engine known as the j79 mtu j1k this was developed in cooperation between the german motorhome and turbines mtu and general electric apart from internal changes one of the main modifications was a new locking mechanism for the engine exhaust nozzles initially the exhaust nozzles were prone to open randomly or remain open after the use of the afterburner resulting in an immediate loss of frost as the diameter was too large for a lower frost setting to prevent this a one-time emergency nozzle closure was installed operated from the cockpit the pilot would manually close the nozzle and return to the airfield under normal power without having to fear for his life as i already mentioned before the starfighter well it had one aim and that was performance it had a poor sustained turn but boy could it put down the heat and hurt in a straight line and its climb wasn't too shabby either paired with the relatively low weight of the aircraft the j79 propelled the plane comfortably into supersonic range with a maximum speed of in excess roughly of 2400 kilometers per hour round about mach 2. the aircraft has about 770 us gallons of fuel roughly 2 900 liters in internal storage for and aft behind the pilot the reserve sits at about 140 gallons to extend the range extra tanks could be carried on the wingtips with roughly 170 gallons respectively the j79 guzzles fuel especially at low altitudes and if you go full afterburner you'll smash through your whole supply in less than 30 minutes drop tanks could of course also be added as well each about 200 gallons in place of the 20 millimeter cannon one additional fuel tank could also be added for about 120 gallons of extra fuel but this was not often done moving over to the starfighter's weapons den it's a mixture of good old medieval fun with a fixed onboard cannon right here and some modern chimpanzee pants in the form of early air-to-air missiles namely of course the aim-9 signwinder the starfighter wasn't the first aircraft to use this weapon but it was the first to be put into a service where this uh well air-to-air missile was added essentially from the start rather than an upgrade later on now let's talk about the cannon for now this of course is well the famous m61a1 vulcan six barrel gatling gun uh it fires a 20 by 102 millimeter round 6000 rounds a minute and this weapon is still in servers it's done its job and overall it has solid performance a warning to the trigger happy however the f-104 carries 750 rounds so about seven to eight seconds of continuous fires at maximum not too bad actually if you think about it moving over to the big stuff of course the weapon the aircraft had seven hard points one in the center line two in each wing and one on each wingtip the am9 sidewinder usually was sitting there quick number includes euro warning of course in some of the older reference books you'll sometimes find that the missile armament is indicated as the gar8 that's just the the old name for the sign miner it's still the a9 as the years went by the starfighter of course moved on to become a multi-role aircraft this was not without its problems there will be another video on that at some point in the future in any case dom fire rockets and bombs could also be carried with the main ordnance block here of course the starfighter also nuclear weapon capable so there was also the option of putting a nuke but that's all on the weapons let's move on so we can see here is the demonstration of racing and lowering the gear and the museum this is done with about 1000 psi so it takes a little bit longer than the 3000 psi that would be used by the aircraft in operational conditions before we jump into the cockpit just a quick notice that i recently released a f-104 starfighter poster in my shop it's got a breakdown and description of some of the plane systems and controls and if you're looking to spice up your room with a starfighter check out the channel store below this video alright getting into the starfighter then we'll just use the ladder mounting up top and then we'll just jump inside smoothly careful not to hit anything and there we go we're inside and it's not the most roomy cockpit but it's not that bad either actually let's have a closer look we're starting up front this time to the top right here and this is where we have the gauges monitoring the engine so we start on the top with the engine rpm we have the outlet and then the inlet temperature in the middle of that is the oil pressure we've got the nozzle position and the fuel flow moving ourselves into the middle here we've got the basic six plus and a couple of extra dials in between let's have a closer look the artificial horizon is to the top right this can be hidden with a rubber cover below that you will find a standby attitude indicator and the permanent dial in the middle is the phi position and homing indicator and above it you will find a rate of climb indicator as well as an angle of attack indicator an integrated speed and mac counter is found to the left with a pressure altimeter below this an accelerometer is then found above the radio altimeter and all the way on the left the radio frequency selector linked to an additional display as well as a turn and slip indicator now up top we have a standby compass that you can use as well just a normal compass and to the right there's a special alert dial there and this is actually used on this aircraft because it does have a radar warning system that is essentially would tell you that you're being well looked at in rather a lot of scrutiny and you might want to be doing something to get out of dodge moving below in the middle here we have the radar scope now everything has been disconnected so i can play a little bit with the bibs and bobs so if we move the control stick just a little bit to the left that actually requires a little bit of force have a better look at the um at the radar scope first of all we can change the contrast by just turning this dial here and if you want to take off the cover just press on it turn it around and there you go you can take that off and you can have a better look at the radar scope that way as well now generally speaking that wouldn't be done in flight but there you go below that would be the control for what you would be seeing on the radar scope so you have 10 miles 20 miles 30 and 40 miles there and of course with the indicators on the radar scope you could then measure the range to your target for the radar generally there the search cone is 90 degrees although that could be limited of course in track mode if you wanted to then below that you have the special weapons panel this is where the exciting stuff happens you can select your special weapons and moving it to the right we have the big red panic button which would immediately jettison the central mounted weapon system that the aircraft has which in this one because it's nuclear capable might have been a nuke moving to the left then we also have your weapon control panel so you can select missiles to the left you can select rockets to the right or in the middle we're set on guns as and of course it also has all the external stores there as well as here then we have a couple of emergency handles so we have the emergency nozzle closure just below the engine engine dials we have the emergency ram air turbine that you saw earlier on the outside that can be activated here we have the landing gear system that can also be activated here and we have the drag shoot on the left hand side moving a little bit further on the left hand side we have the landing gear lever as well as landing lights and external storage jettison as well now this external source jettison is somewhat awkwardly placed and i'll come back to that in just a second before that we'll go to the stick the normal trigger that would activate the forward mounting forward facing weapons whether it's the missiles or in fact the gun this little hat switch here would be for the manual trim this button would drop the bombs then we have for a button for the radar the one on the front you operated with your pinky that would be for the swivel of the front gear and then the lever that is in the back well that is for an automatic autopilot trim moving to the left we have the throttle now we can move this from off into idle right there into full and then if we want to go to afterburner well we go left and bam there we go we are now an afterburner the problem is that oftentimes with the gloves that you're wearing with you know the position of your fingers you would accidentally hit the external drop just some uh button right here the panning button and that is obviously a bad thing suddenly you know you activate your afterburner but you lose all the stores that you have on the aircraft so in most aircraft this was then essentially covered over with a little bit of a well yeah it's it's a sort of a paper plastic glue sticky thing that you could rip off if you actually needed it but it would protect the external stores for the time you need go into afterburner on the throttle itself you have your speed brakes which are in and out like so and you have a button for your microphone on the left of that you have your flap control and then if we move all the way to the left you have your radar control panel uh followed by your uhf and then all the way in the back we have the autopilot and then we have the super munitions system on the top left here which could also then be used to activate well your your rockets your cpus on the right hand side of the aircraft first of all we have an all-important clock that should be in every aircraft next to the radar scope you will also find the hydraulic pressure the internal and external fuel tanks indicator the cabin pressure indicator as well as the clearance and antenna angle indicator we've got your warning lights we have your we have the oxygen regulator we have your tactical navigation takan we have the iff and the the practice or the training system for your nuclear weapon system where you currently go through the sequence of dropping a new we have a bomb timer sequencer here as well behind that we have your phi navigational system now this is quite interesting actually just release the button you can pull out this little device here and on these plastic nozzles here you can pre-arrange certain coordinates so once you have done that the pilot or the plane already knows where it has to go this has been pre-arranged you just pop that into the system there we go and then it would automatically be taking the pilot where it's supposed to go so if we have a distance let's say of well let's make it 10 miles there we go and a bearing of let's say 210 there we go it will take that it will count down the distance as it goes along and once it has reached zero it will automatically then go on to the next course now let's just reset that there we go we have it and behind that we have the circuit breaker and so on and on the outside we have quality of light improvements so it's light and the cockpit temperature we also have the inertial navigator ln3 system there and that really brings us to a close on this aircraft of course ejection if the plane is on fire just pull the taps you go straight out there's nothing to worry about and if that doesn't work well you can have the auxiliary caps right here and that really rounds us up on the inside of the aircraft as for the comfort it's not the best one i've been into so far but with a little bit of a adjustment of some of the seats and uh the rudder it actually gets to the point where i can sit in this aircraft relatively comfortable and yeah it's quite a nice aircraft actually to to sit in of course on the canopy as well you have mirrors for a little bit of rear wards visibility um it's very simple stuff up front we have an optical side that can also be then adjusted with with the contrast of the colors next to the weapon system here yeah it's actually quite a good aircraft the starfighter has a mixed reputation you probably already know that amongst some it was called the widowmaker equally tarnishing its popular image was the lockheed bribery scandal where the company will convince certain government officials to secure the procurement of the f-104 i don't want to go into this now i will at some point in the future most certainly but this video really should just be on starfighter in itself it is badass it was what it was meant to be fast aggressive pushing the limit with an in-your-face attitude with that came certain risks and quirks and the plane could be unforgiving yes while the korean experience had influenced its design america would soon shift over to a new generation of aircraft that where more flexible shall we say multi-role able to more appropriately fit into the american way of war i want to thank the flugraf jaisam of the deutsche museum for the great access and assistance they have given me during the visit i would highly encourage you to go and visit the museum once normal businesses resumes not just to see the aircraft but museums have been affected quite severely by the current limitations so i'm sure that they will be more than appreciative of your visit they have a absolutely fantastic selection of aircraft and if you are like me you'll enjoy your visit a lot also a big thank you once again to my patreon and channel supporters who make inside the cockpit possible and also to mark for sponsoring this episode with his support as always i hope all of you have a great day and see you in the sky

Channel: Military Aviation History

Views: 196,223

Keywords:

Id: wkw1N332zDI

Length: 27min 55sec (1675 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 15 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/BoeingBoeing77]

The widow maker