F-15 Eagle: History, Performance & Discussion

Machinery of War Discussion Aircraft
24

Wrong. F14As did not make deliveries in 1976 .

The F-14 entered operational service with Navy fighter squadrons VF-1 Wolfpack and VF-2 Bounty Hunters aboard USS Enterprise (CVN 65) in September 1974 .

Operation Frequent Wind took place April 29-30, 1975.

The F14A tomcat entered service in 1974 and its first combat mission was in 1975 in Vietnam.

I do not care what version GJ is basing the F14A (early) off of.
You said the F14A received Aim7Fs upon entering service completely unsolicited.

I am pointing out without a shadow of a doubt. That is not correct and impossible.

1 Like
25

That is a nebulous statement.
do you mean;
When deliveries were first taken?
The Squadron(s) were stood up?
IOC milestones were met?
When thy first went into combat / cruise?

and further what do you mean by it, as in “was it” possible, everything we have points towards the fact that it was, but “did it” happen its not clear.

That is the issue.

If the in game Early was supposed to be in its introductory config (July 1974)if that was to be the case where is the AN/ALR-23 IRSTS that it should have among a number of issues with the 3d model that would make it not a Block 130 aircraft.

Summary

8675276217_595dc065d1_b
8675276217_595dc065d1_b1024×683 129 KB

F-14A VF-1 (2)

as per the AIM-7F CS & SMC

The dates of note are
IOT & E complete ; September 1974.
This indicates that the design is frozen and that it is ready to be submitted for trials, certification and a decision on production timelines. This additionally does not preclude the existence of preproduction rounds, or their delivery.

Summary

There is likely to be similar questions that may well show up with the F-16A-15ADF and the eventual introduction of AMRAAMs, as they did not receive them in US service(though were wired as such), but the same airframes did later in Italian service. as Block -25 &30/-32 aircraft retain the full compliment of A2G ordnance so present questions as to a good multirole airframe

USS Enterprise sets sail September 1974 with VF-1 & VF-2 aboard, though they have had their F-14A’s since July 1973, and been at full strength since July 1974

Production approval; October 1974

400 units were to be procured for Financial Year '75 and as per Wikipedia

The federal government’s fiscal year is the 12-month period beginning 1 October and ending 30 September the following year. The identification of a fiscal year is the calendar year in which it ends

Which means that up to ~400 units were in existence before the arbitrary April 1975 cutoff for OP Frequent Wind, and of course without absolute granularity of operational deliveries to Enterprise, there is no way to tell exactly if / when they were delivered to the squadrons, other than that they existed and that the F-14’s involved were cleared to use them had they had them in stock.

2 Likes
26

The F-14 entered operational service with Navy fighter squadrons VF-1 Wolfpack and VF-2 Bounty Hunters aboard USS Enterprise (CVN 65) in September 1974 .

As you literally just said the navy did not have any variation whatsoever of the Aim7F until a non-serial production procurement of 400 which took place 1975. So no. Tomcat did not have the Aim7F upon entering service.

Additionally. just because the Navy procured 400 units does not mean they immediately sent non serial production variants straight Vietnam. They were most likely for testing. Why? Because first serial production units were delivered January 1976. They leave no room for interpretation. Deliveries to the navy takes time, implementing them into squadron wings takes time, deploying them takes time.
The Aim7F did not see service in Vietnam.

Unless you are trying to say those non serial production units where used in vietnam and not for testing by the Navy themselves?
image

27

If that were the case then why explicitly specify Full Production, as that leaves things open to interpretation that there may have been deliveries of pre-production rounds?

What I’m saying is that it isn’t absolutely definitive.

28

First delivery (full production) means first serial production delivery. Final product.

The navy had missiles. But those were not of serial production. Probably for testing.

29

How do you know that they didn’t rush them forwards due to pressing need?

It wouldn’t be the first time that both Operational and Combat Evaluation(s) took place simultaneously.

1 Like
30

Full production means the final product.
First delivery of the final product took place January 1976.

Whatever they procured was not serial production missiles that would see combat.

31

I guess yeah they can send them immediately over to Vietnam, but why?

The tomcat was already in service for over a year. The Vietnam War was over and the Tomcat was tasked with merely escorting the evacuation.

Additionally, they had the brand new aim54s that took much of the spotlight don’t you think?

32

The original argument was that the AIM-7F was allegedly only produced from 1976, and the following question was how the F-14 had a missile that had not been produced yet…

We have proven both that the AIM-7F was produced prior to 1976 and that it could fire the missile prior to arriving at the carrier.

Now, my argument was that the aircraft entered service with the missile. It seems to me the F-14A and AIM-7F finished IOT&E at around the same time, this is because to complete IOT&E the missile has to be fired from the F-14, and the F-14 has to fire the missile… the two cannot happen separately…

Once this was completed, the aircraft was certified and certain shortcomings were discovered and quickly fixed or augmented while onboard the carrier. These quick-fixes from the field maintenance team constituted some of the first modifications to the fleet-service aircraft. The production standard for the F-14 was modified to reflect these changes there-on as well. As far as I am concerned, the 1977 version of the F-14A is the definitive “no more teething issues” model, and this is also the model in the game.

33

The first production of the “final product” was in 1974, prior to the F-14A entering service. It just wasn’t delivered to the fleet because they were required for IOT&E. We are getting quite off topic of the F-15.

34

IOT&E cannot be conducted on non-final-production missiles or products.

The Initial Operational Test and Evaluation (IOT&E) is conducted on production, or production representative articles, to determine whether systems are operationally effective and suitable for intended use by representative users to support the decision to proceed beyond Low-Rate Initial Production (LRIP).
Initial Operational Test & Evaluation (IOT&E) - AcqNotes

35

What does “First Delivery, January 1976 (full production)” mean to you?

No duh… IOT&E cannot clear a missile for serial production without testing on a batch of missiles first… Hmmm… maybe that is why they procured 400 the previous year? Maybe a clue?

Then just perhaps they continually test and clear the missile during evaluation and that is why it literally says "First Deliveries took place January 1976 (full production) the following year?..

Yeah, all of a sudden, we are off topic.
Anyway the F15A can receive countermeasures, any early variation of it.

36

The Initial Operational Test and Evaluation (IOT&E) is conducted on production, or production representative articles

37

Yes they continually test a missile while in early stages of production. That is literally what those 400 units were used for the year prior and first serial full production units were delivered in 1976.

They are so utterly clear on this matter “First Delivery, January 1976 (full production)”

The Tomcat was already in full operational service for two years prior and deployed.

The F15A even if (early) will receive countermeasures.

38

Per the pre-1988 Defense Acquisition Process Phases the “service decision” happens at the same time go-ahead is given for production which started in 1974 for production models. Full-rate production might come after, but the product is “in-service” since 1974 according to this scheduling.
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/965436709502328842/1122380596472193024/image.png

IOC for the F-15 was in 1976 because that is when it entered service, so in this case both the F-14 and F-15 came into service with the AIM-7F.

3 Likes
39

Great jet, can’t wait for it to be in game, hopefully later this year!

40

Are there any good referencing websites for the F-15? (example like f-16.net is for the f-16)

41

F-15 is a vehicle that needs to be added within this year.

Especially in case of Israel, it is the only country in game that cannot use SARH missiles on top tier jets. Even the Python 3 cannot overcome this huge drawback.

We seriously need a IAF F-15 Baz along with American and Japanese F-15s.

1 Like
42

I’m actually very curious about how the F-15 and Su-27 will be implemented ingame.

If they come prior to Fox 3’s, the Su-27 (presuming 27ER/60M for the Su-27 and 7F/9L for F-15) will not only have the qualitative advantage in BVR, but also the quantitative advantage with 10 missiles, of which 6 are ER’s vs the F-15’s 8 missiles of which 4 are 7F’s. Afaik, the Su-27 will also have the advantage in close range. I doubt any of the difference in radar capabilities will be great enough to overcome this, if they’re even modelled.

As for if they come with Fox 3’s, not only will this be MASSIVELY disadvantageous/unfair for many other nations, such as Germany whos first Fox 3 capable jet will be the F-4F ICE (F-4 airframe fighting gen 4 jets almost exclusively while not even having any sensor or weapon advantage as an offset, makes me wanna throw up), but limited information makes me suspect the R-77 will likely come and massively outperform the AIM-120A, yet again giving both the qualitative and quantitative advantage to Russia…

43

If the ER was balanced like it should be it really wouldnt be that much of an advantage. Everyone always talks about the low success rate of the Aim-7 Sparrow but no one ever talks about the 1 hit in 30 fired R-27’s. The R-27 performed terribly if not worse than the Aim-7. However in Warthunder its success rate is artificially increased by Russian bias.

1 hit out of 30 fired in combat. Thats the real R-27.