There is simply nothing like a Phantom rattling one's sternum!

Another demonstration of McDonnell-Douglas Aviations triumph of thrust over aerodynamics...

Another 10 minutes of bliss.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixd1wvOq234

I got to thinking that one reason so much F-4 footage is so grainy is that when the pilots and planes were bread-and-butter best-of-air-show performers 25 years ago, most of us didn't have access to high-pixel digital cameras.

In 1972 the Thunderbirds came to Medford, OR in their F-4s. I was 12. It was the first time I had ever seen a fighter jet. They flew right over my house for their arrival show. I spent the next day at the airshow. One of the most impressive displays Inhave ever seen.

The F4 is still my favorite!

Too bad the J79 Turbojet smoked like a steam train going uphill unless it was in afterburner. Made spotting them too damn easy. But once you did, all bets were off.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SH5953iQ6w

In the mid-'80s we modified the J79 with "smokeless" mods, then the smoke was almost nil until they lit the burners. We had those motors on my F-4Es in the 335 TFS where I was OIC of the AMU.

Interesting. So what modifications were made? It would seem that the "smoke" was a result of inefficient combustion of the JP-4 somewhere along the way and the afterburner completed the combustion process???

Seems the J79-17C engine had the low smoke combustor assembly which when combined with right fuel significantly reduced smoke generation at high engine power settings.

Here is some of the test data on the various fuel types and smoke generation.


http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a095057.pdf