The Last Days of the F-111 

I left the F-111D in 1991 I feel the same thank you for keeping it in the air as long as you could.

It was a very good bomber for our purposes.

We miss them too Sir.

I worked the Fs, and then all models except Cs at the overhaul facility in Sacramento (McClellan AFB). I left there in ‘88. I miss it so much. The Vark was my world.

I volunteer as a tour guide at my local aviation museum, HARS. We have an F111, tail number 109 on display. It’s always a favourite especially as we let our visitors sit in the left side seat.

Always have and always will! - thanks for having our back in ww2! We never forget who our mates are.

USNVA11 anytime brother, anytime.

I was Army, last time I crossed a F-111 unit, was a ANG or AFRES F model sqd in 1994. This was long time ago, so if it wasn't F, my apologies, and like I said, I was Army (13A) Field Artillery. Sqd XO , who doubled also as S-3 operations officer. How? Is that even legal? On operational availability, readiness to deploy now (at the time). He admitted , I was 1Lt (O-2) at time, he was Major, that it was low. About 1/3 of 12 assigned airframes could fly to theater and drop weapons. Half of crews were not 'deployable'. One of those airframes has low op ECM-Def suite. No flare, chaff OK, and Low-Med power restriction on emitter pod. He was talking to Army Res. LTC. My job was to breath and say 'Yesir". This is what I recall, and I don't quite know the details of ECM pods in actual use at time, per USAF regulations. So an explanation from crew or maintainer, or planner would be cool. But stay within applied classifications , if any still apply after almost 30 years. P.S. They had pods that when hung underneath F-111 fuselage , made it look like a male horse with a huge erection. How that phalic symbology made it past USAF, I have no clue? Perhaps they did not care about appearances back then. if a crew exceeds stated restriction, during mission, is that recorded objectively, by some black box?

@@dkoz8321 No F-111s were ever in the ANG or Reserve. The last base that had any F-111s, was Cannon AFB, NM. After the 48th TFW at RAF Lakenheath, the F-111Fs went to Cannon AFB. The F-111Ds left Cannon for the boneyard.

You must have been around Amberley or Leichhardt. I remember doing the same and seeing those early dump and burns when you thought the plane would crash

Chris Toney I’m sure he will be well remembered within the Squadron mate. Salute.

Whats NZ goanna do airspace wise? Not exactly pulling your weight in the region in that regard.

@@craigmoloney4486 fucking savage

Joe Calobeer yes. Australian’s were the only ones to do the ‘fuel dump’.

I was told that an American pilot had some issues after doing it, so all US pilots were told not to do it, the ozzys carried it on though lol

only us Aussies are crazy enough to call that fun

Yep, it was a clause in the contract of sale that they had to be disposed of or rendered non-airworthy (the museum airframes). I think because the US were nervous back in the 1960s/70s when they were purchased because of the whole nuclear capabilities the Pig had.

I work on the D model in the USAF. Awesome plane.

Ross Manley - dear fuckwit... you cannot keep high performance military aircraft airworthy indefinitely... they live very tough lives and eventually wear out... retiring them was not a political decision, it was a technical decision.

@@FallenPhoenix86 He's right airframes have flight time limits due to stress and strain.

Don't listen to those f@$kwits,a top plane,could easily be flying today.matainence is key +upgrades.no RAAF PLANE OF TODAY CAN DO WHAT IT CAN...........🇭🇲🇺🇲🚫💩

@@FallenPhoenix86 Dear FUCKWIT. You have outed yourself.

@@grahamlucas2712 Reading comprehension really isnt one of your strengths is it? Everything I said is correct... but it was in response to a comment that's now been deleted... engage your brain first if you'd care to respond further.... otherwise just fuck off :)

27th AMS A-shop, at Cannon AFB, 1972-76. Wow we were 20 years apart, same planes.

B Shop, 523rd, 1979-82.

You're so lucky you got to fly in one

I noticed these sound a lot like the F-35. They’re very likely just as loud too as the F-35 has 40,000 pounds of thrust and the F-111’s total thrust would actually be more than that as they have 25,000 pounds of thrust per engine. Their noise level was prb deafening in full afterburner unlike the F-35

Add to those the Victor, F-105, A-5 (RA-5C) and the F-104 just for being damn pretty and sexy

Buy it now before the Chinese buy it.

TakeDeadAim p

Timothy Dodd We lived in Felixstowe England in 1970. Dad worked at Bentwaters AFB, My older sisters and I went to school at Mildenhall AFB, and the hospital we went to was at Lakenheath AFB where we used to watch the F-111A's often. I got a battery operated F-111A for Christmas one year and it was my favorite toy for awhile. I wish I still had it now.

Debra Barton see my post above. Cut them up with angle-grinders.

Except for how, you know, Nos. 1 & 6 Sqns had completely replaced with F/A-18Fs on a one for one basis (until 6 Sqn re-equipped with EA-18 Growlers in 2017). So yes. Yes they were.

@@Booyaka9000 well james roberts replaced greg inglis too. Right?? No. No he didnt.

its like these replaced the old Canberras but we had to use F4 Phantoms for a few years as a stop gap till the F111C was delivered I remember when this was the TFX A or B and we decided we wanted both in one lol the F35 may not be as awesome but with how us Aussies do things we will make it do all we need

@@Booyaka9000 Except they were not "replaced" by the F/A-18Fs as they are not equivalent capabilities.

@@beckster181 The JSF-F35's are a dud aircraft. Same as our French Submarines.

Your source???? Doesn't matter about the wind. When the engines are wound up, they get up and go.

Ha Ha. Not true. The F111C was very reliable and didn't need the hours of maintainance per flying hours you claim. It is time for you to go

Andy Smith huh

One of the best deterrents out, now it''s gone. Range and speed, the secret to keeping the potential enemy from not even thinking about it.

not like we can load the F35 onto the new carrier either the deck is not able to handle it

It was a shame, but with a 180-1 maintenance to flight hours ratio, it became absurd to use it.

@@DrWillis1990 Could you educate me about maintenance hours? Roughly what amount of time is spent on combat jet maintenance per flying hour for powerplants, avionics, hydraulics, airframe. I would be interested to know what the split is for older aircraft. I know the F-15C's at RAF Lakenheath, 35 years old, eat up maintenance hours now, so the ground crews will welcome the F-35's from the practical point of view, though they will surely miss the Eagle for its style. I am also amazed at the 12 plus hour daily flying hours of short haul airlines, such flying intensity year after year, how do the flying hours compare to the maintenance hours? The avionics are simpler, the flying is more restrained but they spend as much time in the air as on the ground most of the year.

@@Hattonbank I'm definitely not an expert of maintenance hours or planes in general that's for sure, so I don't think I'm the right person to answer, but I'll do my Best with what I do know. The f35 appears to be a 50:1 (up to however). But it is a new vehicle, that will degrade over time. The gripen which is the best on the market for this man hours to flight hours metric is 10:1. I'm not too familiar with many other planes metrics though. It seems to be a ballpark of 20-60 for new planes. One big thing is the stresses of an airliner pale in comparison to that of a high g manuvouring fighter or bomber. For example a standard a320 type of plane spends most of its life cruising at around 700km/h with low angle and g turns/takeoffs etc. Your average fighter is hitting over Mach 1 and a couple of g's every turn even in a basic training mission, so the stresses are huge and the ratio of stresses as it becomes Higher, makes It much harder to cope with using engineering. Kinda like cars top speed. To go from topspeed of 180 to 200mph, you need an extra 100hp out of the engine. To go from 200 to 220, you need an extra 250hp and so on (just made those numbers up for the analogy). Also Airlines benefit from the larger production runs, less sensitivity over the vehicles secrets and wider competition with less political issues makes it a lot easier to support and upgrade airliners with replacement parts etc. I can choose from 4 companies to buy replacement engines for My Airbus, and they compete offering better support etc. For a fighter jet I can only replace my. Engines if they a, fit the airframe, b, they still get made by the company who built them, and c, don't compromise My other military systems. A fighters man hours to flight hours does degrade quicker due to those loads. However refits and upgrade packages do prolong the life / can lower these to some extent, the f111 had no available options to do so recently. My general observations but you probably already know this, so I guess I'm just saying for anyone else: With any vehicle, the older they get, the more maintenance hours are generally required to check the effectiveness of parts and systems, could be a car, train or plane. These didn't used to require 180-1 hours, much less in fact, but overtime they degrade and parts become scarce or entirely unavailable. So to make sure that the parts that aren't available any more still meet operational and safety metrics, to check an increasingly stressed airframe from time wear, and then to work on those parts should they need to be worked on, gets longer and longer. The more complex the parts and systems, add even more time. They've ended up needing that amount of time to adhere to the strict flying and readiness condition the plane was required to deem suitable as combat ready. So in other words the standard in which combat readiness and safety stays the same or becomes even stricter, but the parts continuously degrade. From an engineering point of view as well, sometimes parts even when replaced with a new one, then require extra checks to make sure that newly refreshed part doesn't effect the older parts. Eg take car break pads and discs. You replace the pads but not discs, so in theory, the breaks should all be good. However, as the discs weren't replaced, you now have a much fresher, thicker, harsher brand new part (the pads) effecting the worn down older disc break that's faced countless hours of thermal changes and friction, and will effect its performance at a different rate to that when it was the older brake pads. So extra and more frequent checks need to be made there adding time to your overall check. This is all amplified with a complex vehicle like a plane with so many parts and systems, as well as the much higher scrutiny given its a plan and a military vehicle. That's one problem of it. The others would be economics, 180 180 man hours to one flying hour just isn't a great return on investment. And another major issue is, in a real combat situation, it's not ideal to have one type of your entire fleet, always requiring maintenance for this long. Eg its not ready to fly when u need it. This is amplified with smaller fleets which is most countries bar the super powers. You could have a rotating roster of course which is common, but you'd need effectively a Minimum 180 planes to have a full rotation of constant readiness. Or else at any given point there will be no planes of this type able to fly. And u gotta wait until the maintenance is done. 180 planes to account for eac hour in its delayed readiness then means the space, maintenance crew, hangers, tools and parts for 180 planes, adding to its economic issues. Hope that was helpful even slightly 🤷‍♂️

@@Hattonbank I should add for details, there are many other complexities which come into it other than maintenance hours. Is the f111 a good plane? No doubt. I could go on for hours but some key things that also need to be taken into account when replacing an aircraft is: Warfare. What wars are being fought. In the lead up to the 2000 up to 2010's it was fighting against lesser opponents, rebels, terrorists etc. Doesn't require to differ planes much. Their counters are at best older gen Sam's or shoulder mounted rockets. Now days the threat of competing advanced nations is coming back from the likes of China and Russia, like the cold war. So needs change. Counter threats advance, Sam's are cheap in comparison and thus can be advanced and built quickly. Russia is an expert in Sam's. Both nations are also creating their own line of newer gen fighters. Back to cost and parts: F15s are still built new. Replacement parts is a big thing because at some point you have to replace everything in a plane. At that point you are effectively building a new plane. Is it worth rebuilding it (assuming the parts are available) or to go with a newer more advanced design that better counters the advanced radars and Sam's? The F15s ended up doing really well with some upgrades as the platform itself was very versatile. And being much more widely produced means its easier to upgrade as there is a willingness. There is a lot of complexities that I know exist but I'm not familiar with on the finer details.

@@DrWillis1990 Except your maintenance claim is Bullshit.

Why???

@@nutster9000 It was a condition of sale stipulated by the US when Australia bought them that they were to be destroyed once retired. Concerns of nuclear capable planes getting into the wrong hands apparently.