When I was stationed in Florida, it was not with the approval of my NCOIC. He had redlined every woman who had been assigned to him, he told me, but had to accept me because my husband and I were guaranteed a joint-spouse assignment. I was assigned to the control panel, where I would give the pilots GCA'a and run them through their missions.
There was plenty of time to fly the F4-E, it was so aerodynamically sound that when it was flown out of control and left to it's own devices it would right itself and fly strait and level. Providing of course, the airspeed and control surfaces was within the envelope. This is where I learned to fly combat missions, air to air, air to ground, and to drop nuclear bombs.
This was a digital simulator, the prized job yearned for in tech school, difficult to get and so far female free. I'm glad I got to work on analog sims first though, tubes and relays, servos-systems and moter-generators. The knowledge was important to have and usually bypassed when assigned to a digital sim directly out of tech school.
There were the usual problems of being the first female, some were jerks and some were ok about it.

I missed working on the equipment though, so I got the schematic books and would go through them while sitting at the control console, learning what I could about the system.

There are always common, repeat problems on any system and saturating amps were one on this computer. The test point for the amps was 24 volts if they were working, I cannot remember what the voltage was when they would saturate, but it was pretty high. The guys would fumble around in the "card" cabinet, attempting to hold the standard issue VTVM while inserting one lead into the test point and the other on ground, the entire time trying to read the voltage.

Since I was not allowed to troubleshoot the equipment I would usually just watch, although sometimes when no one was around I would do it myself and fix it.

There had to be a better way, it took forever to check all the cards.

So I got an idea, easy to do when the NCOIC decided to make a rule that we couldn't "read" have the schematics while working the console, just for me, he was going to make my life as difficult as possible. He already had. War stories about that some other time.
I ordered some parts and made my little piece of test equipment, two zener diodes with a break over point of 28 volts, facing each other, put then inside a test lead with a bulb on the end and at the end of the wire placed an alligator clip. This way they could clip the end to ground, the cabinet was metal of course, and stick the point of the test lead into the test points one after another real fast. When the lamp (little light bulb) lit up you had found a saturated amp.
Oddly even the guys who followed the NCOIC's lead in giving a bad time were impressed. And grateful.

I put in a suggestion, with diagrams and cost and potential cost savings. It was turned down.

I found out that after I left that it had been put in again and approved. The military got the patent on it and it wasn't too many years later that you started seeing them, or a close equivalent, for sale to the public.


-- Cherri (jessam5@home.com), February 17, 2001

Answers

bump ???

-- Cherri (jessam5@home.com), February 17, 2001.

Cherri,

I wish I had your sum of knowledge in that field,but in regards to inventorship,many people,male and female,have been screwed by the system.At least YOU know the real story.

-- capnfun (capnfun1@excite.com), February 17, 2001.

To me, the McDonnell-Douglas F-4 'Phantom' is the baddest ass fighter aircraft to ever lift off. In 1962, my squadron was ready to deploy to Sicily from Brunswick NAS in Maine. The Marine Air Wing had just received a few of the first Phantom’s to go into service and I had the honor to rear seat in one during a time to climb test run. I will never forget the rush when the AB’s kicked in on those two GE J79’s and took us straight to the moon, or so it felt. The Navy was conducting ‘Project High Jump’ during that year and set various time to altitude records with the original ‘A’ version. Then came Nam.

Anyone who was in country for any period of time will never forget this feared workhorse that owned the skies (albeit, free of any competition). The sound of a Phantom screeching down from the clouds will forever be etched into our inner souls. The ‘Magic Dragons’ and helo gunships may have been more ‘efficient’ but for pure destruction and mystical terror, the Phantoms ruled. Unfortunately, some of this mayhem was inadvertently bestowed upon friendly forces.

Now, this stately old warrior can be found in the fleet of many NG units and air museums throughout the country. If you ever have an opportunity to stare one down, head-on, you will forever feel the power of the force.

-- Barry (bchbear863@cs.com), February 17, 2001.

Barry, that must have been incredible flying in the back seat like that. You brought back memories of the sounds and vibrations under my feet and it even felt like in the air around me when in the presence of military aircraft taking off, flying by and landing. I grew up an Air Force brat, I was surrounded by them my entire life until I went in myself.

The different aircraft seem to have the personalities of people, I get shivers down my spine whenever I see a B-52. Having worked on them (B-52's) before I got into the F-4, I had a little period of adjustment to go through. In the B-52 I had to put my feet up on the dash to brace myself as I pulled back the column on take-off. You know how sensitive the stick in an F-4 is. Barry, did you ever get to ride in a B-52? The wings lay like a penguin, the tips need their own set of wheels. As they take off the wind beneath the wings lifts them up. It's beautiful watching them climb into the sky.
I was TDY at Beal (I think it is) and got to fly the SR-71 simulator. This was while I was working on the KC-135. They told me to pull back on the stick. I did. And flipped the darn thing over backwards. The F4-E had to be the most enjoyable to fly of all of the military aircraft I got the opportunity to get into. As for civilian aircraft, the 737 is the sweetest, most enjoyable to fly. It's to bad that flying commercial aircraft has become so boring.

-- Cherri (jessam5@home.com), February 17, 2001.

Having presonally worked as an engineer at Northrop on the F5/T38, F/A-18, and B-2 programs, plus having visited and consulted with nearly every major aerospace firm in the world, I have to vote for the F117. Limited in use, but, when you use it it kicks ass...(XB-70 was my second choice)...

-- Uncle Bob (unclb0b@aol.com), February 17, 2001.

I believe that the F-4 was the only fighter ever deployed by all branches of service using fighter aircraft, Navy, Marines, and the Air Force. Correct me if I'm wrong please.

UB, I agree, the award for the "Best Darth Vader Imitation by a Bomber" goes to the XB-70, however my personal favorite jet bomber is/was the B-58 Hustler. Of course my all time favorite aircraft, and the award holder for most decisive bomber in it's day goes to the B- 17. Nothing else even comes close, IMHO.

-- Uncle Deedah (unkeed@yahoo.com), February 17, 2001.

Holy Crap. Cherri, I started my college career as an aerospace engineer, but ended in CSCI. Have you ever thought about moving into the software side of things? We're paying people $250/hour who I know have less aptitude than you to troubleshoot fibre-channel SAN's for big companies. I have no clue what you're doing now, but if you're not making what you think you deserve, look into learning some new technologies. It doesn't sound like it would be a problem for you.

-- Bemused (and_amazed@you.people), February 17, 2001.

No Cherri, I never had the pleasure of a B-52 hop. Spent a lot of time on SAC bases but the first time that I went inside that monster was at the Pima Air Museum at the Davis-Monthon AFB, just outside of Tucson, AZ. BTW, that is one spot where you can see, up close and personal, just about all of the military aircraft since WWI. I crewed on an R5D out of Anacostia NAS and that very aircraft is now ‘grazing’ in the desert at Pima. When my son was in his early twenties we went there together and I took him inside my old bird. Damn if I didn’t drop a tear or two that day. They stay well preserved in the Arizona desert climate.

Although I was a Naval Aviator, much of my time was spent at Andrews AFB and Torrejon AFB. In 1985 I was in the oil & gas business in Texas and had a home in Abilene. I had many friends that were stationed at Dyess AFB and they arranged for me to be on hand for the delivery of the first B-1B Lancer into the 7th Bomb Wing. To the chagrin of many, this ‘problem child’ broke down in North Dakota and flew in to Dyess a day late. The Rockwell people were highly embarrassed but that was just the beginning of a lengthy period of B- 1B failures. Yes, in the middle of 1986 I got an inside look at this baby but alas, never went up in one. BTW, you may recall that in late 1985, the 7th put one of the B-1’s into a cotton field about 30 miles west of Dyess….tough bird to handle early in it’s time in service.

Funny story about your ‘flipping’ the Blackbird in the simulator. You must have gone through a checkout to know about the experience. Many aspiring aviators have washed out in the box.

-- Barry (bchbear863@cs.com), February 17, 2001.

Barry, Yes.Part of the job. The simulators we worked on were on train cars, they traveled from base to base and our three crews took turns maintaining them. It was a great experience. I got to travel all over the US, but never overseas. We did go overseas with Dad when we were growing up, I was born in Munich.

Bemused, "troubleshoot fibre-channel SAN's for big companies."As a matter of fact I have worked in software quite a bit. There were so many different mainframes at Boeing, the ones that ran the sims, and the engeneering computers. Working days would get boring with the crews in the sims so I started helping the engeneers and they taught me the different systems. I got to where I could go to a new computers and spend a day going through the op sys books and be able to start programming the next day. Even wrote and operated an operating system myself for a few years.
Now that I no longer have the responsibility of taking care of my parents I am interested in finding out what out there needs to be done. I would love to work in a new enviroment with new equipment. Would you care to elaborate about the job you mentioned? What kind of troubleshooters are they? Is the equipment the interface hardware? Almost all troubleshooting on digital-analog equipment involves software as well as hardware. You have to figure out which one is in, and software is a great tool to use to track down hardware problems.

-- Cherri (jessam5@home.com), February 18, 2001.

That's better Cherri ;)

-- Michael (Mike Roskoff@hotmail.com), February 18, 2001.