F-14 forced on the USAF

[bobtdwarf]

I often wonder WHY didn't Allison tried to fill the TF30 / F401 void with their TF41. They had a golden opportunity to screw Pratt and G.E and take an important role as a USN engine supplier. Taking G.E OTL backup role with the F101 / F110.

Like Kaiserd said, the TF41 was a licensed produced Spey. UK Phantoms, F-4K and F-4M, replaced the J79 with an afterburning Spey. That had 20,500 lbs of thrust, about the same as the TF30 in the F-14. So there was not much benefit to be gained after spending all the money that would be needed to get it into the F-14. A better engine than the TF30, but not enough to jutify doing it. . Also, the Spey was "draggy". The UK found that although the extra thrust helped at takeoff and low speed acceleration, because of the drag rise as you went faster the Spey Phantoms lost out to the J9 powered Phantoms. Hindsight is usually 20-20; It's the general opinion in times since that putting the Spey into the Phantom wasn't that good an idea.

There are some important differences here though...

The Spey was "draggy" in comparison to the J-79 because you had to increase inlet size by 20% to accommodate increased airflow.. you don't in this application as the airflow was nearly identical 263 vs 258, and the TF-41 with a reheater would be IIRC slightly shorter. A reheated TF-41 should get you about 26,000-28,000 pounds of thrust max with a dry thrust of 15,000 for 30 minutes and 12,950 continuous and be as easy a swap as it was for the A-7 and that was a substantial enough of an improvement that the TF-30 was dropped like a hot rock by the Navy for the A-7.

The big speed limiter on the F-4K was the material of the canopy.. it would get kind of melty beyond M 1.9.

EDIT: Damn 'Minnow posted with much of what I am saying while I was out having a smoke composing my rewrite... will leave the post... though I feel silly now.

 

[Archibald]

A reheated TF-41 should get you about 26,000-28,000 pounds of thrust max with a dry thrust of 15,000 for 30 minutes and 12,950 continuous and be as easy a swap as it was for the A-7 and that was a substantial enough of an improvement that the TF-30 was dropped like a hot rock by the Navy for the A-7.

Very much that. I understand the difference in generations of turbofans - both F100 and F101/110 were a big leap forward compared to the TF30 / TF41. No question about this.
But the TF30 was so bad, and since the A-7 made the switch...

It is very much a matter of "anything but the TF30 for the Tomcat" - it is also a matter of date.
-1966: the A-7D/E gets that early date, in F-111B times.
-1969: second opportunity when TF30 was confirmed as the Tomcat engine
-1971: third opportunity when F401 was dropped
- Had AMSA been dropped and F101 along it: fourth opportunity.

If some of the above happens then Allison could built on their TF41 experience to outsmart G.E and became Pratt "backup" turbofan provider.

A variant of what was called "the great engine war" (F100 vs F110) except earlier (1973 instead of 1978) and with Allison instead of G.E to pick the fight against Pratt dominance.

 

[isayyo2]

I don’t know the details of the Allison-Rolls Royce partnership, but maybe there were disagreements over continuing production? If Allison got tapped to provide TF41 for the F-14 or F-111 would they need to renegotiate with Rolls Royce? Most here know about the Rb211’s troubled development and the financial shape of RR heading into the 70s. If Allison ramped up TF41 production then RR might want increase their license fee…

 

[bobtdwarf]

A reheated TF-41 should get you about 26,000-28,000 pounds of thrust max with a dry thrust of 15,000 for 30 minutes and 12,950 continuous and be as easy a swap as it was for the A-7 and that was a substantial enough of an improvement that the TF-30 was dropped like a hot rock by the Navy for the A-7.

Very much that. I understand the difference in generations of turbofans - both F100 and F101/110 were a big leap forward compared to the TF30 / TF41. No question about this.
But the TF30 was so bad, and since the A-7 made the switch...

It is very much a matter of "anything but the TF30 for the Tomcat" - it is also a matter of date.
-1966: the A-7D/E gets that early date, in F-111B times.
-1969: second opportunity when TF30 was confirmed as the Tomcat engine
-1971: third opportunity when F401 was dropped
- Had AMSA been dropped and F101 along it: fourth opportunity.

If some of the above happens then Allison could built on their TF41 experience to outsmart G.E and became Pratt "backup" turbofan provider.

A variant of what was called "the great engine war" (F100 vs F110) except earlier (1973 instead of 1978) and with Allison instead of G.E to pick the fight against Pratt dominance.

I know the UK had two versions of the Spey in the 'K.. the last one put out 25,000 pounds, Zen would know more, and as I recall the K's Spey wasn't as big around as the TF-41, which would explain it only requiring 204 or so feet of flow instead of about 260.

So lets divide the max thrust of the last model by the continuous thrust to get an idea of the boost the reheater gives you... then multiply that number by the 15,000 30 minute limit thrust...you know just to give an eyeball on possible performance that gives you 28, 957 pounds of thrust. An early F-14 with a total thrust of 57,915

 

[zen]

Side path on Spey.
Clearly we have strong rumours that more was possible with the Spey, but not considered worth the effort/cost to achieve.
We know later on 205 was expected to make 25,000lb in reheat or a much lower maintenance regime and a projected further development to 28,000lb in reheat.
What held that back.....again not worth the effort for the numbers of aircraft.
The basic engine does not exclude high performance.
What caused the F4K to suffer is that the design was optimised for the J79 and the differences in diameter and crucially length (Spey was shorter) caused a cascade of compromises on cross section, and weight.
None of that is applicable as opposition to Spey in F111 or F14.
The comparable engines such as TF30 are best examined.
Under circumstances of a US order and licensing, RR and UK Government would invest more into the product, resulting in those higher performance figures earlier.
With a large US AF order for F14 with Spey, another factor is UK interest in F14 increases.

Relevent link

https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/roll-royce-spey-205-25-000lbs-thrust-mystery.1682/

 

[T. A. Gardner]

What might have made a USAF F-14 version more palatable would have been one that where cost was lowered by losing the AIM 54 in favor of just Sparrow and Sidewinder as AAM's and some attempt made to increase dogfighting performance as a result of say a lower weight.

 

[F-14D]

I often wonder WHY didn't Allison tried to fill the TF30 / F401 void with their TF41. They had a golden opportunity to screw Pratt and G.E and take an important role as a USN engine supplier. Taking G.E OTL backup role with the F101 / F110.

Like Kaiserd said, the TF41 was a licensed produced Spey. UK Phantoms, F-4K and F-4M, replaced the J79 with an afterburning Spey. That had 20,500 lbs of thrust, about the same as the TF30 in the F-14. So there was not much benefit to be gained after spending all the money that would be needed to get it into the F-14. A better engine than the TF30, but not enough to jutify doing it. . Also, the Spey was "draggy". The UK found that although the extra thrust helped at takeoff and low speed acceleration, because of the drag rise as you went faster the Spey Phantoms lost out to the J9 powered Phantoms. Hindsight is usually 20-20; It's the general opinion in times since that putting the Spey into the Phantom wasn't that good an idea.

There are some important differences here though...

The Spey was "draggy" in comparison to the J-79 because you had to increase inlet size by 20% to accommodate increased airflow.. you don't in this application as the airflow was nearly identical 263 vs 258, and the TF-41 with a reheater would be IIRC slightly shorter. A reheated TF-41 should get you about 26,000-28,000 pounds of thrust max with a dry thrust of 15,000 for 30 minutes and 12,950 continuous and be as easy a swap as it was for the A-7 and that was a substantial enough of an improvement that the TF-30 was dropped like a hot rock by the Navy for the A-7.

The big speed limiter on the F-4K was the material of the canopy.. it would get kind of melty beyond M 1.9.

EDIT: Damn 'Minnow posted with much of what I am saying while I was out having a smoke composing my rewrite... will leave the post... though I feel silly now.

The bigger inlet and the addition of the fan is what made it relatively "draggy". I'm not saying there was anything wrong with teh engine, just that (and this comes from a number of British publications) that in the particular case of the F-4 what was gained at the low end wasn't worth the penalties at higher speeds, and it appears they weren't just talking about supersonic performance.

F-4K had different canopy materials than US Phantoms? Didn't know that.

 

[F-14D]

A reheated TF-41 should get you about 26,000-28,000 pounds of thrust max with a dry thrust of 15,000 for 30 minutes and 12,950 continuous and be as easy a swap as it was for the A-7 and that was a substantial enough of an improvement that the TF-30 was dropped like a hot rock by the Navy for the A-7.

Very much that. I understand the difference in generations of turbofans - both F100 and F101/110 were a big leap forward compared to the TF30 / TF41. No question about this.
But the TF30 was so bad, and since the A-7 made the switch...

It is very much a matter of "anything but the TF30 for the Tomcat" - it is also a matter of date.
-1966: the A-7D/E gets that early date, in F-111B times.
-1969: second opportunity when TF30 was confirmed as the Tomcat engine
-1971: third opportunity when F401 was dropped
- Had AMSA been dropped and F101 along it: fourth opportunity.

If some of the above happens then Allison could built on their TF41 experience to outsmart G.E and became Pratt "backup" turbofan provider.

A variant of what was called "the great engine war" (F100 vs F110) except earlier (1973 instead of 1978) and with Allison instead of G.E to pick the fight against Pratt dominance.

In 1966 the Tomcat award hadn't been made, it was known, though, that the definitive engine wouldn't be ready when the plane was ready for flight so I believe all proposals expected an interim engine for testing, and unfortunately all there was was the TF30. . By 1969 the TF30 was only supposed to be for the first 13 to 69 Tomcats, F-14B was to be the production version with F401s, they didn't know yet what was about to happen. By 1977 when B-1was reduced to testing program, if it hadn't been restored in the early '80s F101 wouldn't have been scheduled for production and wouldn't be available to be turned into F101DFE/F110. Both USN and USAF were mad at Pratt for engine quality, so there might have been enough dissatisfaction to look at afterburning Spey and to spend the bucks (probably more than deriving F110 from F101) to give it a shot in the '80s. I don't see them doing it in 197 when B-1 first cancelled if for no other reason than Carter's people wouldn't have allowed it. .

 

[zen]

F-4K had different canopy materials than US Phantoms? Didn't know that.

No they didn't, USN chaps have revealed that normal training restricted them to below Mach 1.9 as thermal stresses caused clouding after duration at speed.
During high realistic war training that limit was exceeded in the knowledge the transparencies would need replacing.
UK would obviously cost cut by permanently restricting operating limits.

 

[F-14D]

F-4K had different canopy materials than US Phantoms? Didn't know that.

No they didn't, USN chaps have revealed that normal training restricted them to below Mach 1.9 as thermal stresses caused clouding after duration at speed.
During high realistic war training that limit was exceeded in the knowledge the transparencies would need replacing.
UK would obviously cost cut by permanently restricting operating limits.

Good to know, thanks. My understanding, though, is that the (F-4 only) concerns with Spey wasn't just at the top end.

 

[isayyo2]

What might have made a USAF F-14 version more palatable would have been one that where cost was lowered by losing the AIM 54 in favor of just Sparrow and Sidewinder as AAM's and some attempt made to increase dogfighting performance as a result of say a lower weight.

If the Navy/Marines stuck to their original plan of buying ~700+ F-14A's and brought the cost down significantly, would it make sense for the Air Force to fully rip out/delete all Phoenix subsystems or just not purchase the LAU-93 launchers and AIM-54 missiles?

General follow up to some above questions, how would the Air Force employ the Phoenix? Is it a viable weapon over Europe, or a specialized weapon relegated only to the Fighter-Interceptor Squadrons in CONUS and Iceland?

 

[Yellow Palace]

If the Navy/Marines stuck to their original plan of buying ~700+ F-14A's and brought the cost down significantly, would it make sense for the Air Force to fully rip out/delete all Phoenix subsystems or just not purchase the LAU-93 launchers and AIM-54 missiles?

IMHO, if the USAF had procured a VFX(AF) in place of the F-X, it would have been along the lines of the F-14T/F-14X with Phoenix capability deleted to save weight. If this version was developed, I suspect the Marines would prefer it too.

I'm not sure that the VFX(AF) would suffer that badly as a dogfighter next to the F-15, either. I believe the F-14A was pretty handy as it was, if loaded for air superiority, with the TF30s being the major limitation. As noted by others, I expect it's very likely that the F401 would be fully developed; the F110 would probably be better for the USAF 'fighter' mission, and I could see it being developed in time for an 'F-15C' equivalent.

I wouldn't rule out the USAF wanting to look at a single-seat variant, and maybe even a TF-14 - remember that the F-15B was originally the TF-15A! That's not to say that either would prove cost-effective, but I can see them being studied.

 

[red admiral]

The main point of the Spey was to reduce the dollar cost expenditure rather than pure performance.

SEP at low speeds and throttle response were the "performance" considerations.

 

[T. A. Gardner]

What might have made a USAF F-14 version more palatable would have been one that where cost was lowered by losing the AIM 54 in favor of just Sparrow and Sidewinder as AAM's and some attempt made to increase dogfighting performance as a result of say a lower weight.

If the Navy/Marines stuck to their original plan of buying ~700+ F-14A's and brought the cost down significantly, would it make sense for the Air Force to fully rip out/delete all Phoenix subsystems or just not purchase the LAU-93 launchers and AIM-54 missiles?

General follow up to some above questions, how would the Air Force employ the Phoenix? Is it a viable weapon over Europe, or a specialized weapon relegated only to the Fighter-Interceptor Squadrons in CONUS and Iceland?

It would have made sense for the USAF, given their needs, not to buy the AIM 54 and associated hardware to fire it. Any software could have been deleted along with modifications to cabling and other associated things in the aircraft needed to fire that missile. Aircraft, at least US military ones, are usually built in 'blocks' on the assembly line and such mods--both additions and subtractions--are done to them during the production run.
So, the USAF aircraft might not have the same wiring system as naval ones, different software and modified hard points for missiles than the navy specified. The AIM 54 is really only useful as a long-range intercept missile and best against targets that can't perform hard maneuvers. For the USN the expected use was against aircraft like the Tu 95 and Il 16 bombers more than against fighter aircraft.
The USAF would only have a requirement for that sort of use in defending the CONUS and other areas away from Soviet bases where long-range bombers might be encountered.

 

[Archibald]

TF41 was not dead. Allison / "detroit diesel" was not willing to give up.

"detroit diesel""912""B32" - Google Search

https://books.google.fr/books/content?id=VqYJKvZdmzsC&hl=fr&pg=PA152&img=1&pgis=1&dq=%22+reheat+-+thrust+version+of+the+engine+,+designated+TF41+Model+912+-+B32+...%22&sig=ACfU3U1xCPFPuIFq5lKoHhRM4lgxrK8gKg&edge=0

 

[isayyo2]

TF41 was not dead. Allison / "detroit diesel" was not willing to give up.

17,000 dry/27,000 reheat Wow.

Most impressively the 17,000 dry TF41 flew in Sep 72 in an YA-7H.

 

[Archibald]

The one for Helvetia, I mean - Switzerland. Where it fought Dassault Milan teeth and nail, only for the Swiss to buy... third hand Hawker Hunters from the British (facepalm).

 

[Colonial-Marine]

So what are the odds the USAF gets some autonomy over "their" F-14 variant and ends up with a fixed-wing F-14 instead? It would lighten up the aircraft some. Those characteristics that would suffer from the change are less important to the USAF's requirements.

 

[SSgtC]

So what are the odds the USAF gets some autonomy over "their" F-14 variant and ends up with a fixed-wing F-14 instead? It would lighten up the aircraft some. Those characteristics that would suffer from the change are less important to the USAF's requirements.

Slim to none. The Navy considered doing this the other way with the F-22. It involves so many changes you're essentially designing a new aircraft. The swing wing is what made the Tomcat a halfway decent dogfighter in the first place. So deleting it makes it even less maneuverable. Just removing the Phoenix hardware will make it significantly lighter and better performing. So the USAF would probably do that and maybe try to get a denavalized version with lighter landing gear and tail hook.

 

[F-14D]

So what are the odds the USAF gets some autonomy over "their" F-14 variant and ends up with a fixed-wing F-14 instead? It would lighten up the aircraft some. Those characteristics that would suffer from the change are less important to the USAF's requirements.

Slim to none. The Navy considered doing this the other way with the F-22. It involves so many changes you're essentially designing a new aircraft. The swing wing is what made the Tomcat a halfway decent dogfighter in the first place. So deleting it makes it even less maneuverable. Just removing the Phoenix hardware will make it significantly lighter and better performing. So the USAF would probably do that and maybe try to get a denavalized version with lighter landing gear and tail hook.

Agree.

It wasn't so much that Navy considered doing this, it was always known that the Navy version would be dramatically different from the Air Force version, no matter who won, to the point where a different production line would be needed. For example, Northrop's proposed NATF was a canard.

There wouldn't be much advantage to going to a fixed wing. That's such a major change that it wouldn't be worth what it would cost and would delay the plane by years. Taking away Phoenix wouldn't lighten the plane all that much. AWG-9 is AWG-9, whether it has Phoenix software or not. You could take away the pumps and fluid lines that circulated coolant into the AIM-54, but the pallet would remain because that's also there to mount air to ground ordnance and future missile types. To significantly reduce weight you'd have to lower internal fuel load and "denavalize" it, which would be a significant internal structural change. All that is time consuming and expensive. Remember, there wasn't a lot of change to the aircraft when the F-4 and A-7 "went ashore". One of them was bigger, heavier brakes, wheels and tires because for USAF the regular way of stopping isn't to catch a wire.

 

[T. A. Gardner]

As a comparison on the missile issue, the USAF F-4's could use and fire AIM 4 Falcon, while the USN models didn't have that option available. The same is likely to go here with the AIM 54.

 

[uk 75]

The USAF are able to keep its F106 well into the 80s.

Convair F-106 Delta Dart - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

With no significant threat to CONUS from Soviet bombers emerging in the Cold War (Tu160 might have changed that) the use of aircraft already deployed in Europe and the Pacific like the F15 and F16 to replace the F106 and F4 in defending US airspace was logical.
Maybe if the Tu160 had entered service earlier the USAF might have looked again at a different interceptor.

 

[F-14D]

As a comparison on the missile issue, the USAF F-4's could use and fire AIM 4 Falcon, while the USN models didn't have that option available. The same is likely to go here with the AIM 54.

USN never had Falcon in its inventory and showed no interest because of its size and weight and because it wasn't designed to be used in a maritime environment (shipboard handling safety and storage, etc.). Additionally it imposed a drag penalty on F-4s. that F-102/106 didn't have because they carried it internally. Also I don't think itwas compatible with naval pylons.

OTOH, once you have the F-14, you already have everything you need to use AIM-54. No extra effort needed for USAF except to bring it into inventory.

 

[T. A. Gardner]

As a comparison on the missile issue, the USAF F-4's could use and fire AIM 4 Falcon, while the USN models didn't have that option available. The same is likely to go here with the AIM 54.

USN never had Falcon in its inventory and showed no interest because of its size and weight and because it wasn't designed to be used in a maritime environment (shipboard handling safety and storage, etc.). Additionally it imposed a drag penalty on F-4s. that F-102/106 didn't have because they carried it internally. Also I don't think itwas compatible with naval pylons.

OTOH, once you have the F-14, you already have everything you need to use AIM-54. No extra effort needed for USAF except to bring it into inventory.

That's not true. You need different adapters for the ground support equipment (GSE) for example. I know, I supervised manufacture of the first batch of 400 ADU-801E SLAM/ER adapter brackets for that missile, among other projects, while in the military. So, the USAF would have to buy all that sort of stuff along with the missiles.
The easiest path for the Air Force is not to adopt the missile at all since the F-14 could already use AIM 7 Sparrow and AIM 9 Sidewinder. Just dump the AIM 54 capacity as unnecessary.
The AIM 4 Falcon capacity was used in the Vietnam era because the plane could carry more missiles that way. AIM 4 was relatively small and already in the USAF inventory. Once the plane could carry and fire it, that made sense to the USAF--at least until the shortcomings of the missile became apparent...

 

[Deleted member 2278]

TF41 was not dead. Allison / "detroit diesel" was not willing to give up.

17,000 dry/27,000 reheat Wow.

Yes but as mentioned in post#40, the 27000lb was aspirational and not actually achieved with the B52 variant (which unlike the B32 variant, did run in 1986).

 

[Archibald]

TF41 was not dead. Allison / "detroit diesel" was not willing to give up.

17,000 dry/27,000 reheat Wow.

Yes but as mentioned in post#40, the 27000lb was aspirational and not actually achieved with the B52 variant (which unlike the B32 variant, did run in 1986).

Wait, what aircraft had Allison in mind in 1986 ? british Phantoms or A-7 production was long gone...

 

[Deleted member 2278]

I'd imagine anything with a F100 or F110 would be game but that's speculative. Suffice to say, Allison were waaaay late to the party with a potato salad on the way out.

 

[Archibald]

By 1986 I certainly agree. Even the A-7 (-F) when it went supersonic did it with a F110 (or was it a F100 ? can't remember).

 

[BB1984]

As a comparison on the missile issue, the USAF F-4's could use and fire AIM 4 Falcon, while the USN models didn't have that option available. The same is likely to go here with the AIM 54.

USN never had Falcon in its inventory and showed no interest because of its size and weight and because it wasn't designed to be used in a maritime environment (shipboard handling safety and storage, etc.). Additionally it imposed a drag penalty on F-4s. that F-102/106 didn't have because they carried it internally. Also I don't think itwas compatible with naval pylons.

OTOH, once you have the F-14, you already have everything you need to use AIM-54. No extra effort needed for USAF except to bring it into inventory.

That's not true. You need different adapters for the ground support equipment (GSE) for example. I know, I supervised manufacture of the first batch of 400 ADU-801E SLAM/ER adapter brackets for that missile, among other projects, while in the military. So, the USAF would have to buy all that sort of stuff along with the missiles.
The easiest path for the Air Force is not to adopt the missile at all since the F-14 could already use AIM 7 Sparrow and AIM 9 Sidewinder. Just dump the AIM 54 capacity as unnecessary.
The AIM 4 Falcon capacity was used in the Vietnam era because the plane could carry more missiles that way. AIM 4 was relatively small and already in the USAF inventory. Once the plane could carry and fire it, that made sense to the USAF--at least until the shortcomings of the missile became apparent...

Ref AIM 54 vs. AIM 7/9 for the USAF: I agree

It's also interesting to speculate that the USAF having a fighter designed to carry a bigger radar and six 1000 pound missiles, not to mention a dedicated radar operator, might have led to changes in missile development. Possibly the AIM-152 actually makes it into service as a joint program, or the USAF allows a bigger envelope for the AMRAAM, both easing development (more room/weight for guidance) and going for longer range (to act as a AIM54 replacement, or supplement, as well as replacing the AIM7).

 

[Colonial-Marine]

So what are the odds the USAF gets some autonomy over "their" F-14 variant and ends up with a fixed-wing F-14 instead? It would lighten up the aircraft some. Those characteristics that would suffer from the change are less important to the USAF's requirements.

Slim to none. The Navy considered doing this the other way with the F-22. It involves so many changes you're essentially designing a new aircraft. The swing wing is what made the Tomcat a halfway decent dogfighter in the first place. So deleting it makes it even less maneuverable. Just removing the Phoenix hardware will make it significantly lighter and better performing. So the USAF would probably do that and maybe try to get a denavalized version with lighter landing gear and tail hook.

Agree.

It wasn't so much that Navy considered doing this, it was always known that the Navy version would be dramatically different from the Air Force version, no matter who won, to the point where a different production line would be needed. For example, Northrop's proposed NATF was a canard.

There wouldn't be much advantage to going to a fixed wing. That's such a major change that it wouldn't be worth what it would cost and would delay the plane by years. Taking away Phoenix wouldn't lighten the plane all that much. AWG-9 is AWG-9, whether it has Phoenix software or not. You could take away the pumps and fluid lines that circulated coolant into the AIM-54, but the pallet would remain because that's also there to mount air to ground ordnance and future missile types. To significantly reduce weight you'd have to lower internal fuel load and "denavalize" it, which would be a significant internal structural change. All that is time consuming and expensive. Remember, there wasn't a lot of change to the aircraft when the F-4 and A-7 "went ashore". One of them was bigger, heavier brakes, wheels and tires because for USAF the regular way of stopping isn't to catch a wire.

You make good points as usual but presuming the design gets the engines its deserves would such a fixed-wing F-14 really lag behind the F-15 in regards to performance? If I recall Grumman considered at least one fixed-wing design for what would become the F-14 and the idea got brought up again as a less capable lower cost option when the budget hawks were going after the F-14.

 

[T. A. Gardner]

As a comparison on the missile issue, the USAF F-4's could use and fire AIM 4 Falcon, while the USN models didn't have that option available. The same is likely to go here with the AIM 54.

USN never had Falcon in its inventory and showed no interest because of its size and weight and because it wasn't designed to be used in a maritime environment (shipboard handling safety and storage, etc.). Additionally it imposed a drag penalty on F-4s. that F-102/106 didn't have because they carried it internally. Also I don't think itwas compatible with naval pylons.

OTOH, once you have the F-14, you already have everything you need to use AIM-54. No extra effort needed for USAF except to bring it into inventory.

That's not true. You need different adapters for the ground support equipment (GSE) for example. I know, I supervised manufacture of the first batch of 400 ADU-801E SLAM/ER adapter brackets for that missile, among other projects, while in the military. So, the USAF would have to buy all that sort of stuff along with the missiles.
The easiest path for the Air Force is not to adopt the missile at all since the F-14 could already use AIM 7 Sparrow and AIM 9 Sidewinder. Just dump the AIM 54 capacity as unnecessary.
The AIM 4 Falcon capacity was used in the Vietnam era because the plane could carry more missiles that way. AIM 4 was relatively small and already in the USAF inventory. Once the plane could carry and fire it, that made sense to the USAF--at least until the shortcomings of the missile became apparent...

Ref AIM 54 vs. AIM 7/9 for the USAF: I agree

It's also interesting to speculate that the USAF having a fighter designed to carry a bigger radar and six 1000 pound missiles, not to mention a dedicated radar operator, might have led to changes in missile development. Possibly the AIM-152 actually makes it into service as a joint program, or the USAF allows a bigger envelope for the AMRAAM, both easing development (more room/weight for guidance) and going for longer range (to act as a AIM54 replacement, or supplement, as well as replacing the AIM7).

I'd expect the USAF to look more towards other ordinance than focus solely on a better missile for air combat. I could see the 14 becoming a bomb truck, much like the 15 did, PDQ. You already have the two seats, so the conversion would be easier. The backseat guy becomes an ordinance delivery driver for PGM's and a pod developed for optical along with laser guidance.
The 14 becomes a "Bombcat" much earlier in AF use, much like the F-15 Strike Eagle.

 

[isayyo2]

I'd expect the USAF to look more towards other ordinance than focus solely on a better missile for air combat. I could see the 14 becoming a bomb truck, much like the 15 did, PDQ. You already have the two seats, so the conversion would be easier. The backseat guy becomes an ordinance delivery driver for PGM's and a pod developed for optical along with laser guidance.
The 14 becomes a "Bombcat" much earlier in AF use, much like the F-15 Strike Eagle.

That was my hope as well.

The Air Force would accept their position of being forced into the F-14 and might as well make the most of it. Air Force F-4 crews could transfer directly into their new Tomcat's with equal or greater ground attack capabilities. Knowledge gained over Vietnam and developed crew relationships in the Phantom units could be retained.

 

[isayyo2]

Picturing USAF YF-14's deployed out of Korat RTAFB in 1972 à la the F-111's "Combat Lancer" deployment is equally cursed and fascinating. Wrapped in SEA camo and hauling AGM-12C's and M-117s; I wonder if the AGM-53 Condor would have survived? Would the Air Force weaponize the drop tank nacelle hard points?

 

[BlackBat242]

You could take away the pumps and fluid lines that circulated coolant into the AIM-54, but the pallet would remain because that's also there to mount air to ground ordnance and future missile types.

When the F-14 flew with a "no Phoenix" missile loadout, it was with 4xAIM-7 + 4xAIM-9 (or 6xAIM-7 + 2xAIM-9) with 4 AIM-7s mounted directly on the fuselage, not pallets.

In the original ground-attack load tests in the early 1970s, all of the bomb-loads were on dedicated bomb pylons, not the pallets. Apparently this did not allow for proper separation... the description I read long ago (early 1980s, when I was in the USMC air wing) was "after they were "dropped" the bombs tended to stay in the airflow "void" between the engines, bouncing off of the belly & engine housings for a bit before finally dropping free".

When they decided in the mid-1980s to try again to develop a "Bombcat" capability, it appears that they found that using the pallets fixed the issue.

 

[Archibald]

I've heard similar stories related to WWII (and early jet) bombers: bombs refusing to drop and "floating" inside or nearby the bay, to the great terror of aircrews.
In fact that was one of the reason behind Martin rotary bomb launcher on the XB-51 (from memory).

 

[Gobloxx]

What might have made a USAF F-14 version more palatable would have been one that where cost was lowered by losing the AIM 54 in favor of just Sparrow and Sidewinder as AAM's and some attempt made to increase dogfighting performance as a result of say a lower weight.

If the Navy/Marines stuck to their original plan of buying ~700+ F-14A's and brought the cost down significantly, would it make sense for the Air Force to fully rip out/delete all Phoenix subsystems or just not purchase the LAU-93 launchers and AIM-54 missiles?

General follow up to some above questions, how would the Air Force employ the Phoenix? Is it a viable weapon over Europe, or a specialized weapon relegated only to the Fighter-Interceptor Squadrons in CONUS and Iceland?

It would have made sense for the USAF, given their needs, not to buy the AIM 54 and associated hardware to fire it. Any software could have been deleted along with modifications to cabling and other associated things in the aircraft needed to fire that missile. Aircraft, at least US military ones, are usually built in 'blocks' on the assembly line and such mods--both additions and subtractions--are done to them during the production run.
So, the USAF aircraft might not have the same wiring system as naval ones, different software and modified hard points for missiles than the navy specified. The AIM 54 is really only useful as a long-range intercept missile and best against targets that can't perform hard maneuvers. For the USN the expected use was against aircraft like the Tu 95 and Il 16 bombers more than against fighter aircraft.
The USAF would only have a requirement for that sort of use in defending the CONUS and other areas away from Soviet bases where long-range bombers might be encountered.

✂️ Agile Phoenix

34 seconds · Clipped by Scott11078 · Original video "Top Guns: The Documentary" by Phil Cipher

youtube.com