Forum: Off-topic

I think with the F-104, there was later an upgrade, as I recall. The early models had a downward ejection (D'OH!) and later models had the upward method. Some of these ended up in USAF hands, although the majority of them were FMS variants. I believe the 104 used in The Right Stuff was actually a D model flown by AF Systems Command. Too bad they couldn't have altered the jet with a couple bolt-on movie props to make it appear more like an actual NF-104. As far as the most realistic Hollywood ejection I've ever seen though, I would have to say Flight of the Intruder, although the skydiver in the next frame kind of screws up the shot. Also, they had solid white chutes, not the standard White/Orange/OD Green chutes...oops!

F-16.net Sponsor

TC, the F-104 indeed started off with downward seats (B, B-1, B-2, C, C-1) before converting to the C-2 upward firing seat (a later variant the S/R-2 was an upgraded C-2). There was also a D seat being designed as a high-supersonic seat. The D was also planned as a downward seat, but was canceled during the development phase. All these seats used similar chassis as they were all developments of the same basic seat, even the D model. Originally they were Stanley seats, but Lockheed ended up producing most of them.

The seat used in The Right Stuff (in the aircraft) is a xQ-7A seat where x represents the letter code of the country using it, for example GQ-7A for the Germans, IQ-7A for the Italian ones. These seats were made by Martin-Baker. They were retrofitted to the Starfighters for a couple of reasons. First, the Germans were unhappy with the C-2 seats due to a number of fatalities, and they were more familiar with the Martin-Baker systems. The fatalities with the C-2 were probably not extremely excessive based on the mission profiles, but that is a discussion for another thread. In any case, the seat is clearly a Martin-Baker xQ-7A-family seat due to the overhead handles, and its appearance. Although these seats could have been used in several countries, I don't believe many were in the US. I'd have to do some research to find out. I have a F-104G Dash-1 and it shows three seats as possible in the F-104G, however the manual is intended for USAF and foriegn services so it is not clear if the USAF had any of the xQ-7A seats.

In the movie, the seat changes when they cut to the free fall incident. That is quite a tale, as people who have read Yeager's autobiography can attest. The aircraft was in a flat spin and when he ejected the seat tumbled as the typical seat of the vintage would. He ended up falling face down at seat separation. Seat sep on the C-2 is gas inititated by a one second delay cartridge. This cart sends gas into a manifold that passes the gas to the lap belt latch mechanism. This pops open and releases the shoulder belts, but not the 'golden key' to actuate the parachute. From the manifold gas is also sent to the seat separation rotary initiator. This is a unit that has an inverted 'Y'-shaped strap that runs from the rotary initiator behind the parachute and under the survival kit. The hot gas causes this initiator to generate more gas that is used to retract the strap. This pulls the strap tight under the pilot and 'pops' him off the seat (in theory). As Yeager fell away from the seat in his full pressure suit (that was pressurized with oxygen from the survial kit) he was relativly below the seat, which continued to tumble. The golden key mentioned before had pulled an arming mechanism in the backpack parachute ( probably a BA-18 ). One second later the chute pack opened and the chute began to deploy. It streamed past the seat and started to inflate. This caused the famous upward jump effect of opening shock (note 1). The seat then continued on its merry way ballistically to the ground, however it was interrupted in this path by Yeager's helmet. The face mask was cracked and the nearly spent rocket ignited the liner of the helmet and Yeager's face. This flame was fed by the oxygen in the pressure suit and severely burned Yeager's face. He fought to unlock the face mask and raise it, which cut off the flow of oxygen automatically. His hands were also severely burned. Luckily his parachute was not severely damaged by the flames and he was able to make a safe landing. The movie shows it somewhat different, but it is close. On landing he was met by a youth who saw his parachute descent and drove over the desert to meet him. Yeager asked him for a pocket knife and proceded to carve the melted gloves off his hands...

I loved the Flight of the Intruder ejections. Clearly models as I recall, but still pretty cool. Oddly I just bought a parachute for my Mk. J5D seat which is of the Vietnam vintage, and it is a solid white. That makes me wonder if all the chutes were tri-color. I'll have to do some research on that. Mine might have been for US use only, I don't have any way to tell.

Behind Enemy Lines has a very amusing scene with ejections. First of all, it is not clear from the movie because they had to cut the scene to avoid an R rating, but the pilot's leg injury is supposed to be due to a pen from his clipboard. This is actually quite possible, I have heard of similar injuries. Second, the ejection sequence was clearly developed by someone who did research, but didn't understand all the details, and they added some visuals that are quite bizzare, such as a chip catching fire on some odd circuit board. Watch the DVD in slow mo to see what I mean. Also the catapult locks are internal on the NACES seat not external. Beyond that it amuses me how long it takes the second crewman to initiate ejection (gee, why weren't they in sequenced mode) and yet they manage to have a mid-air collision of the seats. With the T-Birds ejection you all should have a clue exactly how fast a modern seat functions. The NACES has a completely different mode of operation, but it is also so fast that by the time the second crew ejected, the first would have been way behind the cockpit under a full chute.

Speaking of chutes, the funniest part comes with them descending next to each other under ram air chutes. So far no ejection seat contains ram airs. This is for many reasons, mainly in packing and reliability of deployment issues. So they somehow manage to split up and land about a 1/2 mile apart, from only a 1000 foot descent it appears. Then as the Nav drops into the trees the camera cut goes to an up angle look where you can see his ROUND chute hit the trees.

As to the seat used in the snow scene (it is sitting at Pax river last I heard, still covered in fake snow) I had a great discussion with several very high up execs with Martin-Baker and they were jokingly commenting on how they had never seen such a hard drive on the seats in the factory. They also were amused at the concept of repowering the beacon that somehow magically was cut off from the carrier.

Kevin
The Ejection Site
Note 1- the opening shock does not increase your altitude. What happens is that the camera platform is usually on a second parachutist in free fall. When the parachute deploys, the sudden decelleration compared to the camera platforms continued freefall makes it appear that you leap upwards. Trust me, that doesn't happen.

Yeah, the producers of that film took some liberties with the design of that seat, I guess just to make it appear that the US military is more and more technologically advanced, especially with a brand new aircraft (the Super Bug.) BTW, speaking of brand new aircraft, some of the scenes on the carrier deck show the Hornet in its prototype markings, with all of the center of gravity markers. Very Amusing.

Kmceject,

As always, thanks for the on target seat tech info, you know more about the darn seats I fly in than I do!

It was about 1960 or 1961 as I recall that all Zippers, F-104s, went to upwards seats. The floor ejection panels still exist though, and are great for maintenance access. Sometime I'll remember to take a pic when the panel is off for y'all.

JR

JR007, I'd appreciate that photo! You only need to know how to safe and fire the seat, to me it is an interesting piece of history. Don't ask me about the hydraulics on a -104, I'd have no clue, but I bet you do. I've collected excerpts from about five different F-104 manuals that show most of the versions of the seats, and I have recently acquired a fair amount of info on the ICESC project that was developing the D seat (and the infamous F-106 Convair Rotational Ejection Seat (aka the 'B' Seat.) I've been in touch with people from Denmark about the DQ-7A replacing the C-2 in thier aircraft, and have been hunting for more data on all the systems....

Kevin
The Ejection Site

Kevin, if you need some info from Denmark, then do let me know. One of the guys who I am talking to a lot (he is fixing my all my life support equipment) used to work on the F-104 (crew cheif) and he might be able to answer some of your questions.

Kosmos, I'm looking for more historical info, but if he has any interesting things to say, I'd love to hear them...

Kevin
The Ejection Site

Sure, will do! I will probably see him this thursday, and make sure to ask him.

Kevin, you need to have your Bud in Texas hook you up with Jay Miller, I bet he has some of the docs you are looking for. Jay used to have a B-58 capsule in his garage... Shocked

habu2, I've been in touch with Jay Miller, very nice guy, but he shipped all his photos out of state. When I am ready to write my book I'll be in touch with him again to go visit and see what I can borrow. He has a heck of a collection of materials on aircraft... I have about 16 file cabinets of seat materials en-route from Texas in the near future to add to the thousands of docs I have already so I have a lot on seats...

Kevin
The Ejection Site

Last edited by LinkF16SimDude on Feb 01, 2004 - 08:18 PM; edited 1 time in total

Lawman wrote:

Anybody else ever seen the movie "By Dawns Early Light"

Ive seen it 2 or 3 times, its a pretty good premise and a great movie if your a BUFF fan. Only thing is for some reason they are flying around in an up to date 80's B-52 and it still has a tail gunner????...... that and the scene with the F/A-18's flying off the USS Midway which was retired before the movie was even shot.

AHHH that never stops Hollywood from embellishing to tell a good story. But my all-time fav BUFF sequence...Slim Pickens and crew in Dr. Strangelove:

"A fella could have a pretty good time in Vegas with all that stuff"

"Nuculer combat toe-to-toe with the Rooskies!"

"If we get any lower we'd need reindeer pullin' us".

Unlikely scenario to be sure but funny as hell! Laughing

Just some short comments:

One thing that always tickled me watching fighter sequences is that they rarely, if ever, have their O2 masks in place. Top Gun is the exception. IE1 & 2, JAG especially, PepsiCola Wings Are Old...dogfighting and jinkin' their keisters off and there's the mask just flappin' against the helmet. Even on cat shots the mask is danglin'. The only time it gets used is to talk on the radio. I guess the actors really, really needed to get that face time for the camera.
Every fighter cockpit sequence has camera shake to simulate movement. It CAN"T be THAT turbulent all the time can it? The pursuit sequences in Top Gun looked like Mav and Goose were in an unbalanced spin cycle for Pete's sake!
Not to toot my own horn or anything but the ONLY reason I have IE1 and 2 are for the sim sequences. I worked on both of 'em at one point or another a few years after the film was shot. Both are Israeli WSTs. In part 1 the interior of the sim is a fancified Hollywood mock up but the next shot of Doug climbing out is the real deal. It still had the original Link NVS (Night Visual System) display mounted! In the opening sequence of part 2 (when Doug and his buddy are trying to go to 10 Gs) those are shots of the actual sim (punching up an innocuous page on the SMS, showing the FCR BIT display on the REO, etc., all unclassified displays, natch). The film says they're C-models but to the trained eye they're really A's. And since when can you get a fix on a SAM site looking at a radar display in BIT? A funny story I heard about the IE1 sim shoot was that the producers wanted NO "Link" insignia anywhere in any shot. Just before the director yelled action one of the shop guys snuck in and put a magnetized Link sign on the sim's mainframe. If you watch as Doug tried to sweet talk the SimSup into some time, you'll see the sign, out of focus mind you, in the background. Don't know why none of the film people caught it but oh well.

There... I feel better now! Thanks!

Heh, kinda like me wanting to have xXx, just to see the 30 secs of Su-22 footage Very Happy

You guys must know that the ultimate flight movie of all time is doubtlessly Hot Shots!

...Or not. ^^; 'Twas a great parody, though. Laughing

One thing in ID4 that surprised me: It seemed weird that the initial counterattack was by Marine Corps Bugs. I know F/A-18s are capable of air-to-air just as much as mud-moving but it just...seemed kinda weird to me that they were Marine planes instead of, say, Navy Bugs. Even more surprising was the second attack wave over Area 51 that was made up of Hornets, Tomcats, and what looked like A-4 Skyhawks. Considering Area 51 is a land base, shouldn't that big squadron have been made up of mostly USAF aircraft (Eagles, Vipers, what have you)?

I actually liked Iron Eagle, despite the silly mistakes (and they are silly). Inaccurate as it was, it looked cool when that bulldozer/truck thing got blown away by a Maverick from the grounded Viper. IRL, isn't there some kind of locking system that prevents missiles from firing while the a/c is on the ground?

You guys have posted 10 pages and have forgotten about one of the "better done" dogfight scenes--at least that I remember, I saw it only once.

Air Force One.

That's the only F-15 movie I can remember.
I thought they did the final dogfight pretty well, except for the guy running into the missle [Link pending approval] right.

Too bad they had to switch FX houses last [Link pending approval] crash at the end was REALLY really bad.

Forum: Off-topic

The Falcons of Iron Eagle/Aviation movies