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Why can't GD make a fricken Aircraft with a Built in Crew ladder? They can't say it's because the 16 is so small, as the huge F wonder-lemon, didn't even have one! Heck every other bird has them; the F-18 has a real neat one that tucks up into the strake.

And the current crew ladders pretty much always feel like they are on the verge of breaking every time you climb on them, un like the Beefy F-15 and F-4 (external) ones! It sucks having to drag a damn ladder every where you deploy. or even accross the ramp!!

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Wayne, I know what you are saying. In part the F-16 does not have one is the strakes, they provide lift and have huge stresses imparted on them. Making a ladder in there would make the area week. F wonderlemeon is a LO jet and a built in ladder or holes in the skin kinda make that impossible.

Quote:

F wonderlemeon is a LO jet and a built in ladder or holes in the skin kinda make that impossible.

F wonder-lemon... Mr. Green

The aardvark hardly qualifies as LO....

They made tons of LO-related changes in the Super Bug (intakes, sawtooth edges everywhere, more...) but they did not remove the built-in ladder.

Salute!

Hell! Not only the lack of a built-in step ladder, but NO RELIEF TUBE!!!!!!

GASP!!!

I flew the Deuce as a sprog and no relief tube. Years later, I am in another GD plane and NO RELIEF TUBE!!!! And by then, we had 13-15 hour deployment missions all the time. Thank God the Life Support troops had beaucoup barf bags, and I personally certified those suckers at 9 gees..........

Back to the ladder. I can still remember going cross-country in the Viper in the early years and transient maint would scratch their heads as to how we were to get outta the jet. LOL. They would roll over some very large set of stairs like one would use for a transport plane. How humiliating....... heh heh. If we were in a hurry, we would scramble back on the canopy rail, then onto the wing, then slide off. Real cool, huh?

later,

Joined: Feb 01, 2007 Posts: 0 Status: Offline

Can't have your cake and eat it too.............

Everything is precious ounces to a design team.

Weight = More power = Bigger engine = More Fuel = Weight = More power = Bigger engien = More fuel, etc.

Elite 2K Joined: Jan 14, 2004 Posts: 2812 Status: Offline

I don't recall the 106 having an internal boarding ladder either. It did have a good external ladder. We always called the ladder for the Viper "Ol' Shakey." Always felt like I was climbing on Erector Set or Tinkertoys or something. Anyway, I had always invisioned what could have worked was a pull down boarding ladder just under the cockpit, and to where it would not interfere with the strake, or anything else of importance there (with me so far?) Then, climb above the strake, and have a pull out step (ala, the F-14.) Maybe I'm just pulling this one out of my @$$. But it's possible it could have worked. Heck, I think my idea would have made some of the kit pulls I had to do a little more quick and convenient, rather than, as a couple of you have already mentioned, waiting for a ladder. Oh yeah, as for no relief tube...hehehe...I like that. Thank God for the piddle packs, eh? As for good ol' #2?...well, you're on your own there. Razz

Newbie Joined: Mar 25, 2004 Posts: 1 Status: Offline

SwedgeII, I can't have a ladder because of the intake and it would be a FOD hazard

During the early design of the plane, John Boyd ensured that no items that added weight to the plane were included, which from the weight point of view was correct. That is why the Yf-16 was such a hot prototype fighter plane.

I always heard a rumour that the engineers were given a bonus for every bit of weight they could safely save......could anyone confirm this?

stik wrote:

I always heard a rumour that the engineers were given a bonus for every bit of weight they could safely save......could anyone confirm this?

Skunk Works engineers during the U-2 development. Wink

Enthusiast Joined: Jan 15, 2004 Posts: 21 Status: Offline

My ladder problem isn't the fact that it's not incorporated into the strake, it's that they don't let us use the small ones used on the Thunderbirds. They easily fit in the travel pod. I guess that is another common sense thing that won't make it into the military.
Ciao

stik wrote:

I always heard a rumour that the engineers were given a bonus for every bit of weight they could safely save......could anyone confirm this?

I don't know about that rumor but I was told by Harry Hillaker that they intentionally minimized internal volume of the YF-16 forward fuselage to make it more difficult to add more (heavier) avionics later on. He didn't foresee the "smaller faster" trend in avionics hardware though...

No relief tube Ha!

Yeah everybody an ship really hates it that the Turkey has a relief tube. On the other hand nobody uses that in the more Northern deployments cause that sucker gets as cold as the outside air no something Im gonna go sticking mine in.

I dont see where it would be an intake FOD hazard, Hornet has one directly infront of the intake. Its not like you leave it down when you have the engine running.

Drew

Gums,

It's just another F-104 follow on... Had a friend at Mac Dill that was a Viper Demo driver at Shaw and then with the T-Birds. He came over to look at and sit in the Zipper and I was showing him all the things the GD dudes took from Kelly's design. No ladder, leading and trailing maneuvering flaps, the main gear, dorsal fins the F-16 borrowed the two outboard one's from the F-104S, no relief tube, wingtip mounted AIM-9s, M61 cannon, the list goes on.

At least we could slide down the canopy rail onto the wing on the T-33, but you've gotta wait for something tall to let you out of the Zipper. You don't want to jump as you might mar the chrome on your ejection seat Spurs... Cool

And yes, never leave home without piddle packs!!! Even though we can only go for 2.9 hours with four bags on...

FOD hazard, the F-15 ladder is directly in front of the intake! as for the strake, F-18's have them in its strake, and its strakes serve the same purpose as the 16's.

Any way a pilot friend of mine broke his ankle scrambeling out of a 16, when he had to divert to a non-16 base with an eng problem.

As for myself being a crew dog for almost 20 years now and having worked on 15, and 4's and A-10's I love the ladders for those jets. I am a big BOY 6'3" 230 and the 16 ladders just feel like the are going to break every time I climb on them!

I don't know if the 106 had a built in ladder, I only got to see one of them ONCE on its way to become a drone. Neat looking aircraft.

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