- Member since
June 2005
- From: MCAS Miramar
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Posted by SSgtD6152
on Saturday, October 29, 2005 12:28 PM
QUOTE: Originally posted by Jonathan Primm
QUOTE: Originally posted by ridleusmc
QUOTE: Originally posted by Jonathan Primm
QUOTE: Originally posted by ridleusmc
QUOTE: Originally posted by HeavyArty
QUOTE: Originally posted by SSgtD6152
cool, all I need in 1/48 for my all MARINE AIR collection is a $hitter,
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By a $hitter, if you mean a CH-47 Chinook, USMC doesn't/didn't use them. CH-47 is an Army only helo.
If you mean a CH-46 Sea Knight, Academy has one in 1/48 scale.
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53's are $h*tters... but not only because of the exhaust smoke. They also leave stains whereever they park. We don't mean CH-47, who needs those things? The 53E is the King of Heavy Lift. Sorry Hook fans, but it's the truth.
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Yeah, but what good is it, if you can't get it off the ground?
Unless things have changed with the Es, I remember earlier CH-53s being notorious for going T.U. prior to launch. I was in the CH-46 det of HMH-461 Dec76-May77 and when I was in Okinawa (77-78) with HMM-164 it was the rule rather than the exception to have to pick up Island SAR whenever HMH-462 or the Air Force '53 Det couldn't deal with it because of NMC aircraft.
The CH-47 units I was in on the other hand enjoyed high Operational Readiness Rates, usually 78-85%,
Now if you really want to talk heavy lift, lets talk about Mi-26s!
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I guess things have changed, because our op readiness rates haven't been that low since just after OIF 1 when 3/4 of our squadron was on leave. Funny you mention Mi-26's. A Halo landed here the 3 days ago. It was a big white whale that made all kinds of noise until it finally set wheels on deck. The pilot cut power and the thing taxied in wispering. I must admit it was a sight. The Osprey can't take mission from the 53 or hook. It can't lift as much, and it can't go into airplane mode with an external load. As for 46's: the only way to get them into the air with a full load is with a running start. They're too heavy nowadays for their worn out engines. Those engines have 30 to 40 years of rebuilds, and can't produce the power they once did.
Hook vs 53E
www.fas.org
Max gross 47D 50,000 lbs
53E 73,500 lbs
cruising speed
hook 143 kn
53E 150 kn (max allowable) (to heck with Natops)
range
Hook 230 nmi
53E 480 nmi
it's all in the numbers, sorry hook fans
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Sorry for what? If the CH-453 is so damned hot, why isn't it bein used in the same numbers that CH-47s are? Who else besides NAVAIR is usin CH-53Es?
This could go on and on! Different missions, different requirements.
The longest flights I was ever invovled in, was while I was in 2/160th (MH-47Ds) when we deployed from Fort Campbell to Guayna. We left Ft Lauderdale and flew non stop with one in flight refueling to St Croix, then the next day from St Croix to Georgetown, Guyana. (Apr-May 93). Earlier that year we had a couple of aircraft fly non-stop San Juan to Fort Campell (refuelled inflight twice).
In the states the longest flight I crewed was from Fort Sill OK to Camp Shelby MS, then to Jackson MS and back to Fort Sill OK, again with 2/160th Jan 1990. ETD was about 21:00, RTB was ~ 08:00 the next morning.
Cruise was 140 Knots, but we routinely flew at around 150 with a VNE at around 160 depending on the aircraft and how the blades were tracked and balanced. The max gross on '47s is in excess of 50K, (yeah I know what the stats say) I know of at least one instance where a '47 hauled an external load of nine full fuel blivets out of an LZ in Honduras, so if you figure 500 gallons of JP-4 at 6.5 lbs/gallon your talkin 29,250, plus the wieight of each blivet, which puts the weight of the external load well over 30K.
When I was crewin '46s the D models were only ten or twelve years old. We still used GE-T-58-10s, we could haul twenty five troops with all their trash with no problems. I guess the SRM, mods, floatation gear, ECM gear and all the rest of the crap loaded onto the Echo, plus havin had the transmissions and engines reworked so many times has finally reduced some damn fine aircraft into flying relics.
When I was detached from HMM-162 to HMH-461 as part of the '46 det, I used to tell people not to tell my parents I was in a CH-53 Sqaudron, they thought I was a piano player in a whorehouse!
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We do not need that many 53's, we only take 4 with us on a ship. Now I'm a Phrog guy, but 53's are bad @$$. The Corps is not the ARMY we do not need 500 birds on the line, to make the mission. We just give'um some TLC to make the mission.
Now as for a Phrog with 25 packs in it, a Delta at that, it's hard for me to see.
I have been flying and working on them for 10ys now. Back in 1995 we only took 12 now we take 10. I'm going to talk to Norm Clark when I see him next.He will know, He made the thing.
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