Vietnam Huey

rotorwash wrote:

Andy,    Just got off the phone with my dad and asked about brass in the cockpit.  He told me that it was not unhear of for a little hot brass to find it's way down the neck of particularly ornary pilots!  In a gunship with a free gun all it took was a little "creative positioning" of the gun to get brass to go just about anywhere.  Any of you other guys heard of this?  anyway, I thought you might get a kick out of the story.      Ray

Kinda like "non-lethal fragging". 

Hot brass in the cabin was definetly a "weapon" of amusement at the right moment. At the wrong moment though everyone was at the mercy of just how distracting it was to the man on the stick.

Chief Snake 

Just a note for everyone. If you could use some copper wire, let me know what size and how much. I was looking for some stuff in the back shop at work and I found out where the excess copper is going. I saw that and I saw a lost treasure for modelers. I'm not going to sell it, just let me know how much and we'll work something out on how to get it to you. Trust me, there is plenty to go around and all kinds of sizes, although length may vary. Even if it may not be exact, I think I can get close to it. They dump this stuff by the loads. I thought the owner at least sold it for scrap.

I'll pile on and add my 2 cents U.S., just build it and enjoy it.  I've been building a good 50 yrs now and was a door gunner and love Hueys!  If I've learned anything, it's "don't wait for a perfect model, it may never happen" whether out of box or if you use every accessory or improvement parts that come out.  Somebody somewhere will still find fault with it!

I've seen models go from over sized raised rivets to our fine engraved panel lines and lightly drilled indented dimples representing rivets.  Fact is, reality is still not being served.  The real Huey had rivets raised up from the surface - and I don't remember any 'fine' engraved lines that scaled up would be significant chanels separating panels!  Look at any photos of real Hueys. Modelers will be better served when they accept that 'this is modeling, NOT reality' and never the twain shall meet!

Most of the available Huey models are damn nice kits out of the box.  If you want to make them better, there IS room for improvement.  Add what you want so long as you're still enjoying the build.  You'll build a heck of a lot more enjoyable models that way.

If you want to build that perfect model, you have all my respect and - God bless!  But if you want to simply enjoy modeling like 85% of the rest of us, don't throw out that perfectly good model for some nebulous - ridiculous and fictitious when you get down to it, notion of perfection.  'Build and have fun!'

Clear right

Howie  

Howie

Well said mate

Andy

Howie,

Transmission received and understood! 

rotorwash wrote:

David,   I am more interested in knowing the details from a historical perspective than anything else.  Little things like the fact that almost all doorgunners used old C-ration cans to make the feed mechanism work better in their 60's is really trivial to most folks, but I find it interesting and indicative of the "necessity is the mother of invention" mentality that characterized the Vietnam War.  No high tech gizmos or computer driven weapons, just good old American inginuity!        Ray actually it was called the orange juice can mod. The idea came from infantry units, and the cans were wired to the side of the 60 to make the belt have to drop down into the receiver about 5/8th". The ammo cans they used were huge, and because of that the tended to burn up barrels faster than they could make them. Also take note that a door gunner didn't wear a flak vest, but a metal plate affair. Nobody wore flak vests except Marines and folks stuck in the rear. A bullet going thru a flak vest was considered a death sentence due to expansion.      In the movies we often see 60's hanging by a cable, but I never saw one in my 15 months. It was always off a pental affair. With all the hours I had as a passenger in one I never ever saw the seats folded down, and many slicks didn't even have seats in them. I've seen them with twin rocket pods, and a mini gun on each side as well. I've also seen a few that had both rocket pods and mini guns at the same time, but not often. I never saw a grenade launcher mounted on a Huey. gary

Melgyver wrote:

Putting hot brass down the neck of an "FNG" pilot was sort of a "tradition".  Welcome to the "Guns" sort of thing!

might sound kinda funny, but I cannot actually remember brass flying around inside the Huey. But I'm sure it did. The one thing I still remember most of all was that everything was a light grey that looked like it had been sand blasted. Lots and lots of wear inside there.

gary

Gary,

  Thanks for your service, sir!  When were you in country and what time period?  Whether pintle or bungee or free 60's were used depended on the timeframe, unit, and command SOP for that unit.  Believe me, all types of rigs were used to mount the doorguns and my father definitely fired a door mounted MK 18 MOD 0 grenade launcher from the door of one.  It was mounted on the brackets for the Sagami mount (the mounting system you would have probably used).  Anyway, Welcome to the forum!  Please post any Huey pics you have that might be of interest to us here.

     Ray

Gary,

welcome home!  I didn't experience the brass flying around inside my Hueys and the last thing we'd want to do was 'spook' a green pilot with a hot one down his collar!  It was bad enough when we nicknamed pilots 'Vertigo Joe' and the like...

One of my favorite phrases is 'never say never' especially re Hueys.  There were specific official armament systems that we started out with, then were replaced with something better, then were 'enhanced' locally in the field. There's numerous books out there documenting the known ones.  I knew about auto grenade launcher turret under the Huey's nose, but never knew about a door gunner/CE's mount.  Man, there were times my good ol' M60 just didn't seem to pump em out fast enough (though in reality it was) - and I sure would have liked that auto grenade launcher to play with!

clear right

Howie  

PS - since the model world believes helicopter modelers must also build armor (hence the popular 1/35 scale helos instead of 1/32), I'm going to assume some of you guys DO also build armor, as I do.  Well, FYI, IPMS USA's Head National Armor Judge, Art Gerber, passed away the other night.  I've known him from well back in the last century, and just saw him at the recent IPMS USA Nat's in 'OC.'  IPMS has already agreed to name our Best Armor award after him for now on.  He was a great guy and an awesome small scale modeler - he'd do stuff that would fit in the palm of your hand and simply blow you away!  Sorry to take up space here but like I said, there's the 1/35 helo/armor connection and some of you may have had the pleasure meeting him. 

Howie Belkin wrote:

Gary, welcome home!  I didn't experience the brass flying around inside my Hueys and the last thing we'd want to do was 'spook' a green pilot with a hot one down his collar!  It was bad enough when we nicknamed pilots 'Vertigo Joe' and the like... One of my favorite phrases is 'never say never' especially re Hueys.  There were specific official armament systems that we started out with, then were replaced with something better, then were 'enhanced' locally in the field. There's numerous books out there documenting the known ones.  I knew about auto grenade launcher turret under the Huey's nose, but never knew about a door gunner/CE's mount.  Man, there were times my good ol' M60 just didn't seem to pump em out fast enough (though in reality it was) - and I sure would have liked that auto grenade launcher to play with! clear right Howie   PS - since the model world believes helicopter modelers must also build armor (hence the popular 1/35 scale helos instead of 1/32), I'm going to assume some of you guys DO also build armor, as I do.  Well, FYI, IPMS USA's Head National Armor Judge, Art Gerber, passed away the other night.  I've known him from well back in the last century, and just saw him at the recent IPMS USA Nat's in 'OC.'  IPMS has already agreed to name our Best Armor award after him for now on.  He was a great guy and an awesome small scale modeler - he'd do stuff that would fit in the palm of your hand and simply blow you away!  Sorry to take up space here but like I said, there's the 1/35 helo/armor connection and some of you may have had the pleasure meeting him.

The Heuy that had the grenade launcher must have came around after 1969. We were just starting to see buble top cobras in mid to late Spetember 1968, and we were stunned about the grenade launcher. I did see a couple Hueys that had mini-guns instead of M60's. I just don't remember brass flying around all over the place, but it probably did. When the door get started shooting you were not looking for brass or even the door gun. You were looking at the ground wanting to get out of that helecopter. But then again bailing out of one over elephant grass was a true adventure! Sometimes it was three or four feet high and sometimes it was over six feet. Add that to a five foot deep bomb crater and a hundred twenty pounds on your back. You hollor for help and the cant find you <g> ! I'd die on the first jump if I had to do that now!

     The best one I ever saw was a buddy named Randy from San Antonio hit a bomb crater and landed ontop a skeleton. He screamed bloody murder for ten solid minutes. Wonder if he still remembers that. Wasn't at all funny then, but hilarious now.

gary

Anyone have any good huey nose pics that show details of the stuff you can see through the lower plexiglass (eg, how rear of instrument panel, etc).

I've dug about here and on the net and not much useful to date.  

There was one pic here on p17, but that was pretty well straight on and not enough to model from.

I found one pic on the internet (at valorremembered.org) that shows part of it from one angle:

Mobe,

  Any of these help you out?

      Ray
 

UH-1H

UH-1B

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rotorwash wrote:

Gary,   Thanks for your service, sir!  When were you in country and what time period?  Whether pintle or bungee or free 60's were used depended on the timeframe, unit, and command SOP for that unit.  Believe me, all types of rigs were used to mount the doorguns and my father definitely fired a door mounted MK 18 MOD 0 grenade launcher from the door of one.  It was mounted on the brackets for the Sagami mount (the mounting system you would have probably used).  Anyway, Welcome to the forum!  Please post any Huey pics you have that might be of interest to us here.      Ray

I hit Cam Rhon Bay on the seventh of December 1967, and came back on the 26th of Febuary 1969. But all the time I was in country was spent in I-Corps with the 23rd infantry, or as they called it in 1967 "The Miracle Division." The first LZ I was on was Gator just south of Chu Lai, but often found myself up on Five Four; ten miles north of there. I did ops as far south as Duc Pho and north to Phu Bai. Been in three different countrys while over there, but never did Cambodia ( I did get within a klick on it's northern border).

     I was on Gator for the first week of Tet, and watched them trash the south end of the airbase from about three miles away. After that Gator was just a jumping off point for all points considered. In all that roaming around, I never saw Saigon, or the DMZ (well once from the air). The last nine months I was at A-102 (Thien Phouc), and it actually became the only home I knew. As for helecopters; I've been in five that went down in one way or another, and learned to loath a ride in them. But on the otherhand I've been ontop three tracks that were CBL'd, so I guess I used eight of my nine lives.

gary

Gary,

  Glad you made it back in one piece!  Man, that's a LOT of incidents!  My father was in the 190th AHC at Bien Hoa from October '68 - October '69.  he just missed TET (Thank God).  In his entire tour he was never shot down.  His copilot was shot once and his helo had five small arms holes in the rotor once, but thankfully he never crashed.  It sounds like you and my dada had very different experiences.  That's what is so interesting about talking to Vietnam veterans.  Everyone's ideas about what was "normal" are different.  Thanks for sharing your story.  Do you happen to have any Huey pics you would like to post?

     Ray

Gary

I'll add my 'welcome home' to that.  I was DG with C Co/227 AHB 1st Air Cav 1969-Jan 70, had an easy tour, never shot down; was AWOL in Saigon (R&R was too short)...  There's about everything you'd ever want to know about modeling Hueys here!

clear right

Howie

Gary, 

Welcome home and welcome to the helos forum.  We've got some fantastic contributors here and as Howie said, if there's anything you want to know about modeling the Huey, this is the place for it! 

Jon

AH-64 pilot and Vietnam Army Aviation historian

rotorwash wrote:

Gary,   Glad you made it back in one piece!  Man, that's a LOT of incidents!  My father was in the 190th AHC at Bien Hoa from October '68 - October '69.  he just missed TET (Thank God).  In his entire tour he was never shot down.  His copilot was shot once and his helo had five small arms holes in the rotor once, but thankfully he never crashed.  It sounds like you and my dada had very different experiences.  That's what is so interesting about talking to Vietnam veterans.  Everyone's ideas about what was "normal" are different.  Thanks for sharing your story.  Do you happen to have any Huey pics you would like to post?      Ray

Take this not as a correction, but your Father did fall right into the 1969 Tet Offensive (there also was one in 1967). To what extent it was down South I don't know, but there was one to deal with up north. For us the one in 1969 was much stronger than 1968. I caught the very begining of it, and went home while things were red hot. A102 had what is now known to be three full strength NVA divisons camped out on their north and west side trying to cut the country in half. They didn't get past Thien Phouc needless to say, but it was pretty ugly all the way into the end of April. (there's supposed tobe a pretty good write up about it on the internet)

    The only photo I ever had of a Huey dissappeared with an old girlfriend, and then it was of the interior bullet holes (about six inches above my head). I wouldn't even have known that if it were not for the door gunner grabbing me to take a look. If I'd been in a seat I wouldn't be here right now. Just wasn't my time.

gary

Howie Belkin wrote:

Gary I'll add my 'welcome home' to that.  I was DG with C Co/227 AHB 1st Air Cav 1969-Jan 70, had an easy tour, never shot down; was AWOL in Saigon (R&R was too short)...  There's about everything you'd ever want to know about modeling Hueys here! clear right Howie

I think I did some stuff down by Duc Pho with you guys in the late Spring of 1968. We were leap frogging between Quan Ngai and Dragon & Liz doing a constant search & destroy. The infantry was out of the 4/31st Polar Bears. My job was blowing sampans. Never a boring job.

gary

Regarding the rear of the instrument panels, anyone have any shots? Are the cables all harnessed up/wrapped like in a car and branching off to individual instruments (well a car from that era - I have a 68 Cougar)

Thanks 

Gary,

  1968 TET was the BIG ONE at Bein Hoa.  Check Jon Berstein's (Cobrahistorian) excellent "US Army AH-1 Cobra Units in Vietnam" for an idea of what it was like down there during TET '68.  I'm glad dad missed that one!  By the way, don't worry about correcting me, my friend.  I wasn't there, you were.  If you say TET was worse for you guys in '69, I trust ya!

      Ray

rotorwash wrote:

Gary,   1968 TET was the BIG ONE at Bein Hoa.  Check Jon Berstein's (Cobrahistorian) excellent "US Army AH-1 Cobra Units in Vietnam" for an idea of what it was like down there during TET '68.  I'm glad dad missed that one!  By the way, don't worry about correcting me, my friend.  I wasn't there, you were.  If you say TET was worse for you guys in '69, I trust ya!       Ray

Trust me there was no lack of excitment in I-Corps as well. Chu Lai was probably the prime target in I-Corps because that's where all the Navy and Marine fighter bombers did the turn around on their raids in North Vietnam. Rarely did we ever get an air strike out of Chu Lai, but always seemed to come from Da Nang. They seemed to hit about every place that could be hit with something. It was rough, and I'd have to say for the first two weeks it was pretty much give and take. Still looking back I think that many of us had somekind of an advanced warning that things were about get get ugly (very). We'd all been following the events at Khe San and of course Lang Vie just up the road. We listened to them on the fire push when reception was good. Then they came accross the DMZ and over ran a couple places, and we got ready.

     In 1969 it was different. It was kinda quiet with the usual probes and a few rockets here and there. Then all of a sudden the strip of ground we sat in the middle was the center of attraction for every Tom, Dick & Harry. Giap was smart, as he new there wasn't much if any infantry west of us, and just a re-enforced battalion east of us. For us 1969 was far worse. We had no way to get help by land, and the only way out of there was cut off within minutes. I've heard that there is a book in the works on this one.

     I'd suggest that all you guys that are into armor look for a copy of Dwight Birdwell's "Hundred Miles Of Bad Road." One chapter in there is about Bin Hoa during Tet in 68. It'll make the hair stand up on your head. Tobe exact this book is a must read.

gary

Ray

you read your history right.  Tet '68 was THE Tet everyone 'knows' about.  While I have to respect the enemy soldiers as fierce, determined bastards, I have no respect for folk like Giap, and General Hguyen Chi Thanh who drew up the plans for Tet '68.  How great a general are you if you don't care how many of your people you sacrifice?  That was true back in Dien Bien Phu vs the overwhelmingly out-numbered French, and Tet '68 especially around Khe Sanh.  Some top Vietnamese communists wrote after the war confirming that they thoroughly 'lost' Tet '68 to the point that the Viet Cong were no longer a viable force.  Colonel and diplomat Bui Tin wrote "While the enemy's losses were insignificant, ours were enormous... we did not recover until 1972."  Except of course politically, thanks to Walter Cronkite and company who like their media brethern today, grabbed defeat out of the jaws of victory.

Every year had a Tet but none were as significant as 1968 - unless 'you were there,' having to live through it! 

clear right

Howie

Howie Belkin wrote:

Ray you read your history right.  Tet '68 was THE Tet everyone 'knows' about.  While I have to respect the enemy soldiers as fierce, determined bastards, I have no respect for folk like Giap, and General Hguyen Chi Thanh who drew up the plans for Tet '68.  How great a general are you if you don't care how many of your people you sacrifice?  That was true back in Dien Bien Phu vs the overwhelmingly out-numbered French, and Tet '68 especially around Khe Sanh.  Some top Vietnamese communists wrote after the war confirming that they thoroughly 'lost' Tet '68 to the point that the Viet Cong were no longer a viable force.  Colonel and diplomat Bui Tin wrote "While the enemy's losses were insignificant, ours were enormous... we did not recover until 1972."  Except of course politically, thanks to Walter Cronkite and company who like their media brethern today, grabbed defeat out of the jaws of victory. Every year had a Tet but none were as significant as 1968 - unless 'you were there,' having to live through it!  clear right Howie

an excellent post on what really happened (sorry Dan Rather). In the 1968 Tet Offensive we kicked his butt all the way back into the stoneage, and he still remembers it very well. One estimate has 325,000 KIA on the little guys side of the street. By the end of the month of May the local VC were a rare find, and only existed in small pockets. Yes there were still a few here and there, but most of the leftovers had gone into the Laotian frontier. But what they never really expected was that some folks followed them back into Laos. (SOG teams)

     We still get to hear about how successful they were in taking control of the U.S. Embassy (no they never had control). But they did manage to take control of Cho Lon and actually hold it for a couple of weeks till the 101st and a Panther Battalion evicted them in some of the most brutal house to house fighting the world has ever known to this day. Then there was the Race Track in Siagon (Sin Loi Victor Charles, but it's still Siagon in this old man's book). One batallion from the 101st took that place in one of the bloodiest actions ever seen in modern warfare (you won't see a photo op there as nobody likes to run with the 101st). When it was over there was about a company and a half standing, but the other guys knew they were not ever going to be welcome there again.

     When Giap stepped on Superman's cape he had no idea what kinda dancing partner he had taken up with. Giap learned new names such as "snakeyes" , cobras, and best of all "class A loads." Met the folks from the 1st Air Cav, and 101st Airborne. By the month of June he was sending teenage kids to do his dirty work, and we were burying them just as fast

Lastly: I think everybody here needs to find a copy of "The Valley Of Decision". It's about Khe Sanh and the surrounding AO. It's not like the history chnnel ever dreamed it could have been. The book is very accurate. And after reading it you'll soon figure out who's got the facts and who did a TV show on it.

gary

I thought when a topic was pinned it stayed at the top of the first page, so how come this was half way down page two???

Rich

Pin has now been nailed back in with superglue. Thanks Aaron.

Rich

Well, looks like I'm moving on to restoring a real one. UH-1C #66-00623. Tail numbers and stencils are there as is the Bell Helicopter rebuild data plate but vandals removed the other plates in the nose and Peter Pilot door frame. Anyone know where else I might find a number? This one served with 170th AHC Buccaneers, 135th AHC Taipans and C Troop 16th ACV Bushmasters. Took 6 rounds in 1969 with 170th with 1 WIA after taking hits in the cockpit. Still working on my 1/48th Hog and my 3d GMAX Flight Simulator models for a slew of 174th Sharks gunships.

I'll post a picture tonight of this one. It was modified for weapons test and bears four rockets stenciled to the door. The entire Peter Pilot station was removed, unique panel.