Vietnam Huey

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 

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

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

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

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,

  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

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

Mobe,

  Any of these help you out?

      Ray
 

UH-1H

UH-1B

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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:

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

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. 

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

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

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

Howie,

Transmission received and understood! 

Howie

Well said mate

Andy

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  

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.

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 

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". 

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

I'll third that!  While we sit here and debate the minutae of Huey details (this panel needs to be fixed, those rivets are too big, that Huey didn't fly with that armament system) we often lose sight of the fact that we're pretty lucky that the Huey kits out there are pretty good and pretty accurate.  The MRC kits are some of the best models straight out of the box.  Sure there's aftermarket stuff, but don't take those as absolutely necessary in order to build a decent model!  As Gino said, build for yourself!  This is supposed to be fun!

I know that I have begun to suffer from severe AMS (Advanced Modelers Syndrome) and often have difficulty just building a model straight out of the box.  As for Andy's "Mustang 6", well... AMS has become an art form in its own right with him!  I just nod, pick my jaw up off the floor and wish I could do something somewhere close to his magic.  

DON'T BE DISCOURAGED!  BUILD THOSE HUEYS!

(and don't be afraid to toss in some resin too! ;) )

Jon
 

Gino is so right!  I have gotten bogged dowm in the details, but I wish I had built a few beforehand just for fun.  Besides, just call it a NOSTALGIC BUILD and have FUN!  That's what this hobby is supposed to be about in the first place.  The world can't have enough Huey models!

   Ray
 

HeavyArty wrote:

You shouldn't really be discouraged.  Most of the things that the AM and PE sets correct are not really huge inaccuracies.  Most of them would only be caught by a crew chief or us rivet counters.  You can make some very nice Huey kits straight out of the box on most of them.  Add a few scratch-built items and you can have a really great looking model.  Remember, you only need to build for yourself, not others.  If you are happy with it, it is great.

Thanks for the advise. I've still feel utterly devestated. Especially after seeing that magnificent Huey "Mustang"...

The photo etched instrument panels are something I really will take as a minimum from now though. Since I restarted with modelling again, I've tried painting instrument panels, and I still stink... That and etched panel lines vs the old style raised panel lines. That is one reason I'm dumping (or just using for practice) the old hasagewa and monogram kits I have.

For the Huey "Frog" model I'll probably pick up the Eduard interior PE kit. For the Monogram 24th Huey, it's fate is undecided... I might park it another 5 years.

I see from all the Huey threads I'm going to have to get pickier on the kits I buy. Actually, I feel closer to just giving up before I start.

I love Hueys. I made my first Huey when I was about 6 or 7, and it was a bad kit - I still remember the left half of the fuselage had the nose bent down below the windshield so I couldn't even finish it half decent (of course these days I could fix that with some heat and putty.

Before today I was looking forward to making my 1/24 Monogram Huey, and thought it was a good kit with good detail. Now, I understand that is it a bad kit with bad detail and scale. Even that new Dragon Huey, which I thought was an utterly awesome model - well, third party patch kits are already out for it to fix up inaccuracies on stuff I have no idea what they really people are talking about. I sort of believe in only doing something if I can do a good job. Now I'm not sure I can. And now that if I'm going to have to buy $70 worth of patches from Eduard for the MRC Huey "Frog" to be able to gain a good level of accuracy and detail, I'm starting to feel like dumping these kits in the bin.

I'm thinking I'll just stick to sci fi kits. Something not based in reality where I'm not going to have to worry so much about "fuel pump on the wrong side", or gearbox wrong, or the like...

I really am feeling somewhat overwhelmed, dejected, and lost at where to start...

Ray,

Im just going on what ive heard from the 1st Cav Crew guys, though like you say its also possible that on a higher level the reasoning for the left side bag was due to the position of the tail rotor. Though its also worth considering that the left side M60 "ejection port" faced away from the TR and towards the Crew compartment unlike the right side gun, also, as far as i know, the "Slick" door gunners would only usually be allowed to fire on the first initial approach into an LZ at which point they would be on short final, descending and not flying fast enough for spent brass ejected from the right side of the left gun to fly back and towards the tail rotor. Though i could be wrong. 

If the TR was the main reason behind the bags on slicks,it seems strange that the right side gun was not fitted with them, as the "ejection port" on the right faces the TR direction and shells could fly back and over the tail boom. I suppose it all depends on who tells you what and so far the info ive been given all points away from TR damage as the main reason for the left side bags. Though that doesnt by any means mean im right or that the info i have is right, it just means that as ever there are conflicting accounts of what was going on or why, in Vietnam, which isnt really a surprise. Anyway its all trivial but interesting .

Grandad,

Well that rules out 778's blade being re-painted . I have no idea what the colour of the blades were, i always presumed (though i shouldnt) that those that were not white were OD but on closer inspection the blades in the photo look black, so thanks for that . You have saved me from a modelling boo boo, as i would have probably painted mine OD (ive gone back and corrected the post with the info you gave me).