Unusual Vietnam Hueys

Hey guys,

I'm in transit now, but should be at the new LZ by tomorrow evening.  KC, shouldn't be an issue emailing you those files.  Just gimme a little bit to get settled in and I'll get it off to you!

Jon

Jon,

  I hope you don't land in a hot LZ!  Perhaps you should have sent in a smoke ship first and maybe a couple of Blue Maxx birds to prep the LZ for ya!  All kidding aside, I hope you have a safe trip and get settled in soon.  I would also like those gold book files, by the way, if it isn't too much trouble.

     Thanks,

            Ray
 

I could give a good home to a copy of those Gold Book files too if you can see me over here at the back of the que

Andy 

 LZ is cold, repeat LZ is cold...

Landed here safe and sound last night.  Met with my new neighbor (Chief Snake) briefly and we'll be getting together today.  Just have to finish unloadoing and deal with rent, etc and I should have things pretty squared away.  

If you guys want the Gold Book stuff, PM me your mailing address and I'll burn you a copy of the database disk.  Just a warning, though, there are plenty of errors.  Like as high as 20%.  For example, I've got data on a UH-1D that served with the 121st AHC, have the last 3 of its tail number, but the Goldbook doesn't have it serving with the 121st at all.  There are errors, but still, it is an incredible resource and as Meatloaf says, "two outta three aint bad".  

I may not get to it right away, but I'll make sure you get the disks soon.  Don't worry, Andy, I see ya back there and I'll make sure you get one too!  It helped a lot when I was writing the Cobras book!

Later!

Jon
 

Jon,

  Glad you made it OK.  Too bad you had to leave though.  I will be moving to Auburn in few months, and I plan to take up where you left off at the Museum.  It was great to meet you last month.  I'm really glad I could help get you and Col Rubin together, and at least we got to chat in person before your move.  Best of luck!

     Ray

Ron, I found the M21 Hog images on the web sites of the aformentioned units and are the result of hundreds of hours of surfing the net and checking thousands of images of Hueys. Intriguingly, there seems to be a pattern concerning the really unusual Vietnam Hueys-usually You will find just one or a couple of images of a particular bird that will, by default, be missing some crucial information (like tail number, or they will show just one side of the bird, etc.)-isn't that frustrating or what!?!... But I guess that's when one's detective and analytical skills come to play, but sometimes it's just pure luck :) As for Your second question-am I a VN vet or a son of a VN vet: that's a double negative Ron. I am too Young to be a VN vet and was born in a wrong part of the world to be a son of one. I live in Slovenia, Europe (where I was also born) and have no ties to the Vietnam war apart from my obvious interest in vietnam-era choppers. So, my only source of VN chopper-related images, manuals, documents, etc. is the ''almighty web'' :)

Jon, I wish You all the best in Your new LZ! Man, it just dawned on me that You wrote the excellent ''US Army AH-1 Cobra Units in Vietnam''. Great book!

 Here are a couple more pics of UH-1Cs with Heavy M21:

First an image of Maverick 33 of the 175th AHC patrolling the Delta in 1968. It carried nose art honoring the french brew that was available across RVN, that is the famous ''Biere 33 Export''. If You look closely, You will notice the flex ammo chute feeding the right-hand minigun. Note that the aircraft is wearing the late-style yellow-tipped tail rotor scheme, but is missing the engine intake filter screen.

Now, this is a very poor resolution image, but both, flex miniguns and 19-shooters are clearly visible in this shot of Cobra VIII, aka. the Liquidator; She was a UH-1C of the 114th AHC gunship platoon at Vinh long in 1967-68 timeframe.

And the last of the M21 Hogs: a left-hand ''Heavy M21'' combo an a Thunderbird UH-1C of the 336th AHC at Soc Trang.

More to come....    

Marko,

A very big to the forum. You have some great pictures there , i too was born in the wrong place and time to have any direct link to the Vietnam war, but i do my humble best to learn what i can and post what i learn.

This forum (and thread) is great and gets better by the day.

Keep those posts coming

Andy.

Guys,

I will have to say that you guys have really resurrected the FSM helicopter forum.  Its been pretty dead for a while now but Ray, Andy and now Marko have really made an indelible impression.  You guys rock!  I honestly can't wait to get home every day to see what new stuff has been posted.  This thread is living proof of never saying "it never happened" or "that was never done".  

Marko, yep, I did write the Osprey Cobras in Vietnam book and followed it up with another on the Apache in Afghanistan and Iraq.  Thanks very much for the compliment!  I've taken a break from writing for a bit so I can fly the real thing now.  I do have a few books in pre-planning right now, but nothing concrete just yet.  I'm gonna focus on flying for a bit and see what happens with my civilian career.

Lookin forward to seeing what else we can find!

Jon
 

Marko,

  Great pics, as before. I am very impressed with your knowledge of Hueys considering you aren't from these parts. I too have spent hours and hours surfing the web, but must confess I have only recently started looking for unusual Huey stuff.  what occurs to me is that the Unusual in Vietnam is looking more like the norm, but I think that may be because I have my eye out for them and I just pass right over Hog ships and M21 ships these days.  I'll be posting some new pics here pretty soon that i don't think you will find on the web. By the way, while I answer to just about anything, the name's RAY not Ron.  The forum is becoming very international all of a sudden.  reckon we could find a Huey fan in Africa or Anatactica?

     Ray
 

Ray, please accept my sincere appologies for the name fluke. It wasn't intentional. No hard feelings?

I do understand what You mean when You say You just pass over the M21 and Hog ships :) Looking forward to seeing Your new pics...

Best wishes,

Marko  

Jon & Ray, Ron & Jay... same stuff. 

Reminds me of something from many years ago, when the world was still young. And I was too!!!

You can call me Ray. You can call me Ray J. You can even call me R.J.!! But, you doesn't have to call me Mr. Johnson!!!

Anyway, this IS a very interesting post.

Marko,

  No worries about the name thing.  I have certainly been called worse!  I guess it's about time to put up some pics since this is a modelling forum.  Those M21 Hog pics are great.  Here are a couple of a M16 Hog ship (quad 60's and M200 rocket pods).   This bird is from the 336th AHC.  Note by the way that this is a B model.  I think all of the M21 Hogs were more powerful C models.  If the guns look a little strange, it's because the barrels have been removed.  I don't suppose you have any other pics of this setup?

Ray 

[img]http://" border="0" />[/img]

Guys,

  I found this on the 161st website:

What can I say, awesome flying or very good Photoshop work!

   Ray
 

.....or he's been at the spinach and using the tins to fit onto the side of the M60's!!

Rich

Nah.. not impressed !

It was the Crew Chiefs job to ensure the pilot landed safely . He's just taking things a little to far.

Probably just trying to avoid a huey (indoor plant) situation.

Lets see him try that with a Chinook!! Now that would be impressive.

(bloody show off) .

Andy

Ray,

Good to see the M16/19-shooters combo too; I only have the M21/M200 photos that I already posted, but I am allways on the lookout for unusual/non-standard Huey configurations. So, if I find some more heavy M21 or M16 Huey photos I will certainly post them :) And as things are going here we might even come to see M21/M5 or M16/M5 armed Hueys :)

I got some new stuff for You guys though. The first set of images is of a UH-1B 63-08673 of the 117th Aviation Company (Air Mobile Light) from 1964/65. This bird was armed with the XM14 .50 cal gun pods. Each pod housed the M3 .50 cal MG with 750 rounds and a rate of fire of 1100-1250 rpm! Though the XM14 was a standardised piece of equipment it only saw limited use in Vietnam. In fact, I have only ever seen pictures of this particular UH-1B armed with XM14. I just love the early 117th tiger stripe camouflage! This Huey went under three different names: KARIN (painted on the nose), Cigar 6 (crossed cigars and 6 on both pilots doors) and Woody (don't know how this name came about).

The nose art included a small figure of a soldier in tiger stripe fatigues peeing red tracer fire on both door posts and what was supposed to be a stylized ''angry'' Huey on both XM14 pods.

Note that this Huey had a mkVIII sight mounted on the co-pilots side too and didn't have the armored seats yet, but early style armored panels.

The next image shows a UH-1B of the 68th Aviation Company (Armed Helicopter) (ex UTTHCO) at Soc Trang prior to a POW camp raid around Rach Gia in 1965. Note the door gunner is wearing a gas mask and the unusual XM3 system. This was a XM3 modified to dispense grenades; they could load 8 smoke, WP or CS grenades per tube. I remember reading about this grenade dispensing XM3 somewhere and it was initialy designed for laying smoke screens, but this is the only photo of it I've ever seen. Obviously the system is loaded with CS grenades in this photo. Does anybody have any additional info on this unusual system?

This is a Marine UH-1E TV29 of the HML-167 at Marble mountain in late 1970 armed with CBU-55 FAE cluster bombs. As far as I know only the Marines used this awesome weapon on helicopters operationaly (navy HA(L)-3 used a couple of UH-1L/HH-1K Hueys that had the capacity to carry CBU-55s, but for reasons unknown to me never used this weapons operationaly. They even installed specialized bomb sights in the chin bubbles, but...). CBU-55 was a 500-pound weapon containing three BLU-73 FAE submunitions and was used primarily against bunker and tunnel complexes. I believe there are a couple more images of CBU-55 armed UH-1Es on the ''popasmoke'' website.

I saw that You guys were discussing the mk115 mod 0 Helicopter Trap Weapon some time ago. Well, in case somebody decides to build a HTW armed UH-1E I dug a couple of drawings of the mk115 mod 0 with dimensions. mk115 was a modified mk63 60-pound 5-inch Zuni warhead. What they did is, they took the thin outer casing of the warhead, replaced the fragmentation cube liner with two layers of rectangular steel rods that were welded at alternate ends and attached the parachute and suspension lugs.

Marko    

Marko,

  Great pics, man!  I alreay had the one of the 50 cal system, but the others are new.

"And as things are going here we might even come to see M21/M5 or M16/M5 armed Hueys :)"

  Funny you should mention that:

[img]http://[img]http://[img]http://[img]http://

The first three are the XM50 system and are pics from the Army Aviation Museum archive. The lower one is a pic of a M16/M5 system (the original version of the Monogram Huey Hog) from tha Squadron Gunslingers In Action book by Lou drendel.  All four of these birds are Charlie models.  They were the only ones with a chance in you know where of getting off the ground with this armament configuration (except for a UH-1M).  Notice the last bird is incorrectly identified as a Bravo model, but the 540 rotor head identifies it as a Charlie.  Alao, Bravo sported the T53 L9 and Charlie model had T53 L11 engine.  Mike model had a T53 L13.  Currently the holy grail of armamant pics is a picture of either one of these setups in the field.  I think all the pics above are of test birds, but i don't have much data on them.

  Ray
 

     Ray
 

Grandad,

  Yeah, I guess I should call all 540 rotor equipped Army birds UH-C/M, but since most were C's i just usually call them Charlies.  The photos of C/M birds without the particale filters are almost certainly C's, however.  I believe all the one's I posted are C's.  The last two have nose mounted FM antannae as well (meaning they're too early to be a M).

    Ray
 

Ray,

Great stuff! I've been looking for XM50 armed UH-1Cs for quite some time-not much luck except the one or two photos in the Squadron UH-1 Huey Gunships Walkaround. Did You by any chance find some photos of the interior of XM50 Hueys? I would really like to see the arrangement of ammo boxes, since both M21 and M5 ammo boxes took up the same space in the cabin. Man, I really envy You US guys for having access to such great collections and museums like the ft. Rucker Army Aviation Museum. From Your photos of the XM50 it seems that both systems (M21 and M5) were integrated and aimed using a common sighting station similar to the M21 sighting station (it can be seen stowed in the last XM50 image You posted).

I think we might at least have a chance of seeing M5/M16 combo on Vietnam Hueys. And I've got two reasons for believing that this combo was at least tested in Vietnam:

1) I have a 1972 UH-1B maintenance manual, and there is a note under the armament subsystems section saying that M5 could be used in conjunction with the M16-this is further referenced to M16 armament subsystem manual. So if anybody following this forum happens to have a M16 armament subsystem manual, I would really appreciate if they could check it up and possibly provide some additional info on M5/M16 combo.

2) I stumbled upon this image of Lou Drendel's painting of what was suppose to be a UH-1B of C troop 1st Squadron 9th Cavalry at Phu Cat in 1966. Since Lou Drendel's artwork is usually historically accurate, we may assume that he painted this UH-1B according to some photographic reference... Huey buffs will immediately notice the short rotor mast associated with UH-1A (mistake on Lou's part, I guess :).

I know that several images of INFANT UH-1Ms were allready posted here, but we mostly get to see test birds and INFANT NETT birds. So I am posting a couple of images of a 191st AHC UH-1M INFANT. It is quite frustrating that there are so few images of INFANT Hueys from Vietnam.

Marko  

Ok, here's a couple of pics for you guys.  We all know what the M5 looked like in Vietnam, but have you ever seen the early experimental model (the XM-5):

 " border="0" />

" border="0" />

Now you have!  Note by the way that this pic is of an Alpha model.  I was very excited to say the least when I ran across these pics in tha Army Aviation Museum archives!

Here's another pic that I have NO IDEA what the system being tested is.  Please help me out somebody.  There was no info with the photo:

[img]http://

This system is on a UH-1H, but that's about all I know.

    Ray
 

Ray,

I haven't got a clue what the system on the UH-1H is!?! In fact, I wouldn't even dare to guess! And what's with that screen fitted to the co-pilot's door? Strange looking rig indeed. That early XM5 system really looked crude :)

I found a couple of images of XM3 armed UH-1B 64-14054 of C/2/20 ARA at LZ Lane in 1967/68. Note the CS grenade dispenser mounted in the cabin; I think it is the modified XM3 I mentioned in one of the previous posts, just that C/2/20 ARA had it mounted in the cabin. I have never seen this configuration before.

Marko

Marko,

  Great pics as usual.  Ever seen an ALE 29 countermeasures dispenser mounted on an Army Huey?

[img]http://

I'm sure this was just a test bird, but you can see the unit is mounted on an M156 universal mount.  I thought this might mesh with your flare dispenser theme.

   Ray
 

Here's a very unusual Huey that i also posted in the Unusual Cammo thread. It is a UH-1B that has a nice tiger stripe cammo and presumably a quad M-200 rocket pod armamant system!  I call this the Super Hog!

It looks to be a 1t Cav bird (sorry UTTHCO, thanks Marko), but I really have no data on it.  I woudl be happy for any info anyone could provide.

 Here's a system I have no clue what to make of.  I was wondering if it is a smoke generator of some sort.  as far as I knew extra fuel tanks were carried in the passenger cabin, right?  But then again what would a rescue bird need with a smoke generator? By the way, the little label on the canister says Bell Helicopter, so it must have been manufactured for them.

[img]http://[

Next is a experimental FLIR system I guess?  Jon, please correct me if I'm wrong.

[img]http://[

Finally, I hesitate to even post this one, but does anyone know EXACTLY what type of missile this is?  After the fiasco last time, I ain't even gonna guess!

[img]http://[

I really thought I knew a lot about Hueys but this post has me feeling kinda like this:

[img]http://" border="0" />

   Ray
 

Ray,

Fantastic stuff! I guess that so many unusual systems were tested on Hueys, that maybe even the Army lost track of them all :) As for that quad 19-shooter UH-1B, it was a UTTHCO (Utility Tactical Transport Helicopter Company) bird, not the 1st Cav. The UTTHCO was tasked with testing new weapons and developing gunship tactics. They would camouflage their UH-1Bs in three tone tiger stripe pattern in the early 60s and apply crossed sabres on most of their Hueys. The unit went through a lot of name changes: from UTTHCO to 68th Aviation Company (Armed helicopter), then 197th Aviation Company (Armed Helicopter) and finally 334th AWC. I think I got some more pictures of UTTHCO birds and info on the unit, just give me some time to dig it up :) The same quad mount was also used to test other ordnance such as XM14 .50 cal gun pods, napalm canisters, GP and frag bombs, smoke generators... Also, the 19-shooters in picture aren't Army M200 but USAF LAU-3.

I believe that roof mounted sighting system is more likely to be some experimental optical sight for some missile system (like for TOW) rather than FLIR. I could be wrong though :)

Marko 

Marko,

  How do you know the rocket pods are LAU-3's?  ACTIV (Army Concept Team In Vietnam) also tested lots of new weapons systems as well.  What are your sources for your info?  I'm always looking for new refs!

      Ray

EDIT: I found a report by ACTIV on the Virtual Vietnam Archive from 1964.  UTTHCO was one of the testbed units for armed Huey concepts examined in ths report.  the other two were the 118th and 120th Airmobile Companies (light).  UTTHCO had 20 armed UH-1B's and the 118th and 120th had 8 each.  Anyway, the units tested both the LAU-3A 19 shot pods and the LAU-32A seven shot pods as well as the M-6 quad M60C system.  There is no ref to quad LAU-3A's, but pics don't lie!

rotorwash wrote:

Marko,   How do you know the rocket pods are LAU-3's?  ACTIV (Army Concept Team In Vietnam) also tested lots of new weapons systems as well.  What are your sources for your info?  I'm always looking for new refs!       Ray

They probably are LAU-3's as the M-200 didn't yet exist when that photo was taken. That cammo paint scheme predates the introduction of the M-200. The scheme wasn't just used by UTTHCO but also was seen on 114th and 117th unit helicopters. The crossed sabers have appeared on photos linked to UTTHCO but as of yet I have not found them elsewhere.

Chief Snake 

Chief,

  Yeah, I kinda figured that out later (see my edit above).  Exactly when were the M200 pods introduced and where can I go for that documentation?

   Thanks,

           Ray