W.H.BECKETT ୆ K.P.RICE ୆ M.E.KING

« Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Next »

The YOV-10, Product of the "System" continued

Other countries were interested, but were constrained by still more political considerations. For example, the Canadian Air Force actually liked the concept. They were heavy into peacekeeping at the time and the OV-10's military/utility characteristics would have been particularly appropriate. However, their budget was used-up procuring F-5s which the Air Force despised, but had been pushed politically in both Canada and the US.

Spain provided a similar example. After a very successful trip to Venezuela with a company team that worked directly with their air force, we proposed the same thing to the Spanish air force. This idea was reinforced by the fact that an OV-10 was flying to the Paris Air Show at the time and was scheduled to stop at Rota Air Base on the way. The Spanish air force answer was a polite, "Not only no, but hell no." Seeking the cause of this unexpected reaction, we later found out that previously they had welcomed such a team from Northrop to evaluate the F-5. When the Spanish air force rejected the F-5 after this evaluation, Northrop sold it anyway through political connections involving the US DOD, the King of Belgium and Franco. They were, understandably, taking no chances of a repeat.

In spite of such politics, the OV-10 was eventually also procured for the air forces of Morocco, Philippines, Columbia and Korea. In addition to the earlier buys by Venezuela, Indonesia, Thailand and Germany, together with the USAF, USMC and USN, the OV-10 eventually served in eleven air forces.

Through the late '60s a variety of improvements were proposed by North American including a transport version, proposals for a Harvey designed recoilless rifle, a bomb bay for ground and aviation ordnance, infra red suppressors for protection against missiles, side firing guns (like the c-47 "Puff the Magic Dragon"), loudspeakers for psy-warfare and a smoke screen capability. Also, the newly developed fuel-air explosive bombs which are many times more powerful than the conventional type were demonstrated in the OV-10. The only items that made it to Vietnam were the infra red shield, the smoke generator and the fuel-air explosive, CBU-55. I don't know what the evaluation was on the infra red shield, but, as noted earlier, the smoke generator was received enthusiastically by the users - so much so that they wouldn't return the test aircraft for months. None of these items made it into regular use.

It is interesting to note here that defense oriented industry was even less willing to fund demonstrators than the government. For example, North American has a full scale mock-up of their transport version in '65 and most of their competitors had at least designs and brochures. However, none of them would risk the money to actually build a demo aircraft. Eventually, a cheaper, but less capable, similarly configured aircraft, the Shorts "Skyvan" took over this significant market niche with only moderate competition from a similarly configured Israeli Aircraft Industries offering.

The only real "improvement" that got onto production was the OV-10D Night Observation Gun-ship (NOGS) which had bigger (1000hp) engines and advanced night vision devices coupled to a 20mm cannon in a remotely controlled turret. (You can always get bigger and more complex.) While the turret was later dropped after a landing accident, similar systems were put on helicopter gun-ships.

In '69, I left North American to join KP at China Lake where he headed a new group pushing advanced aircraft systems. Mixed in with a number of missile, weapon and aircraft projects we tried again to get the recoilless rifle airborne. At the time, Piper was pushing a modified P-51 for roles similar to the OV-10. Their "Enforcer" modification had a much more powerful (and lighter) turboprop engine, lots of armor and impressive speed and maneuverability. A retired Air Force colonel who knew KP was heading the project and had also become a believer in the recoilless rifle. It was through this program that we finally got a recoilless rifle fired from an aircraft.

In the event, an Army P-51, supported for maintenance and parts by the Air Force, was flown from a naval base (China Lake) by a Marine pilot for the demonstration. The recoilless rifles were unmodified infantry weapons and were mounted on the wingtips to obviate any problems with back-blast. The test went off rather well, and, although not a test of accuracy, the pilot, Maj. Pippa, reported that the rounds went right where they were pointed.

Unfortunately, the people selling the Enforcer not only bucked Air Force policy, they also infuriated some of the top brass with their sales tactics. This resulted in letters from the Chief of Staff, USAF to the Chief of Naval Operations and then down the chain of command to the CO of the Naval Weapons Center, China Lake, to the effect that no more tests, or even mention of this aircraft would be tolerated. That was the end of the Enforcer.

In spite of this, we did, finally , get a feasibility test of the recoilless rifle on the OV-10. A standard, unmodified infantry type recoilless rifle was mounted on the centerline of an OV-10A. The OV-10 was then hoisted into the air by a crane and the rifle fired remotely. The gun fired appropriately, but the back-blast and shock wave from the unmodified nozzle slightly damaged the rudder trim tabs. I considered this quite a success considering the fact that a modified nozzle, like that suggested by Dr. Musser, together with the flight speed of the aircraft would take care of the problem on any production installation. Even without these obvious modifications, a slight beef-up of the trim tabs would have taken care of the problem. Nonetheless, the damaged trim tabs were used as a basis for ending all further tests.

« Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Next »