[Stock] 1:1 F-14 Tomcat replica

[Servo]

Stock 1:1 F-14 Tomcat

The F-14 Tomcat is one of the most iconic U.S. fighters, ranking along the P-51 Mustang, F-86 Sabre, and the F-4 Phantom in the lists of the greatest fighters of all time. Its wide versatility, immediately recognizable swing-wing, and appearance in Top Gun add to its appeal. In the air, the F-14 was a Mach 2.2, carrier based fighter-bomber designed with experience fighting MiGs in Vietnam. As a capable dogfighter, the F-14 earned 160 kills versus only 10 losses to enemy fire in the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. And now, finally to you, so you can take the highway to the danger zone while reliving tales of aerial combat and trial by fire.

This is a 1:1 scale replica of the F-14 Tomcat, complete with a pair of air-to-air missiles and swing wings.

Controlling the wings is simple. Simple use action group 1 to toggle the wings forward, and action group 2 to toggle them backward. Note that you have to stage to release the wings first. Most of the time, the wings should snap into position by themselves, but sometimes you have to adjust the limit on the airbrakes manually in order to move the docking ports so that it docks. The F-14 can be flown without/halfway docked wings, but landing and time warp are discouraged.

Takeoff is really simple. Pitch-up at 40m/s and it's off like a rocket. Landing is much harder. To land safely, come in really hot, at full throttle (non-afterburning), above 120m/s at a low glideslope. As soon as the wheels stick, kill the throttle and brake hard, and it comes to a stop quickly.

 

 

 

Guide for Aerial Combat:

Due to the magic of Target Hold on SAS, it is very easy to control a large number of craft in the air at the same time. When I was flying my dogfights, I had a single "lead" aircraft that each of the other craft were targeting. This made flying the entire swarm around very easy, once they made it into the air. Getting five planes airborne at the same time was a feat in and of itself. My method is extremely quick, and requires lining up aircraft slightly farther apart than their takeoff roll (this is extremely easy with the F-14s, which take off in under 200m). The intent is so that as soon as you lift off with one craft, you are passing over the next one in line (within 200m), so the entire chain takes off before the lead plane passes the end of the runway. From there, it is merely a matter of maintaining speeds (ideally, they should be equal, but 2-3m/s is excusable) so that one plane doesn't turn into a guided missile. From there, simply have the lead plane make a hard yaw to spread out the chase planes, and begin dogfighting.

In order to fire the missiles, decouple them and select the target and the target hold on SAS. After you have done that, you can switch back to the F-14 and continue flying. The missiles are fire-and-forget, so multiple can be targeting a plane at the same time. This can lead to swarms of missiles chasing their target, as for what they lose in accuracy, they make up for in flight time. Often, unless the probe core is destroyed, they will follow their target all the way to the ground.

I am also including the F-5 (or MiG-28, if that suits your fancy), as it has a very comparable top speed, and is armed with two unguided rockets. They can make excellent target dummies adversaries in dogfights.

 

Download Links:

F-14: https://kerbalx.com/servo/F-14-Tomcat

F-5: https://kerbalx.com/servo/F-5-Freedom-Fighter

I would like to give a massive thanks to the people upon whose shoulders this was built on, first and foremost @Torquimedes for his own amazing stock F-14, which inspired me to begin building swing-wing aircraft in the first place, and also to @Jon144 for designing the bearing which I ultimately used on the F-14 wings.

Enjoy!

-Servo

 

Edited March 5, 2017 by Servo

[Munbro Kerman]

18 minutes ago, Servo said:

F-14

Just beautiful. I've never seen a F-14 replica this accurate, spectacular job to you, good sir.

[Servo]

11 hours ago, Munbro Kerman said:

Just beautiful. I've never seen a F-14 replica this accurate, spectacular job to you, good sir.

Thanks! I spent more time on this craft that I think I have on any other one I've ever released, so I hope it lives up to expectations.

Here are some more gifs of it going through its paces:

Wing Sweep:

Flyby:

 

[Majorjim!]

Amazing work mate, truly. 

[Matuchkin]

^He's a wild card, flies by the seat of his pants.

[Yobobhi]

"Now you too can take the highway to the danger zone"

The description is almost as good as the craft, great work man!

 

[MiffedStarfish]

Great craft! What are you using to actuate the bearings? I have my own F-14 Tomcat that I am working on, but the main problem is the range of the wings. I am using elevons, and they move about half as much as I need them to.

(sorry if this is a necropost, but the thread isn't to old.)

[Servo]

5 hours ago, MiffedStarfish said:

Great craft! What are you using to actuate the bearings? I have my own F-14 Tomcat that I am working on, but the main problem is the range of the wings. I am using elevons, and they move about half as much as I need them to.

(sorry if this is a necropost, but the thread isn't to old.)

Short answer: download it and take a look for yourself

Long answer: the bearing is made from a cage of I-beams, surrounding a mk0 tank. It's actuated by a pair of airbrakes. There are docking ports on the wing that allow it to dock in both positions. Another important part is the "wing glove", the part of the fuselage that sandwiches the wing to keep it from moving up and down.