OT:snake art

[txpete]

a good friend of mine made this for me and I just got it last week.mario is a navy vet and did this from a old photo.I am going to get it framed and its going in the gun room beside my old flight helmet.

[JReed]

Nice. I will always be a fan of the snake

[Hobie]

Snakes are our friends...

[BigSky56]

Pete it was pure pleasure to watch my pink team snake work over charlie gotta love them birds Ive watched him make a rocket run pull up and away and do a pedal turn and be back on target just as charlie was crawling out of hiding to shoot at them. We never got heat rounds just used 17 lbers to knock out T54's hit them in the butt,engine area, when the crew ditches the tank hose them down. Worked many a tank humping mission, I think you have the pic of taking out a T54. Blue Max 79 ARA got the new heat rounds. danny

[Ysabel Kid]

Very cool!

[BigSky56]

Pete those 4 tube holders on the end of the wing what kind of missile do they hold. danny

[txpete]

danny those 4 tube launchers were for TOW missles.the AH-1S and AH-1Q were just mod's to the old G model snake.they would blow the lid off a T72 no problem.a good friend of mine dave CWO flew G's in nam with the M35 20MM 6 barrel on the wing store and took out a few tanks with it.the problem was you had to retorque everything on the bird after you shot it .
I worked on my first AH-1S (mod) tow in 79 when I went to germany and the 2nd cav.(ACR) where we flew the border against the evil empire.we had several mine laying hueys with M60D's and 21 snakes.I was aircraft armament but being in the cav we did just about anything.I crewed a huey for a while and on the aircraft recovery team.
I started off working on hueys and G's and was a T.I. on the apache when I retired out of 1st cav 227 avn.



moc up for school for the new tow system



the toilet bowl mod to reduce heat signature and we had apr-39's that would strobe if they had lock on.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ye0fjkjYmOU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfuqXIVq ... re=related

[BigSky56]

Pete are Tows wire guided or?
There was a unit that had SS-11 french wire guided on the charlie model gunships you had to come to a complete hover above the trees to shoot, the peter pilot guided it by using a crude sight and a joy stick, you were a sitting target till it impacted, kept the CE & DG busy with free mounted 60's. danny

[Hobie]

The TOW is wire-guided but the optics are used by the operator to guide the missile one doesn't have to fly them. Now they have fire and "forget" systems and periscopes so that the aircraft can remain in defilade and still engage targets.

[txpete]

hobie nailed it.in the snake once the missle launches you track it (guide it) to the target.the missle has a IR source in the tail and the TSU (optics) in the nose picks up the IR and a joy stick is used to guide the missle.
the hellfire is a total different game.I won't go into detail but its a fire and forget weapon .
the last cobra was alot like the old huey gunships.once they put all those black boxes optics and fire control computers and the M197 20MM it was heavy.full up weapons load they would have to burn almost 1/2 a bag of gas to pull pitch .
I went thru the apache transition in 1990 when they were deactivating 1/9 cav and moth balling the snakes.when I got here to ft hood 1/7 still had 7 cobras in 1st cav.they were turning them in when I retired in 94 and drawing the kiowa warriors.it was sad to see the old snake go....

pete