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High flights.. How high have you flown in a Herk?


M_Wales
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When I was stationed at Langley we took 63-7838 to 36000 on a trip out to Hill AFB Utah--Capt Thyssen (sp)(I think) was the pilot and he wanted to see how high we could go since the ceiling was 36 thou on the E model--Needless to say we where hanging on the props--a united flight wanted to know if we where trying to resupply sky-lab when the controller ask what kind of plane we where on--

I believe our cabin pressure was at something like 8500 to 9000--had plenty of pressurization

Smitty

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When I was stationed at Langley we took 63-7838 to 36000 on a trip out to Hill AFB Utah--Capt Thyssen (sp)(I think) was the pilot and he wanted to see how high we could go since the ceiling was 36 thou on the E model--Needless to say we where hanging on the props--a united flight wanted to know if we where trying to resupply sky-lab when the controller ask what kind of plane we where on--

I believe our cabin altitude was at something like 8500 to 9000--had plenty of pressurization

Smitty

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On one cross country was flying from Minot to Homestead during the winter months and we went up to 35,000 feet. This was in my H-3 that was only about year and half old, good pressurization, don't remember what the cabin altitude was.

We only stayed at 35K for about an hour, we were always getting vectored out of the way of the airliners that were overtaking us.

73, Rex

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Was in a spook A model outfit in mid 60s. Our mission altitude was 32,000 ft., 150kias, 10% flaps. Early on, cabin altitude was 10,000ft. When landing after an 8.7 hr. mission believe me, you were beat. After much complaining we succeded in getting an expired TCTO cw that strengthned fuseladge skin. After that cabin altitude was 3,500 ft. Time to climb was on the order of 45 mins. At cruise, engine fuel flow would be about 500 pph, total ff of about 2,000 pph . Mission takeoff weight was always at or very near max gross takeoff weight.

During phase inspection it was not unusuall to do depot level mx on the flaps. Our sheet metal honcho, a SSgt, was supurb.

Edited by larry myers
erroroneous statement
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Somewhere around March or so 1973, flyin' out of langley, also, we took a ship, can't remember the tail number, to 35,000. Capt, mcEchron I believe was the AC. at least it is him in the left seat in the picture I have showin' the altimeter. We were goin' to Mountain Home, ID. step climbed on the way out. Salt lake Center, i think it was, asked aircraft type confirmation. Some airline guy asked why we were up that high, I told the Ac to tell him we had 10,000 pounds fo Tang for Sky Lab. Then, to show us the error of our ways, the main landing gear froze, and wouldn't extend. Had to bounce around don't remember how long now, for it to thaw out

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LRF, school sqd, '81-'82 timeframe, 10 hour nav OW - 42,500' on the way back to LRF after nav training had finished. At least the co-pilot had his helment and O2 on, per the regs. Cabin alt, hmmmmm, ah, 10,000'. Can't remember the tail number but it probably was one of the '73 H models.

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LRF, school sqd, '81-'82 timeframe, 10 hour nav OW - 42,500' on the way back to LRF after nav training had finished. At least the co-pilot had his helment and O2 on, per the regs. Cabin alt, hmmmmm, ah, 10,000'. Can't remember the tail number but it probably was one of the '73 H models.

Wow thats high in a herk... Shortly after that those Super E's/H's from Little Rock became EC-130H's...

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By the way, is anybody remember above what cabin altitude the flying crew required to be on oxygen.

Our “SOP†–if memory not against me- state:-

8,000 night time.

10,000 day time, and maybe it is limited to certain time.

Table attached showing cabin altitude in relation to aircraft altitude when deferential pressure at normal maximum (15.18) Hg.

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Wow thats high in a herk... Shortly after that those Super E's/H's from Little Rock became EC-130H's...

Yeah, that was after my time at LRF. Left there in May '82. Sure was nice flying those. Had to keep a lot of students from over torquing them on T&Gs. Extra pubs added to the book bag weight but not much.

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Yeah, that was after my time at LRF. Left there in May '82. Sure was nice flying those. Had to keep a lot of students from over torquing them on T&Gs. Extra pubs added to the book bag weight but not much.

I was at Pope when they left to be modded, but I caught up with 6 of them at Sembach in 1987-1990.

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Low thirties, Yokota to Elmo in an E-Model. An empty airplane, but with the standard gas stop fragged at Shemya. Once we got going, and I looked at the winds, I knew we could bypass that damn rock (got stuck there one day for a week) so I kept crunching the 1-1. By the time we were talking to Shemya on VHF, I told the pilot "Press on, let's get to Elmo, we got this thing" and so we put Shemya under the nose and pressed. By the time we checked in with Anchorage on VHF, we were in the high twenties and eventually stepped the old girl up to the low thirties. Of course, at that point we were sipping gas, with max cabin diff and a cabin at or near 10 grand. We took the obligatory picture of the altimeter with our name tags around it, and then dropped her into Elmo with plenty of gas to spare. Full stop, go to Humpy's, grab some halibut chunks and then on to Koots!

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I think we got up to 34K once. It was coming back to the Deid from northern Iraq. The copilot was new, but eager to learn. The AC recognized the talent and instead of talking about high altitude flight, decided to demo it.

That airplane popped and pinged as we went up and the airframe got colder. I wasn't sure it would be ok. But it was. The heater couldn't keep up and we all ended up on the flight deck.

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