Spectre623

After 30 years of hammerin' on those old dump trucks I'd take anything over that leaking, outta balance, outta sinc Ham Stan piece of junk...still love that old Herk though!! ha ha Bill

Whaaat? They have a weather program on the Weather Channel????When??? Naaaa! ha ha .Bill

Good one Jim. If you ain't been sick in a 130 you ain't flown much in one , ha ha. Bill :)

Well yer so right Don R... after banging around on 130's for over 30 years I can almost tell the difference... heh heh. I know the J is a great bird but I still would have went with an FE just for the added safety factor and to help keep the zero's awake, ha ha . Bill

Recorded 2 episodes Donwon and enjoyed it also. Now if they would go along on a gunship and film an actual mission I could get into that...even an old trash haul or troop drop would do ha ha. I noticed something about the flt deck....they left the FE at home. Must have needed the room for the film crew.They even took his seat out!!!!!!! Oh well thats the movies for ya! Bill

Ben if my memory is correct it is where Lockheed connected the hose to pressurize the fuselage when the bird is first built. The A models were pumped up ( max press proof test) to 10 psi until they blew the cargo ramp open as a woman employee was walking under it and it did some brain damage. Last I knew they only took it to 8psi. ( It could have been 12 psi, lowered to 10 psi later on, been so long ago...) I remember the swing shift sealent crew took their snacks and newspapers into the bird at the start of the shift and didn't come out till either dinner break or quitting time. They would find air leaks and squirt B and 1/2 sealent into the cracks and the air pushed it into the crack. Yes, it would be pressurized to a lower psi while they were inside sealing. Bill.

That would be Gen. Westmorelands VIP ride during VN wouldn't it Jim? The AF wanted to give him a VC-131 but he wanted the Whale, guess he won. Bill

Hey Jerry, like you and the others on this board, our versions of Vietnam and the thing we did then are just our "snapshot" in time. We love rehashing them and all I was doing was throwing a little techinal junk into the conversation. We all love to hear each others "I was there" comments. Keep'em coming Jerry and don't pay me no mind, ha ha . Bill

Jerry,the engine on the B-52 ( all but the H) were J-57's with 13,750 lbs of thrust and were twice as long as a J-85 with 3000 lbs of thrust that were hung on the C-123 and Sam, 1966, is when they started converting them . Bill

Leon Panetta visited CRB a few days ago...wonder if he stayed on Herky Hill, ha ha. Says he wants more access to CRB and VN. Ok you Herk troops, get ready for CRB rote inputs. What is that old saw...what goes round comes round or history repeats itself etc. Hard to believe these clowns running the show now. Bill

I don't call it a holiday, but a day of remberence....calling it a holiday cheapens the real meaning of MEMORIAL DAY. Lost an uncle in the D Day invasion in June of 44 so I bring out his picture, medals and flag and teach my friends and family what the real meaning of MEMORIAL DAY is all about. Even my wife explains to her friends the CORRECT meaning of it. It ain't about living vets nor their service, even wounded vets ,God bless'em, but about the vets who died defending our great country! There...I feel better, thanks for listening. Bill

Well Larry, Lockheed got smart on this one. The winch is mounted under the floor at Fuselage station 257 to 277. You have an access panel and you can operate the winch from several locations in the cargo compartment. This mod is also available for ALL earlier C-130's. To bad we don't have the money to mod all the other Herks. Bill

Bob, between 1966-69 there were 184 C-123B's converted to K models by adding 2, J-85 jet engines. The aircraft was designed at first as a glider with NO engines...now that is funny! Bill

What are you saying Chris...that the C-123K didn't have 2 jet engines? J-85's me thinks. We are getting old huh? Ha Ha Bill.

Another reason Don...look in the mirror. Ha Ha We are old! Bill

Hello Gary. I did many rotations to CRB while stationed at Clark AB, P.I. from 69-70. As far as C-130's hauling AO it would have been in 55 gal drums with an orange band around the drum. C-130's never sprayed it. They used C-123's in operation Ranch Hand to spray AO. As a crewchief on a C-130 at that time we usually had a Crew Chief and an asst. assigned to each aircraft at it's home base, Clark, CCK and Naha . They normally went with the aircraft in-country when it rotated in and maintained the bird while there...with the help of the back shops ie. elect,eng, hyd sheet metal. Normally the crew chief did not fly with his bird after arriving in country. Just the basic aircrew flew the daily missions. When a crew chief's aircraft broke down while on a sortie in counrty, such as a blown or flat tire, engine change or many other problems they encountered, the assigned crew chief would normally be sent with parts and specialist required to fix the bird to get it back to it's in country bed down base..CRB,TSN or wherever. If for some reason the assigned Crew chief could not be located they would ask for a volunteer CC to take his place to fix the aircraft. Also AO was sprayed on the bases to kill the vegetation around the primeter to make it harder for the Viet Cong to sneak into the base. On an AO site on the web I found that they sprayed 21,227 gallons of AO and 1,373 gallons of AW on CRB . Hope this helps you to understand the part the C-130 and it's people did in VN just a little better. ( Another thought) Also Gary since your dad was TDY from Dyess to Tachi there would have been many times when he may have been picked by his Flight Chief in a hurry to just "Get on the bird and go in country" as happened to me also while TDY from Sewart AFB Tn to Clark AB P.I. in 64 and 65. Some times they would have an add on mission and would just grab whoever was on hand. On these TDY rotations from the states to Clark and Tachi, the crew chief flew all the missions with the crew when they went "in country" where as when you were PCS to Clark, CCK and Naha we didn't fly that much while on rotation in country at CRB. Usually when TDY back then there were guys who wanted to fly on every mission and then there were guys who only wanted to stay on the ground...sounds like your dad was the former. That's why he was always on the go. Bill

Thanks Casey....is 979 still in the inventory? I think it used to be in the 6514th at Hill. Bill

Just finished reading about the ABL 747 being sent to the boneyard in this months AF Asso. mag. It also had a pic of an early HC-130 sans ext. tanks with a laser turret in the fwd belly. All numbers were scrubbed with only ET on the vert fin. This is old info and pic...curious as to what the tail number was and did it go to the boneyard too? The article didn't say what happened to the Herk. Bill

You are right on Don. The winds coming out of Ogden Canyon could blow a C-5 off final as I witnessed during the big supply effort for The Yom Kippur war in 1973. All who were familar with Hill's runway knew you had to be set up for the huge 90 degree crosswind in the morning about 1000 hrs. This one wasn't and we were watching from our Hotel2 truck on the Rescue side of the flightline. When he got hit with the crosswind he almost lost it and cobbed the power and came right across our flight line at about 2500 feet. Talk about a scare....we just knew we were going to see a crash but the pilot did a good job on the go around and was set up right for the next landing. I saw a lot of strange things during my 3 years at Hill...mainly due to the 60+ helicopters in our unit. Bill

Hey Frank I guess we can't do it all but I liked Ogden Ut so well I went back for 4 more years after I got off active duty. That's the neat thing about this great country it has so many great places to visit and live....worth fighting for and sometimes dying for huh? Bill

A great spread Casey, thanks for posting it. A couple of nuggets of info about the place: It is offically known as AF Plant 6, it is not on Dobbins ARB proper, but does share Dobbin's runway. The final assy. building is B-1( that is where the pics were taken) and covers 76 acres and is fully air conditioned. There are 2 building number sets and they are B-1,2,etc which were the original Bell Bomber Plant buildings (1943-45) and buildings across the runway that were built by Lockheed and their numbers start with an L prefix such as L-10 (C-5 wing r&R hanger) . Also the mid fuselage for the 2 XB-70's were built in a tent in the B-1 building in the 60's. Also B-1 bld. had 38 miles of fluoresent light tubes. Just some info I picked up about B-1 while working there in the 80's. Any Herk type should tour the plant if ever given the chance. It will only add to your confidence and trust in the Herk as it did for me. Bill

Went to Dover AFB after Clark and when we junked out the C-133's in 1970, I got to pick my next base, Rescue at Pease or Hill AFB Ut. Sure glad I chose Hill. Best assignment of my career as far as a fun place to be...shooting, sking, fishing and hunting, dune buggining, mountain camping... oh yes and the Rescue 130's ,Utah has it all. Bill

Is that why you didn't get very far as an FE...ha ha. Just kiddin' Don. Couldn't pass that one up. Bill P.S. I crumped my first upgrade check ride as a 141 FE...about a million years ago

Great job Casey. Your hard work let's us old and young Herk Lovers stay in touch. Thanks a bunch. Bill

JimH if that ain't it, it is it's twin sister....only been 43 years (69-70) so I'm not 100% sure. The bottom pic with the stairs sure look familar. I do remember the latrine being on the bottm floor and a note scratched on the wall saying " Flush twice, it's a long way to the chow hall" along with the red rat poison boxes Ken spoke of. Thanks for showing the pics. Bill