3 seater f-14

how many does the US have of the 3 seater f-14's
and does it exsist?



[edit on 25-11-2004 by bodrul]

The aircraft in question is actually an F-14, it could be a trainer...I haven't seen it before though...

I haven't seen that before either. It must be a trainer seeing as regular F-14s have two seats. I don't expect anymore development of the F-14 seeing as it is being retired in 2008. Assuming that this is real which it probably is as a trainer it's probably not that new.

Well i can't seem to find any info on this 3 seater version. I noticed GlobalSecurity.org has the image in there F-14 images section, but no other pics of a 3 seater. So i'm not sure if it's a photomanip (and a damn good one at that) or just a one of a kind F-14. I've never heard of them having 3 seat trainers.

I don't expect anymore development of the F-14 seeing as it is being retired in 2008.

I thought they were already retired. Or had I misread something somewhere?

I haven't heard of three seater either. I can imagine that one might have been built. It could have simply been a scraped project, modern avionics could have replaced the need for a third person. As for retirement some of them are already being retired and the last F-14s will be retired in 2008. Such a shame as it was always a dream of mine to fly one in the USN.

WOW, I've never seen this variant before. I do question the legitamacy of it though.

Try emailing the webmaster of the source, he/she might know.

It definitly looks real, esspecially since the pilot helmets don't seem duplicated...

The F-14 isn't retired yet...but it seems the F/A-18E will replace it, but no replacement for the AIM-54?!

The f-18 is inferior to the F-14 in virtually every way except cost. Other than being a trainer I can't really see a need for a three seater.

Look at the reflection of light on the canopy over the third seat, it doesn't line up. Fake. Interesting though. the only use I could imagine would be EW or something along those lines.

Look at the reflection of light on the canopy over the third seat, it doesn't line up. Fake. Interesting though. the only use I could imagine would be EW or something along those lines.

Originally posted by balrog
Look at the reflection of light on the canopy over the third seat, it doesn't line up. Fake. Interesting though. the only use I could imagine would be EW or something along those lines.

That doesn't necessarily make it fake. The canopy could be shaped just slightly differnt, affecting the way it reflects. But I am still a bit skeptical of the aircraft.

I emailed the photo to my dad who's really into aircraft and what not. He hadn't ever seen this before either, but he did point out that it had the ' D ' type afterburners, so that makes it a bit more recent. Just thought i'd point that bit of info out incase it helps.

I think I found the original webpage;
www.jimbrooks.org...
This might help prove whether or not the plane is real. On the site the photo is labeled as a "rare three-seat F-14 Tomcat". I've noticed that a couple of photos on the site look photoshopped. An example being the Soviet Firefox with 4 engines;

and the three SR-71s;


[edit on 11/26/2004 by cyberdude78]


[edit on 11/26/2004 by cyberdude78]

The SR-71 shot is not photoshoped and the Fire Fox is from a movie.l

The three SR-71's pic is defiantely real. I've seen that photo in a lot of places. Also as I said in my first post in this thread. The 3 seater F-14 can be found at globalsecurity.org

www.globalsecurity.org... click on "F-14 Pictures" on the right. It's in there. But they list no info about it anywhere from what I can tell.

AFAIK, no trainer version of the F-14 was ever produced.

Pilots trained in trainer AC and simulators only.

I personally have never seen a 3 seater or heard of it, so i'm 99.99% sure that its a fake.

As for it being on Global Securities site, that doesn't suprise me, they dont go around taking every picture themselves, they do what everyone else does and gets them from the net, When they were collecting pics they probably didn't look at it close enough to notice that it had a cockpit for three.

Edit: I e-mailed Northrop to find out if its real or fake, so if/when i get a response i'll post it.

[edit on 26-11-2004 by Murcielago]

Originally posted by cyberdude78
I think I found the original webpage;
www.jimbrooks.org...
This might help prove whether or not the plane is real. On the site the photo is labeled as a "rare three-seat F-14 Tomcat". I've noticed that a couple of photos on the site look photoshopped. An example being the Soviet Firefox with 4 engines;

and the three SR-71s;
[edit on 11/26/2004 by cyberdude78]


[edit on 11/26/2004 by cyberdude78]

The fact that the site show the 'Firefox' which is NOT a real aircraft as if it was real makes me dubious

For those that have not heard of it 'Firefox' was an excellent book by Craig Thomas from late 70's that was made in a movie (released 1982) starring Clint Eastwood. The plane is the pics is the one from the movie



Hope this helps

3 seater F-14 is most likely to be a fake than not,i mean,a two seater would be good enough for a trainer (one recuit and one trainee),and the F-14 isn't as complicated as to need 3 pilots to control one aircraft.

Tomcats were not used for trainers, there are no dual controls. Training was in sims and T-34's etc.

A three seater is extremely, extremely unlikely. It would play hell with the CG. You would need a complete redesign of the AC, wing pivot point, trim angles, etc. You just can't fool around with the balance of a fighter like that.

Remember what happened when the Brits tried to buy some Typhoons without the gun, it was a fiasco.

img72.exs.cx...

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[edit on 19/6/2006 by Mirthful Me]