Interview with a USAF pilot who flew the F-106 Delta Dart

This month I interviewed a USAF pilot who flew the F-4 Phantom for almost 20 years. He also had the opportunity to fly the F-106 Delta Dart as a familiriasation excersice on how to fight delta wing aircraft. This interceptor is the subject of the interview.

1. Hello H., many thanks for accepting an interview for alejandro-8en.blogspot.com. What was your first impression of the F-106? What were the strong and weak points?

I thought the airplane had excellent visibility, very easy handling aircraft. I did not care that much for the instrument panel layout. It was rather awkward to operate the radar unless you were using the auto pilot. I missed my second crewmember to handle the radar while I fought the airplane. It had extremely good high-altitude performance compared to the F-4 which I have been flying. Its weapon system was optimized for use against bomber attacks. It was fairly useless against other fighters. The air conditioning worked a lot better than that in the F-4. And the auto pilot worked, which is way more than you could say for the F-4.

2. One of the features of the F-106 was its delta wing. Could you comment on its flying characteristics? Was it hard to adapt to it? What about the landings?

The Delta wing provided good lift at all altitude particularly at high altitude. However, at high angle of attack it generated huge amounts of induced drag. It was good for one turn and then you were stopped. At the same time at high altitude the F-4was not good for even one turn so I guess it was an improvement. It did not have enough power at low altitude to overcome the drag. The F-4 was much more usable under 10,000 feet.

3. The cockpit had novel features like vertical tape instruments and a “yoke” joystick. What are your views on them and how did they compare to other aircraft you flew?

Many people liked the vertical tape instruments. I was not one of them. I prefer the steam gauges. The yoke joystick was OK, I was not particularly impressed with it one way or the other.

4. The MA-1 system was notorious for its reliability issues early on. Did you experience them when you flew it?

This part was fixed before I flew it

5. The F-106A operated in conjunction with the SAGE (Semi-Automatic Ground Environment) network. How useful did you find it? Did you consider scenarios where it is jammed?

In theory it worked well, I did not really get to use it as most of my time in the airplane was spent flying against other fighter aircraft.

6. The missiles were one of the notorious issues with the F-106. Could you describe the problems?

The problem is that the missiles of the time were not reliable. This was the same problem with the F4 had. That is why the F-4E had a gun.

7. The typical load of an F-106 was 4 missiles in the internal bay. They would be fired in pairs, the ones aft being the first. AIM-4G (IR) would be placed aft because they needed to be fired first.  Was there a particular reason for not being able to fire them one by one?

You could fire them one at a time. The doctrine called for flying firing to because of the low probability of kill.

8. In 1961 the Defence Department organised an exercise (Project High Speed) to compare the F-106 and F-4H? The latter proved superior in most of the fields. What are your views on this exercise?

The F-106 was a very good high altitude interceptor. The F4 was acceptable at everything.

9. F-106 could take off in as little as 2 minutes. Was there an emergency mode for the navigation when taking off in such a short interval?

You could get an airborne alignment, it would not give you as much accuracy as a full alignment however you were pretty much always in contact with GCI.

10. When performing a mission, did you fly all the time in supersonic or in “dashes” while keeping a subsonic cruise speed?

You would only go supersonic when you had to. Fuel consumption was very high.

11. What defensive tactics were expected from Soviet bombers (Jamming, high speed dashes…)? Did you consider scenarios where they were escorted?

The Russians were never going to be escorted. It was theoretically possible over the Atlantic, but they never were. There really was not much they could do for defensive tactics other than jamming and flares. Which is a good thing because we had very little capability to deal with it.

12. In the 1960s some airforces started to look at low altitude bombing (RAF with Vulcans). Was this also included in the training?

Yes, we looked at low altitude intercepts. On the West Coast of the United States the bombers would have to drop down for the last leg because otherwise their fuel consumption would be too high.

13. Convair tried to export the F-106 to different countries without success. What is your opinion on this lack of sales (factors as cost, complexity)? Do you think the F-106 could have been improved in some ways to make it more attractive to foreign customers?

The F-106 was an outstanding high-altitude interceptor. But it was a one trick pony. Unless you needed a full-time high altitude interceptor nobody would buy it.

14. What was the maximum speed you managed to reach? Was there a limiting factor (aircraft temperature, engine)?

I never attempted a mach run in the aircraft. I did hit 1.5 mach several times while fighting.

15. What was your most challenging sortie? And the most memorable one (if not the same!)?

The most challenging thing was trying to beat an F-4 at low altitude. At high altitude it was easy.

16. Is there any anecdote you would like to share before finishing the interview?

Not really. I had a very good time flying the F-106. I did it as a familiarization thing to help understand how to fight Delta wing aircraft. It was interesting and enjoyable. It was very nice vacation.

Other interviews:

- Interview with an US Army M48A5/M60A1 veteran tanker
- Interview with a former British artilleryman and veteran of the Gulf War
- Former M60 tanker in the Army of Austria
- Former Chieftain crew member
- Former Chieftain gunner
- AMX30 commander of the Army of France
- NCO of the Army of Serbia 
- Former crew member of Challenger 2
- Former Leclerc commander
- T-72 driver in Czech Army  
- US Army M60 tank crewmman
- Interview with D., former US Army tanker with experience in the M60 and M1 Abrams
- Interview with Stefan Kotsch, former NVA/Bundeswehr tanker  

More interviews can be found in the Spanish version of the blog (link), including with veterans of Leo 2, AMX30, M48/60 and REME.

I am always looking for more veterans, active members or people related with the defence industry to accept interviews. If you enjoyed reading the material and would be happy to accept an anonimous interview you can get in contact with me. My e-mail can be found in this link at the heading. Otherwise leave a message in the comment sections.