Interesting article and short movie with Brig. Gen. Jimmy Stewart

[Pinecone]

https://www.starfighters.net/

 

Go to FL and FLY a -104

 

[N201MKTurbo]

2 hours ago, EricJ said:

That airplane sat at KIWA for a long, long time essentially as a semi-derelict.    I'd see it during the 2000s when I'd fly on the Intel shuttle and it was still there when I was in A&P school and they were trying to tear down the shelter that it was in.    It showed up for sale on some of the usual sites and I recently saw that it got packed up and shipped to a museum (in Canada iirc).

It first showed up in about 94. When it first showed up it was in great shape. It is sad when they just let it rot. The problem with jet warbirds is they aren’t worth much. You could probably buy it for less than a long body. But they are wickedly expensive to operate. And as jet warbirds go that thing is one of the more expensive ones to run. Supersonic isn’t cheap! I would expect that plane to cost $4000- $5000 per hour to run. Expensive to stay current. 
 

They look good on a pole in your yard.

[N201MKTurbo]

1 hour ago, Pinecone said:

https://www.starfighters.net/

 

Go to FL and FLY a -104

 

Their website doesn’t say what it costs. I bet it’s way north of $20,000

[EricJ]

18 minutes ago, N201MKTurbo said:

Their website doesn’t say what it costs. I bet it’s way north of $20,000

My former employer used to have a research lab in Nizhny Novgorod that I'd visit occasionally (it's an aerospace center with a good technical university).   The MiG factory is there, and you can get a ride on a MiG-29, including going supersonic, for 14.5k Euros.

https://migflug.com/flights-prices/fly-mig-29-in-russia/

Edit:   Apparently no longer available.   

[N201MKTurbo]

3 minutes ago, EricJ said:

My former employer used to have a research lab in Nizhny Novgorod that I'd visit occasionally (it's an aerospace center with a good technical university).   The MiG factory is there, and you can get a ride on a MiG-29, including going supersonic, for 14.5k Euros.

https://migflug.com/flights-prices/fly-mig-29-in-russia/

 

That’s like $16000 for 45 minutes. That makes the Mooney look cheap!

[MikeOH]

2 hours ago, N201MKTurbo said:

That’s like $16000 for 45 minutes. That makes the Mooney look cheap!

Hey, that's about what I spend to fly my Mooney....for a YEAR!!!

[Ragsf15e]

There were times I took off with 31,000lbs of fuel (3 tanks).  Landed with 3,000. After a 2.0.  Now that’s just north of 4,000 gallons of jet fuel and $5/ gallon, well, you see how it adds up!  The fuel is probably the cheap part too!

[MikeOH]

The Starfighter is really just the production model of an X-15, IMHO  WIngspan is just over 21 feet...Cessna 150 is 33 feet

The fins, er I mean wings, are nearly razor sharp.

What was the phrase, "Missile with a man in it!"

My absolute favorite Century Series fighter.  Tied with P-51, T-38, and F-16 as coolest (yeah, I know the T-38 is 'just' a trainer)

[Pinecone]

10 hours ago, N201MKTurbo said:

Their website doesn’t say what it costs. I bet it’s way north of $20,000

Yeah, I noticed.  They used to have the price, but the link to price and booking is broken.

I seem to recall 15AMU or so.

Not a -104, but I got to fly the L-39, Su-25, and Mig-29 in Ukraine many years ago.

[Pinecone]

7 hours ago, MikeOH said:

The Starfighter is really just the production model of an X-15, IMHO  WIngspan is just over 21 feet...Cessna 150 is 33 feet

The fins, er I mean wings, are nearly razor sharp.

What was the phrase, "Missile with a man in it!"

My absolute favorite Century Series fighter.  Tied with P-51, T-38, and F-16 as coolest (yeah, I know the T-38 is 'just' a trainer)

T-38 wingspan is a whopping 25 feet.

And remember, it held the time to climb record for a while.  OVER the -104.

F-104 set time to climb records in 1958 and 1959.  To 12,000 meters, it set the record of 99.9 seconds.

In 1962, the T-38 set the record to 12,000 meters at 95.610 seconds.   

Both aircraft set the records to 3000, 6000, and 9000 meters at the same time.

F-4 broke the record in early 1962 with a 77.156 second climb to 12,000 meters.  This was next broken by the Mig-25.

Next US record was the F-15 in 1975 with a time of 59.38 seconds to 12,000 meters/

[N201MKTurbo]

40 minutes ago, Pinecone said:

Yeah, I noticed.  They used to have the price, but the link to price and booking is broken.

I seem to recall 15AMU or so.

Not a -104, but I got to fly the L-39, Su-25, and Mig-29 in Ukraine many years ago.

I have flown the T-33 and Strikemaster. I did the ground school for the MIG-15 but chickened out when the fuel truck pulled up. My CB inner self couldn’t do it. So I played crew chief for the boys with the big wallets.