AP 118 · No. 10 Section II · Aircraft Plate 111 / 125

Plate 111 of 125 · Cold War · Swing-wing strike

General Dynamics F-111E

F-111E, painted as 67-0120, a General Dynamics F-111E of the 20th Tactical Fighter Wing, flown by the 55th Fighter Squadron from RAF Upper Heyford: the swing-wing, two-seat strike aircraft with side-by-side crew, twin TF30 turbofans and quarter-circle intakes beneath the wing gloves; painted as it is displayed in the American Air Museum at Duxford, with its wings fully swept: SEA tan and two greens over black undersides, a black radome, ‘UH’ and the 20th FW lightning flash on the fin with a blue 55th FS fin tip, a tiger head and 19 mission marks on the port nose, an Indian chief head with ‘The Chief’ to starboard, and a black cover over the port jet pipe; the camouflage blotches are drawn to match the photographs only where they are clear, and the starboard fin is assumed to mirror the port.

3D model

Turn it over

A procedural model built in Blender from published dimensions, drawings and photographs, painted as 67-0120, a General Dynamics F-111E of the 20th Tactical Fighter Wing, flown by the 55th Fighter Squadron from RAF Upper Heyford: the swing-wing, two-seat strike aircraft with side-by-side crew, twin TF30 turbofans and quarter-circle intakes beneath the wing gloves; painted as it is displayed in the American Air Museum at Duxford, with its wings fully swept: SEA tan and two greens over black undersides, a black radome, ‘UH’ and the 20th FW lightning flash on the fin with a blue 55th FS fin tip, a tiger head and 19 mission marks on the port nose, an Indian chief head with ‘The Chief’ to starboard, and a black cover over the port jet pipe; the camouflage blotches are drawn to match the photographs only where they are clear, and the starboard fin is assumed to mirror the port. Drag to orbit, scroll or pinch to zoom · download .glb (1.5 MB)

Data plate

Specification

First flight, number built and top speed are for the whole family (E/F); engine, crew and dimensions are for the F-111E modelled here.

History

The F-111E

In 1961 the US Defense Secretary, Robert McNamara, decided that a single design, the TFX, should meet both the Air Force’s need for a long-range strike aircraft and the Navy’s need for a fleet-defence fighter. General Dynamics won the contract in 1962 with a big two-seater whose wings could swing from 16° for take-off and long-range cruise to 72.5° for supersonic dash. It was the first production aircraft with variable sweep, the first with afterburning turbofans and the first with terrain-following radar, and its crew sat side by side in a capsule that separated as a whole for escape. The first F-111A flew at Fort Worth on 21 December 1964.

The commonality McNamara wanted never came. The heavier Navy F-111B was cancelled in 1968, and the early F-111As were dogged by engine-intake problems, weight growth and wing-carry-through failures, and lost three of their first six aircraft on combat trials over Vietnam in 1968. Britain ordered 50 F-111Ks in 1967 to replace the cancelled TSR.2 and cancelled them in turn in 1968. The Air Force persevered, and the F-111 matured into a formidable night and all-weather bomber. The F-111E, 94 of them built, had redesigned intakes, and from 1970 it equipped the 20th Tactical Fighter Wing at RAF Upper Heyford in Oxfordshire, while the F-111Fs of the 48th TFW at Lakenheath flew the raid on Libya in 1986.

In the 1991 Gulf War F-111Fs dropped laser-guided bombs on Iraqi aircraft shelters, bridges and armour, and F-111Es of the 20th TFW flew from Incirlik in Turkey. Upper Heyford closed in 1993, and the US Air Force retired its last strike F-111s in 1996 and its EF-111A electronic jammers in 1998. Royal Australian Air Force F-111Cs flew until 2010. In all 563 F-111s of every version were built.

This airframe

F-111E 67-0120

67-0120The airframe modelled

67-0120 is an F-111E of the US Air Force’s 1967 fiscal year, and it served with the 20th Tactical Fighter Wing at RAF Upper Heyford. The 19 mission marks on its nose record its sorties in the 1991 Gulf War. It was flown to Duxford in October 1993, as the wing left Upper Heyford, and it is displayed with its wings fully swept in the American Air Museum at IWM Duxford. The model shows it as photographed there: SEA tan and two greens over black undersides, a black radome, “UH” and the 20th Fighter Wing’s lightning flash on the fin with a blue 55th Fighter Squadron fin tip, a tiger head on the port nose and an Indian chief with “The Chief” to starboard, the crew names on the nose-gear door and a black cover over the port jet pipe. The camouflage blotches follow the photographs only where they are clear, and no photograph shows the starboard side of the fin, so its markings are assumed to mirror the port side.

See it at IWM Duxford

Where to see one

In the gazetteer

The gazetteer records the F-111E in 2 UK collections. The airframe modelled here is marked.

Every airframe and serial All 125 plates

Profiles and models are procedural interpretations built in Blender from published dimensions, three-view drawings and photographs of each airframe. Treat the museum aircraft as the reference.