Republic F-84F Thunderstreak
The Thunderstreak is the swept-wing version of the F-84 Thunderjet. This aircraft was born from an F-84E fuselage and was powered by a 5,200lb thrust Allison XJ35-A-25 engine. Under the designation YF-84F, it flew for the first time on June 3, 1950. The engine soon showed a dangerous lack of power and a second prototype was built with an english Armstrong Siddeley Sapphire turbojet, redesignated as the Wright J65-W-1 when built under licence in the US.
All but 375 of the 2,713 F-84F Thunderstreak later received a 7,220lb thrust Wright J65-W-3 turbojet.
From 1955, NATO widely adopted the Thunderstreak and a total of 1,301 were delivered. The armament consisted of six .50 machine guns, but some air forces only used the four nose mounted ones, as the root mounted guns too many vibration problems. Able to carry a nuclear bomb under the port wing, the 'Streak' was often seen with 450 gallon external fuel tanks mounted on the inner wing pylons.
During production, a braking parachute was mounted in a long fairing under the rear fuselage to reduce landing roll to about 2,400 ft (750 m).
In 1952, a reconnaissance version, the RF84F Thunderflash, started its career. The wing root air intakes and nose mounted cameras made it easily recognizable. The main difference with the Thunderstreak was in fact a 7,800lb thrust J65-W-7 turbojet powering this model. Late production RF-84F's received wing spoilers to increase the roll rate of the aircraft. A total of 715 Thunderflash were built, of which 386 were supplied to NATO.
The F-84F and RF-84F models were the last to remain in USAF serivce, many were transferred to the Air National Guards before being withdrawn from service in 1971.
Variants :
- EF-84B : two conversions of F-84Bs for 'tip-tow' parasite trials with a Boeing ETB-29 'motherplane'
- XF-84H : two F-84F's were converted under this designation with a 5,850 shp Allison XT40-A-1 turboprop powerplant driving supersonic propellers under a joint USAF/USN programme.
- YF-84J : two converted F-84F's with larger nose intakes and deepened fuselages. One was tested with a 8,750lb thrust General Electric XJ73GE-5 and the other with a 8,920lb thrust YJ73-GE7 engine.
- RF-84K : 25 F-84F's were modified under the USAF's FICON (fighter conveyor) project to hook on to a trapeze under a Convair B-36 bomber during long-range reconnaissance missions.
- F-84KX : 80 ex-USAF F-84B that were converted to target drone configuration.
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