Door Gunner

[Bill Farnie]

Here's the other pic ... this is what I remember riding in on CA's

[phuloi]

Was it SOP for a Crew Chief to double as a door gunner?

[Andy]

There were two guys who sat behind the 60s. The crew chief was responsible for checking out out chopper for repairs, the other guy was responsible for the machine guns and ammo. While in flight there were both door gunners, on the ground, one was chopper maintenance, the other weapons. Crew Chief, in Huey slicks or gun ships, always "earned" their aviation wings and the respect of the other three men on the chopper.

Stay healthy,
Andy

[39mto39g]

I have been gone for a couple days and well, the answer is , (according to Smitty)
The crew chief sits on the left side of the Huey. The pilot sits on the right side. The Crew chief is responcible for the aircraft not the pilot. The gages are all angled to the pilots left ( toward the crew chief) . Although the crew chef was responcible for the aircraft he was undistinuishable from an infantry guys point of view, He was just a doorgunner. If there is such a thing as "Just a door gunner"

Ron

[MontanaKid]

Every slick I ever saw in the Americal had two door guns, whether one was manned by a "door gunner" and the other a "crew chief" was more than this grunt medic ever knew. Bill's photos are pretty much what I recall. We of course did not have the kind of air assets in the Americal that the 101st did. So, until 1/501 and 1/502 arrived and worked with us from May 15 throw August of 1969, I never saw so many slicks in one place as in Bill's photos. My experience with them was occasionally being farried into and out of the field and hoping "milk run" flights between Chu Lai TRANS and LZ Professional.

[Andy]

Ron

Not trying to be a wise guy but next time you talk to Smitty ask him who refueled the chopper and on which side of the bird was the gas cap. Every time we re-fueled I tried to light a cigarette. Wouldn?t have done that if I had the gas pump in my hand.

Also, choppers are like American car's, Pilot sits in the drivers seat. If the instruments were on the pilot's left if would have made it very difficult for the co-pilot to take control when necessary.

We're getting old, memories fade but I'm pretty sure about who sat where.

Stay healthy,
Andy

[39mto39g]

"In both the Huey and the OH-58s the pilot stations are on the right sides. (Opposite of that found in an American auto). Actually the aircraft can be flown from either side because they have dual controls."

Pilot is on the right side, Gages are angled to his left for the Crew chief to view while in flight.

Ron

[Andy]

We can agree to dis-agree on this one. It's no big deal.

Stay healthy,
Andy

[rotorwash]

If you don't mind, I would like to clarify any misconceptions on this thread. As was previously stated, the crew chief (helicopter MOS) sat on the left and the door gunner (inf MOS) was on the right, both functioned as door gunners (often referred to as OJT "on-the-job-targets"). In the first Huey's to arrive in country, the M-60's were infantry type suspended from bungees that the gunners fired. Pilots being a nevous lot anyway, complained when an errant round entered the ship on occasion. It wasn't long before the modified M-60 (the M-60D) was introduced with the spade grip handles and the ring sight. It was mounted on a hard point outside of the aircraft with an ammo box that held 600 rounds. Even as late as Jan 67, we still had one aircraft that did not have the hard point mounted M-60s.

The pure air cav units like 1/9 were the last to get the hard point mounts. The idea was that the crewchief fired one M-60 and the infantry squad machine gunner was responsible for the other when he was on board. In these units it was optional for the crewchief to fly at first, but later on with the infantry squads not at full strength, he was required to fly and often a door gunner was assigned. For some reason, in all other aviation units, crewchiefs were required to fly, something about having the guy responsible for maintenance on board when they took off.

Most Army aircraft were designed with two sets of controls, but the pilot on the right was expected to do the work. The collective lever (think "handbrake") on the right had the idle cut off controls necessary to shut down the engine. On the Huey there were duplicate flight instruments such as artificial horizon, vertical speed indicator, airspeed indicator, turn and bank indicator and gyro compass. On the right side only there was a stop clock and a magnetic compass. In the center of the panel was two rows of engine instruments. The right row contained the engine and rotor tachs at the top, one needle superimposed on the other in the same dial, the N1 percent indicator that measured compressor speed, the torque guage that was a modified reading of power turbine speed and the Exhaust Gas Temp guage that gave a reading of the temp of exhaust gasses (duh). The row on the left contained the fuel guage, oil pressure and temp guages, generator and inverter guages. The crewchief could see both rows of instruments, and I never saw them mounted at an angle, although it could have been done. It was vastly more important for the pilot to see them then me, he was the only one that could do anything about something that was wrong because he had the controls.

The GIF's (guys in front) were not called "pilot" and "co-pilot" but "pilot" and "aircraft commander" with the AC sitting in the left seat. The pilot flew the aircraft while the AC monitored all the radios and was generally responsible for everything.

On the slicks the fuel filler cap was located on the right side of the aircraft and this is what decided which GIB (guy in back) would sit where. The refueling ritual went like this: aircraft lands and RPM is rolled off to idle, crewchief gets out with out tripping, walks to AC's (left side) door, opens door and slides back the armored panel on the pilot's seat. Meanwhile gunner gets out, slides cargo door shut and opens the fuel filler cap. Crewchief has by this time gotten around the nose of the aircraft and opened the pilot's door and slides back his armored panel. Gunner has, hopefully by this time, located the hose and is now pumping fuel on board. The crewchief now strikes a suitably heroic pose standing on the skid toe in the pilot's door watching the fuel guage. When the AC feels that they have enough fuel, he signals the crewchief, who, if he hasn't slipped off the skid toe, signals the gunner who stops the fuel and replaces the hose nozzle somewhere other then in the dirt.

Variations on this normal routine might include:
a) crewchief scrambling around on hands and knees looking for bullet holes and making sure more fuel is going in then is leaking out.
b) pilots stepping out of the aircraft and attempting to take a leak in the rotor downdraft.
c) gunner opening cargo door before he has re-installed the fuel cap. This usually breaks the retaining chain and sends the fuel cap flying about twenty feet forcing the gunner to chase it down, put it in and get on board before he gets left.
d) something REALLY interesting could happen to somebody else.
We were part of a bunch of aircraft, including a 1st Cav gunship, all refueling at the same time in POL. The first inkling I had of anything wrong was when my pilots were frantically trying to get my attention. I had unplugged my helmet and was doing something constructive, like looking for bullet holes, when I detected a rather unusual amount of commotion going on. Looking around I saw everyone pointing to the cav gunship. The gunner was nonchalantly pouring in fuel, the fuel cell filler point was about his eye level, but he was looking forward at his crewchief who was standing on the toe of the skid watching the fuel guage. What no one on that particular aircraft noticed was that flames were coming out of the fuel tank around the nozzle. Every pilot in every aircraft in POL was having a fit - literally screaming in the radios - except for the gunship pilots, who were probably discussing the chances the Cubs had for winning the series, or something just as important. Their radios were obviously on a different frequency then everyone else. At length the gunship crewchief looked around, saw the flames and simply pointed at them. The gunner carefully removed the nozzle, took the cap and in one swift movement slapped it in place and locked it. Nothing more, nothing less. The only damage was some scorched paint and deformed fiberglass. After a second or two, he carefully unlocked the cap and took it off. The flames were out so he inserted the nozzle and continued fueling. Those guys probably saved a pilot?s life, because someone would have tried to fly that aircraft out of there, fire and all. He would have either been decorated or toasted. Or worse yet, the aircraft would have been abandoned to burn up along with our POL. Now I know every pilot there collected some grey hairs that day, but as for the enlisted men, it was only a short interruption to what was really important, figuring out how beat all those other aircraft to a parking spot so we could jockey ourselves to the head of the chow line.

Rotorwash