The
F-
14 was a great, yet
overrated aircraft built by the Grumman corporation. The Navy needed an aircraft that was able to
fly at supersonic speeds that was still able to maneuver fairly well. In development, the aircraft was known as the XF-
14. The earlier versions of the
F-
14 used Pratt and Whitney TF30 engines which were famous for its frequent compressor stalls. Later variants (A late, B, D) fixed this by replacing the engines with General Electric F110's which are found in a lot of other modern American fighters currently. Another issue found on the Tomcat was that there was no "fly by wire" system. That made it easier for the plane to get into a flatspin or exceed the G-limit (the wings could rip off). The early A variant had special retractable fins in the
LEX called glove vanes. They were found to be almost completely
useless so they removed it on all the later variants. The
F-14B had almost nothing different except for the "Tomcat Eyes". The
F-14D had a camera and an IRST under the nose. It also had automatic wing sweep which the earlier variants didn't have.
