<p>Project MX-1016 Tip Tow: A Boeing ETB-29A (s/n 44-62093) with two Republic EF-84D <i>Thunderjet</i> fighters on 20 October 1950.<br><b>This photo is <i>NOT</i> of Project Tom Tom as the photo title states. Project Tom Tom utilized a Convair B-36 and two Republic RF-84F Thunderflash aircraft, and was also a "tip tow" experiment.</b><br>
One of the more interesting experiments undertaken to extend the range of the early jets in order to give fighter protection to the piston-engined bombers, was the provision for in-flight attachment/detachment of fighter to bomber via wingtip connections. One of the several programs during these experiments was MX106 done with a B-29 mother ship and two F-84D "children", and was code named "Tip Tow" (not Tom Tom as stated above) A number of flights were undertaken, with several successful cycles of attachment and detachment, using, first one, and then two F-84s. The pilots of the F-84s maintained manual control when attached, with roll axis maintained by elevator movement rather than aileron movement. Engines on the F-84s were shut down in order to save fuel during the "tow" by the mother ship, and in-flight engine restarts were successfully accomplished. The experiment ended in disaster during the first attempt to provide automatic flight control of the F-84s, when the electronics apparently malfunctioned. The left hand F-84D-1-RE 48-641 rolled onto the wing of the B-29, and the connected aircraft both crashed with loss of all onboard personnel.<br></p>
The pilot of the right-hand F-84D-1-RE 48-661 wrote of the Tip-Tow experiments in an article entitled <i>Aircraft Wingtip Coupling Experiments</i> published by the Society of Experimental Test Pilots. The photo above was taken during the longest "hookup" on 20 October 1950.
US Air Force
Taken on 20 October 1950
U.S. Air Force photo <a rel="nofollow" class="external autonumber" href="http://www.ascho.wpafb.af.mil/korea/photos/cap67a.htm">[1]</a> from the USAF Aeronautical Systems Center History Office <a rel="nofollow" class="external autonumber" href="http://www.ascho.wpafb.af.mil/">[2]</a>