Great Planes - Northrop F-5 Freedom Fighter

Video from the channel ElementalShield about Northrop F-5, linked on its Above Ten Thousand entry. Duration: 49:17. Language: English. Video type: Documentary.

Documentary in the Great Planes series devoted to the Northrop F-5 family. It covers its origin as a light, simple and cheap fighter designed for the United States' small allies under the Military Assistance Program (MAP), its baptism of fire in Vietnam, the evolution to the F-5E Tiger II and the F-20 Tigershark, and the T-38 Talon's roles as a trainer, chase plane and display aircraft.

Against the trend toward ever larger and more complex fighters after Korea, Northrop completed a study in 1955 that led to the N-156 design. The Air Force did not want the fighter, but did want the trainer: the T-38 flew on 10 April 1959. Northrop kept developing the N-156F on its own, which found no buyer until the Department of Defense chose it for the MAP in 1962; that October the single-seat F-5A and two-seat F-5B versions were ordered, and the YF-5A flew on 31 July 1963. Iran put the first ones into service in February 1965, and Norway, Spain and Canada bought them, the latter two with local production. In 1965 Operation Skoshi Tiger brought 19 modified aircraft (F-5C) to Vietnam, which later passed to the South Vietnamese air force. The lesson was embodied in the F-5E Tiger II, unveiled on 23 June 1972 and flown on 11 August; its production ran until 1989.

Each F-5A engine weighed about 570 lb with afterburner and produced 4,080 lb of thrust, and could be replaced in 20 minutes by three technicians. It carried two 20 mm cannons in the nose, Sidewinders on the wingtips and seven external hardpoints. In the Vietnam evaluation more than 3,500 sorties were flown with a 1.5% abort rate. The F-5E raised thrust to 5,000 lb and reached Mach 1.6; the F-20 Tigershark, with the F-18's engine, reached Mach 2 but had no sales. The documentary closes with the F-5E in the Red Flag Aggressor squadrons, chosen for its resemblance to the MiG-21, and with the F-5 fuselage used in the X-29.