My Passion for the Grumman F6F Hellcat
By
Charles “Chuck” J. Dixon
It was 1943 and I was 13 years old. I learned to build flying models. During World War II the Hellcat had asserted its air superiority in 1943; so, I built one. Then I sold it to a lady who wanted it for her grandson.
Already, aviation was in my blood.
When I was 17 I joined the Naval Air Reserves at Millington Naval Air Station. It was there I got my hands on a real F6F Hellcat. Among other things I learned how to put gas in it without squirting it everywhere. During some two-week cruises I was taught to be a Plane Captain. On the way to Pensacola Naval Air station the following picture is what I saw from my seat in the gunner’s position of a Gruman Avenger. It is a formation of F6F Hellcats from our squadron. Every one of the pilots were World War II veterans.

Figure 1 Formation of F6F Wildcats

In 1950, I was called to active duty for the Korean War. I wound up in a Fleet Aircraft Service Squadron at Alameda Naval Air Station in California. There I learned about many distinct types of Naval Fighter aircraft. We still had two World War Two F6F Hellcats, and I became Plane Captain for one of them.
These aircraft were used as utility for our pilots to get their flight time. On what I like to call “Dark Friday,” two pilots signed in to get some flight time. After about 2 hours only one came back and it was not mine. I asked the pilot of the other F6F about my plane. He said, “I don’t know, I lost him in a cloud.” My first thought was “Did I do something wrong.?” I had a weekend off duty, and I worried all weekend about what happened, When I got back on Monday, I learned the wings on the returned aircraft were buckled, too much load was pulled to get out of a dive. Now, I knew why my aircraft did not make it and we lost the pilot.
At Alameda I continued to be a Taxi Pilot. My task became taxing the F6F and many other types of aircraft to the Compass Rose (A huge compass on the ground) to calibrate the magnetic compass. When my military time was up I used the GI Bill to help get a bachelor’s degree in Aeronautical Engineering. Later, I got a master’s degree. My life from that point has continued to be interesting and adventurous. I have never forgotten my story about the F6F hellcat, it arises often.
Just recently I am privileged to have gained a new friend who was a Navy pilot about the same time I was in the Navy. We had been on the same aircraft carrier, but not at the same time. I was surprised to learn that my friend was an F6F Hellcat pilot. It was even more exciting to learn he had become a member of the ” Blue Angels” flying the F6F aircraft one of the first aircraft the Blue Angels used.

Figure 2 Flying War Cats

I was excited to get a new hat from the Commemorative Airforce (CAF) that has the flying War-Cats on it. I received it just before I met my new friend, and I used it to honor him at his recent ninety-eight birthday. In two months, I will only be ninety-four, but we have a lot of Navy in common. .I like to wear the hat because I get a lot of questions about it. It is not only good for advertising for CAF, but for talking about my own book, Chasing A Whirlwind and my wife’s book, Born Three Times.
Both of us have had exciting lives. I began learning to fly in a single seat glider after enrolling in college. Eventually I earned a pilot’s license and an instrument rating. As an Engineer and Research Scientist, I became an inventor with a few US patents. Two of these were done after My wife and I started our own business, “Consulting Aviation Services Inc.” My Christian life was followings God’s plan, and I know aviation and flying has been part of it.
My wife’s book, Born Three Times tells of her exciting life with a liver transplant. She is 80 years old and has had the transplant for 26 years. Our first spouses passed away, so, part of her book discusses her search for Saint Superman. I did not qualify, but I could fly. She authored an article for “Chicken Soup for the Soul” called “Love at First Flight.” It was selected and published in the book and in our local newspaper. Then, NBC interviewed us on television. We enjoyed our 15 minutes of fame for a weekend!
You can find more about us on our website, https://chasingawhirlwind.com and Facebook “Chuck and Frieda Dixon”.
 

Tennessee Ernie Ford sang and probably wrote the song called “Just a Picture on the Wall.” It starts out with the joys he had on an island in the middle of the ocean. Before the song was over, he admitted—There was no island at all; It was just a picture on the wall. I have a picture just above my computer on my wall that made me wonder if it predicted anything that happened to me. It was given to me when I retired from Lockheed in California in December 1989. It is a cartoon style picture that comically illustrates my past and future.

The picture was created by the art department of Lockheed and supervised by one of my associates. Today it would have been created by a computer. Obviously, I was surprised to have so much attention from my associates and the Art department. Now I am thrilled at how prophetic the picture was.
The picture illustrates my past as well as the future. The rocket shows the beginning of my employment at Lockheed Missiles and Space (LM&S) company in Huntsville, Alabama. It was a privilege to have a small part of the engineering of the Saturn 5, the vehicle that launched our astronauts to the moon. I learned valuable engineering and science while working for two years with LM&S. Then I transferred to Lockheed Georgia in Marietta, Georgia. That is symbolized by the Lockheed building on the green grass near the east coast of the US. I was anxious to get back to working on airplanes like I did in California while working at Douglas Aircraft. Fortunately, my past experience put me into the Research Facility where new concepts are discovered to design better airplanes. I spent 20 years as a Research Scientist in Georgia. Much of that time was spent proving that vortices are not enemies in airplane development, but they can be made to work for us. That is why the cartoon C-130 says I am the tamer of the wild vortex! It is interesting to note that the artist used the C-130 to make that comment. The artist did not know that I designed a vortex generating device to put on the vertical tail of the C-130 to improve its flight.

The next cartoon is the bird that says I had 24 plus (almost 25) years working for Lockheed. Why is that bird sitting in California? Lockheed’s financial condition caused the management to shut down part of Lockheed Georgia and send us to California. I needed 2 more years to get my 25 years to retire with a pension. So, off I went to work at Lockheed in Burbank California.

Using the bird for the sign is another part of the prophecy for the birds have been using vortex control forever. Vortex Control and analysis for fighter planes had become a valuable concept during the late 1980s. My knowledge of the concept was needed for an Air Force contract and the design of the F-22 at the Lockheed plant in Burbank, California. Two years seemed to come quickly, and my retirement was completed. In the picture a comment just off the west coast of California was made by one of my close associates. It says, “Happy Retirement, all two weeks of it “That really happened , but the timing was bad. It was more like two years. Lockheed moved back to Georgia and so did I. I finally became a Lockheed consultant and helped finish the Air Force contract.

The picture of me flying my company airplane (Dixon Flying Service) is truly prophetic. After finishing the contract, I started my own company. Instead of calling it Dixon Flying Service I called it Consulting Aviation Services (CAS). I did use an airplane, occasionally for business. The company continued for 25 more years. During that time, we received a copyright for software that predicts airplane flying characteristics including vortex flow effects. Also, we received two United States Patents for vortex control devices that improved both flying characteristics and less drag. Both were proven by flight tests. CAS is still in business but not regularly active. So, I am enjoying my retirement! As I look back I have to thank my Lord, Jesus, for being with me and my family even when I didn’t know it.
Thanks for letting me share my prophetic picture with you. You can enjoy much
more of my life of flying and aerospace engineering adventures in my book called Chasing a Whirlwind.” My wife and I teamed up to author this book. She also authored a book about her life, which shares the difficulties of having severe liver problems and a liver transplant. The book is called “Born Three Times.” Also, she shares her thoughts about looking for a husband. She said she was looking for Saint Superman, but she got me. Well, at least I took her flying in a small airplane. It was called “Love at First Flight.” You can find all this information in our website hppts://chasingawhirlwind.com  

What Makes Airplane Visual Trails

I like to watch clouds change into shapes of animals and other creations of our Lord. Contrails are equally fascinating aviation science. Some misinformed people want to call them “chemtrails” to encourage their ideological concepts. These trails are made of nothing devious, just engine exhaust materials, ice crystals from the air vapors, and the trailing vortices that begin at the wing tips of the airplane. The airplane will not fly if vortices are not created. That brings up some questions.

Why do you only see these trails at high altitudes of 25000 to 50000 feet? Some days you don’t see the trails at any altitude even on clear days. Why is that? The airplanes are still flying! The scientific question is, what makes the trails visible only at high altitudes? Even more amazing, on some days you may see these trails extending behind the airplane for many miles. How can that happen? Unfortunately, some miss-informed people like the climate-change crowd see these trails polluting the air with carbon emissions. They are making one of God’s magnificent creations an enemy. We’ll show you there is no more carbon created by these vortices than what was already there to start with. The effect of the engine exhaust is another story.
Some facts about the vortices and some about the atmosphere must be understood to explain the formation of the visual vortices at high altitudes. Let’s start with the atmosphere. Our dry air is made up of nitrogen, oxygen, argon, carbon dioxide, and small amounts of other gases. Air also has variable amounts of water vapor. Air composition, temperature, and atmospheric pressure vary with altitude. Vapor pressure is more complicated. Vapor pressure is the pressure that air and other substances must reach before creating vapors (like boiling water). How does that happen?

When we examine the effect of increasing altitude on these two terms, we find air pressure goes down rapidly, but so does the vapor pressure, even more than the air itself because it is highly a function of temperature. Not until the altitude gets into the 25000-to-50000-foot level do these two pressures begin to approach each other. Then the airplane’s jet exhaust reduces the air pressure to its vapor pressure. If the humidity is high enough, we get ice crystals. These ice crystals get entrained into both the jet exhaust and the wing tip vortices. Note, we said “humidity” is already in the air to be turned into ice crystals. The air pressure must reach its vapor pressure to release the water vapor, which at once turns to ice crystals due to very low temperature. Some scientists say there must be particles of carbon dioxide in the water vapors. If so, the air already has carbon dioxide. We don’t need carbon dioxide from the engine exhaust to get visual vortices. Vortices can create their own ice crystals.

We have answers to two of the questions: (1) The altitude for visual vortices, and (2) Visual vortices occur when the humidity is high enough. The other question is: How can the visual vortices extend so far downstream. This is one of the amazing effects of the wing tip vortices. Another amazing effect is creating their own Ice crystals.
Wing tip vortices can become very powerful whirlwinds. The larger the airplane, the more powerful they get. I have experienced that personally. This is discussed in the beginning of my book “Chasing A Whirlwind”. I nearly lost my life in a small airplane caught in the wing tip vortex of a large cargo airplane. This vortex was hovering in a very dangerous position just above the runway. That is why I have learned a lot about vortices. Most of the airplane trails you see in the high altitudes are from very large airplanes.

As the vortex leaves the wing tip it only has a small part of the vortex. More vorticity leaves the training edge of all lifting parts of the airplane, and it is entrained into the wing tip vortex downstream to create the ultimate vortex strength. You can’t see this vorticity, but it is there. That is a very important effect of a vortex. This entertainment is lowering the atmospheric pressure in the core of the vortex, and this is exactly what is needed for the air pressure to reach the vapor pressure. This sets the conditions for ice crystals at these high altitudes. Now you can see the vortex. See the attached photograph (Figure 1). While climbing to the visual height, we saw several Vortex trails (High Humidity). Air Traffic Control” (ATC) makes sure the airplanes are at different heights.

I like to see a single vortex trail that is extremely long. Sometimes you can see details of the dynamic vortex. See Figure 2. Look carefully and you can see both trailing vortices from the airplane. These trails are approximately 100 miles long. How can a dynamic vortex trail extend so far without breaking up? First, it is the power or linear momentum of these vortices, which was discussed previously. This keeps it moving downstream. Second, it is the angular momentum which comes from the rotation. Eventually these forces and moments are overcome, and the vortex will begin to break up. Occasionally you can see this happening. I have zoomed into figure 2 and seen some of this action. One of the two vortices has begun to breakdown. The whole vortex core is swirling, but still very strong and you can see the periodic effect.

This concludes the discussion of the visual vortices. Frieda and I plan to continue the blog, “Faith, Aviation and Science,” periodically with articles related to our books. If you have not read our books, they are thoroughly described in our website Chasingawhirlwind.com
You can also buy the author-signed books at https://whirlwinds-together.square.site . Future blogs will include flight tests of methods of using vortices to reduce drag and improving flight control to save lives. These methods are discussed in the book, “Chasing a Whirlwind”.


Figure 1 Multiple Vortices

Figure 2 Very Long Vortex Trail

 You don’t have to be a pilot or an aeronautical engineer to enjoy aviation. In my case, I believe God had aviation in my plans before I was born. I always wanted to take people flying to let them see this great planet from another point of view. Our website www.whirlwindstogether.com”, tells that a “first flight” led to marriage to my wife. After getting her secured in the seat, the first thing I told her was I always prayed before I started the engine. Some people might want to get out of the airplane at that point. I explained it was not because I was afraid, but to thank God I have the opportunity and ability to fly the Cessna 172 and other types of airplanes. After a short tour to the North Georgia Mountains, we made a perfect landing at the Cobb County airport, and within 3 months we were married. Now, we have been writing our memoirs and living in the world of aviation for 27 years.

Our books will tell you how our faith helped us through the whirlwinds of life prior to our marriage and since that time. However, there are many interesting events we did not include in our books. The book did not indicate how difficult a decision I would have to make after two years of college education. Ever since I watched the squadrons of military airplanes flying overhead during World II, I had dreams of becoming a military pilot. I had that chance when I learned my military experience and two years of college qualified me to get flight training experience in the Air National Guard. As noted in my book, my college professor talked me out of it. Now, I realize that was God’s plan in action. Becoming an aeronautical engineer was more valuable to God, my family, and country. My civilian flight experience has also been valuable to others and my aeronautical engineering career.

When I consider my part in flying “Young Eagles,” I see happy children. I got so involved, I was made Young Eagles’ coordinator for Experimental Aviation Association, EAA, Chapter 268. This and my receiving an award from the president of EAA is discussed in chapter 49 of my book. What is not noted, I was also given a free flight in EAAs’ World War II B-17 (Flying Fortress). This occurred when Chapter 268 was coordinating the sale of B-17 flights at Cobb County Airport in Kennesaw Georgia. Seats were being sold for a price around $300. After having seen many B-17s fly over our house during World II and learning what they went through while being a part of the Eighth Air Force Command, I was extremely humbled to sit in the radio operators’ seat. A picture of the B-17 is attached. Maybe this was an example of a reward for “doing for others as you would have them do unto you.”

Atlantic Baptist Aviation Mission (ABAM) is another aviation organization where I made a difference with my flying and aeronautical engineering experience. I discussed my shared time with JAARS Mission Aviation in my book, but I didn’t write anything about ABAM. As with JAARS, I shared my experience with ABAM after retiring from Lockheed. At the time, I was doing business under an Airforce contract with my own Consulting Aviation Services Company and Georgia Tech. Employed again, I could afford to rejoin the Lockheed Flying club. I flew to the ABAM location in Zebulon, GA south of Atlanta. ABAM had some very good mechanics and pilots. They wanted a major design change to reduce the drag of their Helio Courier. (Picture attached) As noted in the title of the picture, this is a JAARs’ airplane. It is not the same one I worked on at JAARS nor is the one I worked on at ABAM, but it is similar. The airplane I worked on had a bigger engine, which caused its front end to be much less aerodynamic or flat. The management at ABAM wanted me to design a new streamline cowling. This was a huge task and the only pay I was going to get was to fly the airplane before the work began. Flying a Helio Courier was not something that many pilots get to do. Being an aerodynamicist who had specialized in High Lift wing design for airplanes I was challenged to create a low drag fuselage design. I told the leader at ABAM I would enjoy giving some of my time to help do God’s missionary work. That kind of work was not work. For me, it was fun.

I made a few trips to ABAM to collect data needed for my design work. Finally, the day came when the Helio and instructor were available for me to get a lesson. Being a designer of high lift airplane wings, I knew what full-span leading edge slats and full-span trailing edge flaps could do. I knew it was going to be very different from the airplanes I was flying. Furthermore, the airport at ABAM was short and narrow, and had Pine trees on all sides. I learned from flying my airplane, I had to be skillful. It wasn’t long before I knew why I was designing a streamline engine cowling. When landing, I was doing what I usually do; that is cut back on power. I cut back too much, and we started to drop like a rock. The instructor quickly caught it. This really encouraged me to get busy with the design work and I did as much design work as I knew how. I delivered my results to the organization, but I never learned if it worked for them. They moved from Zebulon, and I never heard from them again. However, the greatest joy I had was working with a dedicated group of people who had given their life to serve Jesus Christ in difficult and sometimes dangerous places.

Frieda and I have worked together now in our second chance of life for 27 years and gone through many whirlwinds of life, both good and bad. Our books tell you about much of what we have done, but there is more we hope to share with you. To really understand the miracles we have experienced, please read both books: Born Three Times and Chasing A Whirlwind. In subsequent posts we will share more about how faith, aviation, and other scientific matters have affected our lives. #Whirlwindstogether

For years we shared our lives and adventures with you through Frieda’s blog two late bloomers. Now we have joined forces as Whirlwinds Together to continue that legacy. Our new Facebook page facebook.com/whirlwindstogether and website chasingawhirlwind.com continue to tell our story. A recent article published in the local newspaper and a CBS TV spot focused on our first meeting in Chicken Soup for the Soul. Love at First Flight tells how we met and are continuing our adventures. That story ties our two books together.

Whirlwinds can work with you or against you. When we get into a problem that turns us into circles, we call that a whirlwind. The books we have written share many of those types of whirlwinds. Many times, it was a teaching experience from God and a solution came through prayer.

Nature creates whirlwinds and we see the devastating effects from tornadoes, hurricanes, and typhoons. The resulting vortices can cause much destruction.

A positive effect of vortices is required for airplanes to fly. The smallest planes to the largest aircraft are all dependent on the work of vortices. The white trails you see high in the sky are due to the vortices coming from the wing tips of an airplane in flight. They have been falsely accused of having a part in climate change. We will be discussing this more in future posts.

In future posts you will see more stories about our adventures and pictures and videos of flight tests. You can help our efforts by liking our Facebook page and website. We look forward to hearing from you.

Welcome. We are Chuck and Frieda Dixon, authors of Chasing a Whirlwind and Born Three Times. Whirlwinds Together is very special to us, and we hope to share some of that excitement with you here.

We’ll be using this blog to interact with you about Chasing a Whirlwind and Born Three Times, expanding on some of the topics in it and posting on some of the ideas related to our books. This is a great place for you to get to know us, and we are looking forward to getting to know you, too. What did you think of our books? What questions do you have for us? How do you relate to our books?

We’ll be returning here frequently with new posts and responses to feedback from you. Until next time, tell us a little bit about yourself.