Tornado F3 stores

[Lord Riot]

Can anyone tell me what the store is in the photo please?

 

Would it have been carried by the F3 in the late 1980s?

 

If they did carry it, could they also have had an ACMI pod underwing at the same time or did this thing replace it?

 

[Selwyn]

Its a BOL  Missile launcher

 

Selwyn

[Des]

BOL combined Launch rail/Countermeasures Dispenser replaced the standard shoulder launch rail during the late 1990s , in most photos I have seen ACMI/RAIDS/Acquisition rounds were carried on the outer shoulder rails

[Lord Riot]

Great info guys, thanks.

 

In that case I'll leave them off, as I reckon 1988 would have been too early.

[Selwyn]

13 minutes ago, Lord Riot said:

Great info guys, thanks.

 

In that case I'll leave them off, as I reckon 1988 would have been too early.

definately not used  in 1988.

 

Selwyn

[Tyxxx]

I can confirm it is a BOL combined chaff/launch rail which we began fitting to the inboard shoulder stations form the mid to late 90's. They replaced the LAU-7A's which were normally fitted to the shoulder stations as they increased the chaff load we could carry without loosing the ability to fit a missile, as was the case with fitting a PHIMAT chaff pod instead of a LAU-7A. The BOL was only fitted to the inboard Stub pylons as with the wings fully forward if fitted to the outboard stubs they inter feared with the flaps when dropped. The bulbous front to the BOL is actually a Nitrogen bottle used to cool the head of the Sidewinder/ASRAAM missile. The rear of the Launcher contains packets of CHAFF where in a LAU-7A would be a long Nitrogen bottle. Where possible, certainly on 11 Sqn where I served, we avoided fitting external stores to the BOL LAU's as the nose bottle did not provide the number of sorties before requiring re charging that the larger N2 Receiver in the rear of the LAU-7A provided. I also seem to remember that electronically the outboard stations were either wired to accept RAIDs/ACMI PODS or the Missile Management System (MMS) only recognised them on particular outboard stations, the latter I think and again if memory serves, the outboard stations provided less interference from the airframe/Pylons/Tanks in regards to data transmission than using the inboard launch rails. I hope this info helps