F-100C Super Sabre
Produced by
North American Aviation
Years in Service
1954 – 1988
Production Cost
$664,000 (1954)
[$8.2 million (2026)]
Wing Span
38 ft. 10 in.
Length
53 ft. 11 in. (with boom extension)
47 ft. 0 in. (with boom folded)
Height
15 ft. 6 in.
Weight
36,549 lbs
Maximum Speed
900 MPH (Mach 1.72)
Average Cruising Speed
600 MPH (Mach .78)
Range
1,350 miles
Service Ceiling
51,0000 feet
Crewed by
One (1) pilot
Armament(s)
Four M39 20mm cannons
42 2.75-inch rockets
5,000 lbs. of bombs
Engine
One Pratt & Whitney J57 of 16,000 lbs. thrust with afterburner
Flown By
U.S Air Force | Royal Danish Air Force | French Air Force | Republic of China Air Force | Turkish Air Force
The F-100 was the USAF’s first operational aircraft capable of flying faster than the speed of sound (760 mph) in level flight. It made its initial flight on May 25, 1953 and the first production aircraft was completed in October 1953. North American built 2,294 F-100s before production ended in 1959.
Designed originally to destroy enemy aircraft in aerial combat, the F-100 later became a fighter-bomber. It made its combat debut during the Vietnam conflict where it was assigned the task of attacking such targets as bridges, river barges, road junctions, and areas being used by infiltrating enemy soldiers.
The F-100C, which made its first flight in 1955, featured such advances as an in-flight refueling system, provisions for extra fuel drop tanks and bombs under the wings and an improved electronic bombing system.
Used as a fighter/bomber, the F-100 saw extensive use in Vietnam. The F-100 was flown by the USAF Thunderbirds for eight years; they flew from Grissom from 1956-1957.
About Our Plane
Tail Number
53-1712
Years in Service
1955 – 1956
Service Location(s)
NAMIC (Air Materiel Command) | Inglewood, CA
Edwards AFB | Edwards, CA
National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics | California
F-100 Super Saber, tail number 53-1712, did not have a long history, but it was a memorable and groundbreaking one. Unlike other F-100Cs, this plane was sent directly to the U.S. Air Force for testing and research. Her first stop was the Air Materiel Command units stationed at Inglewood, California, where the designation was changed from F-100C-1-NA to JF-100C.
The Super Sabre was transferred out in September of 1956 to the 6515th Test Squadron at Edwards AFB (CA), where it was used as an evaluator plane for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics. As the precursor to NASA, the work being completed by NACA was important to the development of aviation technology throughout World War II and into the early decades of the Cold War.
53-1712 was used in thirty test flights, which focused on the effects of a pitching motion damper on supersonic planes like the F-100. The tests took place between September 1956 and March 1957 and four pilots participated in the tests.
Sixteen of those were undertaken by famed research pilot Stanley Butchart (1922 – 2007), who had been flying for NACA since 1951 and would rise to chief pilot by the time of his retirement from the program in 1966.
Future first man on the moon Neil Armstrong (1930 – 2012) was the pilot on ten of those test flights and was given the honor of flying 53-1712 to her next location at the Military Aircraft Storage and Disposal Center in Tucson, AZ. Armstrong had only been a pilot with NACA for a little over a year when he took part in these tests. During his career, he worked as a project pilot on several of the Century Series flyers. The F-100C Super Sabre was only one of 200 planes he would ultimately fly as a tester.
The last four flights were split between World War II veterans Capt. Joseph Walker (3) and Capt. Hugh Hunerwadel (1). Both perished during test flights for the NACA. Hunerwadel died in September 1958 while testing a U-2 weather reconnaissance plane near Rodgers Dry Lake in California and Walker perished in June 1966 when his F-104 Starfighter clipped an XB-70 Valkyrie during a promotional photo shoot. One of the two pilots in the Valkyrie also perished in the crash.
53-1712 did not remain in the MASDC ‘boneyard’ for very long and spent three years being used at Norton, McClellan, and Langly AFB before being returned to MASDC. It would be pulled from storage in 1971 by the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force and added to their loan program. The F-100 spent seven years on static display at Lackland AFB’s Parade Ground Air Park. It wouldn’t be until 1986 when the plane was then loaned to Grissom AFB and its whereabouts in those interim years are unknown.
Grissom AFB maintained 53-1712 until stewardship was transferred to the GAM in the early 1990s and was part of the first planes in our air park.