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Lockheed F-104 Starfighter

Of all the “century” fighters the F-104 Starfighter is probably the most famous one. This could be due to its long service life - the last ones were retired from active duty in Italy in 2004 - but also its design. The Starfighter is hardly more than a flying tube. It has a pointed nose, behind which is a slightly popping out canopy. At the sides of the fuselage are two semi-circular air intakes, with fixed inlet shock cones in the middle on all versions except the XF-104 prototypes. Directly behind are the short, thin, trapezoid wings, with a swept leading edge and forward swept trailing edge. They have significant anhedral. Large fuel tanks can be fitted to the tips, but they are not standard. The F-104 has a low T-tail with a slightly curved small dorsal fin and a forward swept trailing edge on the vertical part. All gears, all with single wheels, retract forward in the fuselage.

Different versions

The variants of the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter can be distinguished by looking at

  • the shape of the air intakes
  • the length of the (rear) fuselage
  • the number of underwing pylons
  • the number of pylons under the fuselage
  • the shape of the vertical tail
  • the shape of the nose
  • the size of the canopy
  • the presence of a canon in the left side of the fuselage, below the cockpit
  • the presence on ventral fins 

More details will follow later.

Confusion possible with

Douglas X-3 Stiletto

at 3a

The similarity between the X-3 and F-104 is in the trapezoid wings that are short compared to the length of the fuselage. For the rest the X-3 is way different: a long long, canopy flush with the top of the fuselage, air intakes diagonally placed against the side of the fuselage and without shock cones and a low tail, to mention a few.