Hal Vincent Skyhawk Flights: ....."had first flt in Flight Test at Pax river in the YA4 on 28 Nov 55, so guess I will start there,(Lynn Helms on his first tour in Flight Test may add more and earlier info.) and use this e mail initially as easier to send in increments, and to type on. Flew over the years from 55 to the last on 2 Nov. 1980. .... total of 2960 built, and last one, buno. 160264 is in front of our Marine museum down at Miramar MCAS. I was never in a squadron, Did manage to get 30 or so missions at RVN when one A4 squadron VMA 214, joined our fighter group mag 13. --------- The most significant item you mention is that Ed H. designed to a "negative structural margin"... BOY, was that ever a license to steal.... Gordo Gray had the project when I joined out of TPS, and every flight we both had initially seemed to results in a structural failure of one kind or another. For example the A4 speed brakes cracked and failed, the metal along the tail peeled back, the slats stuck and caused a bad snap roll with uneven opening,trim changes failure, no oil pressure gage etc. ..you wrote well on many I have forgotten. In each case DAC would take the part off our company maintained planes, get on first airlines back to DAC, and a day or so later another part back and on and we retested. This is so significant as it turned out we in Flight test ended up proving their plane, and we used to say we did the work but DAC pilots got the pay. ....the A4D1 had just lots of failures, but the -2 later sure showed a big improvement. We joined 137819, 818, 826 in flight test in 56. All DAC planes came in at less than allowed wt. Seem to remember 8800 empty.?? --- we complained about the low g available so Lt Hank Hancock and I were sent to EDW, on an NPE, to evaluate 2 new DAC ideas. First was a "washed out wing or potato chip wing " that had curves like at the end of the wing. Only gave us .5 more g. on bu# 142082. Also we evaluated a cambered leading edge wing on 137821 and it also gave us .5 more g. I think on this same NPE we evaluated a trim change limiter, but forgot the details.----- Hank?? About this time we looked at the A4D-2.. What a great improvement over the -1. A tandem reverse actuator for aileron boost, a irreversible long control helped ... and as I recall a direct reading oil press gage vs the old barber pole reading which was lousy for a shaky engine like the -65. Now want to go back a little as don't remember the way you wrote it but Jimmy Verdins crash near the Palm Springs South, said cause was ?? We always were told crash was fact he was doing Fe/g work, and lateral and yawing moment work, and without a chase. We thought cause was fact that fuel bladders had no separators, and when yawing much fuel would go from one side of plane to other, and caused a snap roll where he hit his head on the left canopy rail, (found eye tissue there) and that was reason for the padding we saw on later models along the side. Another note: they looked and looked for body but could not find it for some time. He had on a regular navy flight suit. ... well DAC sprung for new orange flt suits for all their pilots and we were at EDW for another NPE for something, and darn if we didn't talk them out of the same suits for us. Boy , were we the admired and handsome pilots when we returned to flight test dressed in our new suits. Guess they gave to us to bribe us into a good NPE report. ha. ------------next around 1956 we Hancock and Vincent, were sent to Columbus to evaluate the FJ4, with a Mk 7 store on the right wing, as a possible replacement for the slow to be fixed A4. We found requirement for 156 kts before enough aileron to hold wing up for t/o, a neg roll above 500 with installed ailerons, supersonic even with speed brakes out in dive, and Fe/G for ftr vs attack plane. They sure responded in a hurry, and put spoilers on, raised stick force per g, and another set of speed brakes. Sure did a nice job and Ed H. sure got nervous, and his response was sure better. ... with the progress we saw and reported on ...!!! Personal opinion is the carry of the Mk 7 was in fact better on the A4, and although I sure liked the FJ4B later in the Corps, I think they made the best choice on the A4 for attack work--not as a fighter. I will stop here as left flight test to go to our Corps first west coast F8 squadrons, and will send second msg on VX5 work with the A4, Pres. Kennedy as affecting our weapons work, and hope that Ray Powell, who followed me after my 1960-62 tour as he sure did a lot of weapons work with the A4. Hope all the above folklore helps. questions from you might have reminded me, but sure have forgotten a lot in over 50 years...." Hal Vincent sends..