From Estrella Warbirds Museum
Designed by Lockheed's creative genius, Clarence "Kelly" Johnson, the prototype F-104 rolled out the company's high-desert Skunk Works and made its first flight on March 4, 1954 at Edwards Flight Test Center. Later, it was the first aircraft to hold simultaneous world records for speed (1,450 mph)*, altitude (103,395' without rocket assist), and time-to-climb to altitude. Because of its physical appearance and performance, the F-104 has often been called the "missile with a man in it." The design was a product of the Korean War, and was unique in several respects. The encounters with the MiG-15 in Korea caused a strong outcry among Air Force fighter pilots for a cheap, lightweight, maneuverable, high-performance fighter to confront future Soviet fighters. The result was the F-104, a fighter that overemphasized rate of climb and brute speed.
The F-104G had full all-weather capability, carrying an Autonetics F15A-41B NASARR (North American Search and Ranging Radar) fire control system. The fire control system was optimized in two basic air-to-ground and air-to-air modes--these were for bombing/navigation and target interception, respectively. In the air-to-air mode, it provided radar search, acquisition, and automatic tracking of aerial targets to make it possible to to carry out lead-collision attacks with automatic missile release. The NASAAR acted in conjunction with the director-type gun sight for the M-61 Vulcan cannon. The director gun sight gave the pilot an optical line-of-sight indication after the NASARR had computed the required lead angle. The weapons sight incorporated a basic infrared facility with common optics developed by Lockheed, which gave the aircraft some night-sighting capability. For air-to-ground modes, the NASAAR provided the pilot with range information for visual bombing computation, ground mapping for all-weather bombing and navigation, contour mapping for navigation, and terrain avoidance for low-level combat missions. The caged sight could also be used as an aiming reference for visual dive-bombing.