Don’t ask an ageing aircraft maintainer anything
Discussion
Mainly because I’ve probably forgotten the answer!
I’m 58 now, and as someone who enjoys bending spanners, likes aircraft, and would definitely have struggled with over 40 years behind a desk, I feel lucky/privileged/got away with it.
A year on Buccs, then from 1983 to 1990 Tornado GR1 and F3. Went to Saudi, Tornado GR1 and F3 again. Then 2000-2009 civvie stuff at Stansted and Upwood. And now 13 years on Apaches. A mix of first line, hangar and workshop over the last 40 years, currently first line.
I look back at the things I can actually remember and chuckle. Some great people, amazing experiences, and they’ve all paid me for it!
December 2023 I’ll be 60, and hopefully starting to narrow down the retirement date. I can’t see myself, at 6” 4’, wanting to scrunch myself up into the CPG’s footwell for much longer
Cold War? Russia was the enemy? Seems a lifetime ago…
I’m 58 now, and as someone who enjoys bending spanners, likes aircraft, and would definitely have struggled with over 40 years behind a desk, I feel lucky/privileged/got away with it.
A year on Buccs, then from 1983 to 1990 Tornado GR1 and F3. Went to Saudi, Tornado GR1 and F3 again. Then 2000-2009 civvie stuff at Stansted and Upwood. And now 13 years on Apaches. A mix of first line, hangar and workshop over the last 40 years, currently first line.
I look back at the things I can actually remember and chuckle. Some great people, amazing experiences, and they’ve all paid me for it!
December 2023 I’ll be 60, and hopefully starting to narrow down the retirement date. I can’t see myself, at 6” 4’, wanting to scrunch myself up into the CPG’s footwell for much longer
Cold War? Russia was the enemy? Seems a lifetime ago…
Strange isn’t it.
I’ve done 25 years fixing aircraft for the RAF, including 7 years as an Airborne Technician on Sentry E3D operating as crew.
I’ll be 50 when I get out (5 years if I can stick it, it’s starting to grate on me now). The one thing I won’t be doing once I leave is fixing an airplane again in civie street. I’m already getting to old to be hanging off undercarriage legs in 3ft of snow and -10 deg.
So go on then OP what’s the biggest F**k Up you have ever made.
I’m still in so I have to be careful but as a JT I found it amazing how poorly packed 1 particular piece of Nimrod R1 equipment was packaged for transited to us and how smashed up it was when it came out of the packaging.
Nothing to do with the LRU being on the back seat of the tractor and due to its s
t suspension and it getting in to an ever increasing bounce said box definitely didn’t bounce of the tractor seat and smash a couple of SMA connectors of the front of it.
In fairness as a good boy I owned up to my Sgt to what had happened.
His response - Terrible packaging it came in wasn’t it (wrapped in bubble wrap). You found it like this didn’t you.
Yes Sgt I most certainly did.
This was obviously quite early in my career and back then things were just moved around unit in bubble wrap. These days everything seems to be in an STC so that wouldn’t fly these days.
I’ve done 25 years fixing aircraft for the RAF, including 7 years as an Airborne Technician on Sentry E3D operating as crew.
I’ll be 50 when I get out (5 years if I can stick it, it’s starting to grate on me now). The one thing I won’t be doing once I leave is fixing an airplane again in civie street. I’m already getting to old to be hanging off undercarriage legs in 3ft of snow and -10 deg.
So go on then OP what’s the biggest F**k Up you have ever made.
I’m still in so I have to be careful but as a JT I found it amazing how poorly packed 1 particular piece of Nimrod R1 equipment was packaged for transited to us and how smashed up it was when it came out of the packaging.
Nothing to do with the LRU being on the back seat of the tractor and due to its s
t suspension and it getting in to an ever increasing bounce said box definitely didn’t bounce of the tractor seat and smash a couple of SMA connectors of the front of it. In fairness as a good boy I owned up to my Sgt to what had happened.
His response - Terrible packaging it came in wasn’t it (wrapped in bubble wrap). You found it like this didn’t you.
Yes Sgt I most certainly did.
This was obviously quite early in my career and back then things were just moved around unit in bubble wrap. These days everything seems to be in an STC so that wouldn’t fly these days.
No major f-ups that can be planted directly at my feet, but…
I was in a hangar, approaching knock off time, disconnecting a test hose from the engine bleed air system, when my chief told me to just finish it off in the morning. Hmm, ok, unusual.
Came in next morning, empty space where the aircraft was. Asked, and it was out at the detuner for engine ground runs. The next second, the phone rang. Brown smoke billowing from the aircraft fuselage, could we go and take a look.
Long story short: a few guys went in early, panelled up the aircraft, dragged it out. What they didn’t do was fit the effin’ blanking cap on the aircraft bleed air fitting! So air at a few hundred degrees C was belting out, frying the One Shot Battery (it was sizzling) and fuel was dripping from the fin fuel low level sensor….
Disaster averted, thankfully. I had to explain EXACTLY was had happened to a string of engineering officers, and I was then offered the chance to move from my team to another. 18 months later, promoted to corporal!
It was a good, early lesson in human factors, and I’ve been well on my guard for something similar since.
Aircraft bite, and they bite hard, given the slightest chance.
I was in a hangar, approaching knock off time, disconnecting a test hose from the engine bleed air system, when my chief told me to just finish it off in the morning. Hmm, ok, unusual.
Came in next morning, empty space where the aircraft was. Asked, and it was out at the detuner for engine ground runs. The next second, the phone rang. Brown smoke billowing from the aircraft fuselage, could we go and take a look.
Long story short: a few guys went in early, panelled up the aircraft, dragged it out. What they didn’t do was fit the effin’ blanking cap on the aircraft bleed air fitting! So air at a few hundred degrees C was belting out, frying the One Shot Battery (it was sizzling) and fuel was dripping from the fin fuel low level sensor….
Disaster averted, thankfully. I had to explain EXACTLY was had happened to a string of engineering officers, and I was then offered the chance to move from my team to another. 18 months later, promoted to corporal!
It was a good, early lesson in human factors, and I’ve been well on my guard for something similar since.
Aircraft bite, and they bite hard, given the slightest chance.
El stovey said:
Have you ever finished a job and been left with a spare piece and not sure how it happened or where it went.
Surprisingly, never! I’m a little meticulous when I comes to removing items from aircraft and components, as I’m aware of my own shortcomings. If I don’t label items, I’ll end up crying!Being handed a box of bits at the start of a shift from the off-going shift is never a great place to be.
I like to operate in a way that, if I were to suddenly and unexpectedly be away from work, the poor soul taking over the job should have all the info needed to carry on.
Tony1963 said:
Surprisingly, never! I’m a little meticulous when I comes to removing items from aircraft and components, as I’m aware of my own shortcomings. If I don’t label items, I’ll end up crying!
Being handed a box of bits at the start of a shift from the off-going shift is never a great place to be.
I like to operate in a way that, if I were to suddenly and unexpectedly be away from work, the poor soul taking over the job should have all the info needed to carry on.
That sounds very professional.Being handed a box of bits at the start of a shift from the off-going shift is never a great place to be.
I like to operate in a way that, if I were to suddenly and unexpectedly be away from work, the poor soul taking over the job should have all the info needed to carry on.
I’ve got the greatest respect for aircraft engineers you do a vitally important job.
As an aside, I’ve been out eating and drinking abroad with aircraft engineers and technicians and often admired engineers ability to drink beer and eat hot curry although I did manage to nearly kill one with some salsa flavouring I bought in Mexico, he boasted he could eat anything hot and poured loads onto his food. . . and won’t do that again.
Eating very hot and spicy food is one of my better known characteristics!
I don’t drink anywhere near as much as I used to (RAF taught me to drink, Saudi took that skill to another level) but I always have time in my life for a hot curry etc. Not drinking cheap beer means the day after a vindaloo isn’t as punishing as it used to be!
I don’t drink anywhere near as much as I used to (RAF taught me to drink, Saudi took that skill to another level) but I always have time in my life for a hot curry etc. Not drinking cheap beer means the day after a vindaloo isn’t as punishing as it used to be!
Chuck328 said:
What's the most amusing ( if any) tech log ( or what ever the mil parlance is) entry you had to deal with ?
Had one where a Harrier pilot accidentally "headbutted" a radio control knob on the Up-Front Controller whilst wearing his helmet and broke it off. The entry in the "tech log" was a nicely humorous "Knob lost in cockpit" and after finding and refitting it we, again in the same spirit, wrote "Pilots Knob found in Cockpit, Pilots Knob refitted IAW (procedure number), Pilots Knob functional test C/O satis, Pilots Knob assessed as Serviceable".The Sqn Docs cell (paperwork checkers) had a minor sense of humour failure made us redo all the paperwork "properly"
Chuck328 said:
The most infuriating?
This must have happened to me literally hundreds of times in the decades I've worked aircraft (although mainly on "training" Sqns to be fair) - "Equipment XYZ display doesn't work" - Go out the aircraft and find the brightness control on the display turned down. Turn the brightness back up and...............oh look, it works. Every time it would take around 45 mins to 1 hr+ of "wasted" time to check the aircraft was ready to be worked on and any fault history, get tools, get to aircraft flightline/HAS/Hangar, power everything on the aircraft up and then spend 10 seconds "fixing" the fault, then power everything down, wrap the aircraft back up, head in from the flightline/HAS/hangar etc, tools back in, complete paperwork etc before moving onto the next job. So in a typical 8 to 10hr shift (with 30mins for food + 30mins for smoke breaks etc) you could lose 2 or more engineers (we can't work alone - safety, checking etc) for a few hours a day just "fixing" incorrect switch problems.In the past we used to be able to run "hit teams" of 4-6 experienced trade specialists who, when the pilots were starting the aircraft, were sat in a van right next to the aircraft so immediately available to quickly check any aircraft issues with the pilot still in the cockpit, negating all of these very minor issues, but with the drawdown in manpower available (post SDR '98) these teams became a luxury to most places as we just couldn't spare 4-6 experienced folks being "away" from the usual more indepth work we'd be doing to sit in a van when we only maybe had 20 total experienced trade engineers per shift on an average Fast Jet Sqn.
Ha! Hit teams.
We used that set up in Saudi. I really enjoyed it.
But my first turn at being on hit team wasn’t planned. I’d only just arrived on the squadron, and still didn’t really know what was what, having spent the previous few years in hydraulic shops. But sickness and leave meant I was the only person available.
Anyway, a hydraulic issue was called for one of the aircraft, we arrived, I climbed out of the HiAce still struggling with my headset and throat-mike. The Brit ground crew dude stood by the aircraft who’d radio’d in the issue took one look at me, rolled his eyes, and thought to himself that there’d be no way I’d be able to fix it.
I plugged in, and the pilot said the issue had cleared itself, no problem now. I could’ve disconnected there and then, but I thought I’d turn it round to my advantage
I asked the pilot what the symptom was, how he’d cleared it, kept him chatting for a minute. Then, said bye bye to him, disconnected my headset, gave the thumbs up to a shocked Brit ground crew dude, and went on my way.
That elevated my standing within the squadron immediately. Told everyone at my leaving do what had really happened.
We used that set up in Saudi. I really enjoyed it.
But my first turn at being on hit team wasn’t planned. I’d only just arrived on the squadron, and still didn’t really know what was what, having spent the previous few years in hydraulic shops. But sickness and leave meant I was the only person available.
Anyway, a hydraulic issue was called for one of the aircraft, we arrived, I climbed out of the HiAce still struggling with my headset and throat-mike. The Brit ground crew dude stood by the aircraft who’d radio’d in the issue took one look at me, rolled his eyes, and thought to himself that there’d be no way I’d be able to fix it.
I plugged in, and the pilot said the issue had cleared itself, no problem now. I could’ve disconnected there and then, but I thought I’d turn it round to my advantage
I asked the pilot what the symptom was, how he’d cleared it, kept him chatting for a minute. Then, said bye bye to him, disconnected my headset, gave the thumbs up to a shocked Brit ground crew dude, and went on my way.
That elevated my standing within the squadron immediately. Told everyone at my leaving do what had really happened.
When I was an Air Cadet we went to look around a 31 Sqn Tornado GR1. We were allowed to sit in the cockpit and take photos but were told we were not allowed to take pics of the rear seat floor area.
So I’ve always wondered why. Any ideas (that don’t land you in trouble with Official Secrets..)
So I’ve always wondered why. Any ideas (that don’t land you in trouble with Official Secrets..)
Tony1963 said:
Might have been to do with the ‘special weapons’ cabling, especially if covers were removed. Usually had red sheathing.
More likely where the porn was stashed. All planes used to have porn stashes but that stopped in most workplaces a while ago. On the B757 it was where the escape rope is stowed. You’d open it to check the rope was there and porn would fall out on your lap.
Flying was much like being at school back then.
Edited by anonymous-user on Sunday 1st May 12:52
Tony1963 said:
Aircraft bite, and they bite hard, given the slightest chance.
Yes they do, friend of mine was medically discharged after an accident on an aircraft. Aircraft up on jacks and they were functionally testing the undercarriage. Post cycling it the hydraulics were shut down but obviously there is massive residual pressure that has to be dumped. Guy stood where the door would come down and someone reached up in to the wheel well to release the undercarriage door thinking the pressure had been dissipated. It hadn’t. Door came down and smashed the bloke in the back of the head. Knocked him about 10 ft across the hanger. Got up but felt sick so was sent home.
Next day he never turned up for work. Later his wife rang in to work to say he had woken up blind in the morning, rushed to hospital and they discovered a bleed on the brain so they had to drill a hole in his skull.
The RAF medics then fu**ed up his care, resulting in problems with kidney and/or liver.
Needless to say he did not use the military compensation scheme but sued. There is an NDA in place I believe but he’s never disclosed the payout other than to say his kids will never have to work if they don’t want to.
That’s the incident that really made me aware of just how hard they can bite. That and a sooty chief on gr1/4 with a missing couple of finger ends. Taileron moved while his had was in the APU door and took them straight off apparently.
Injuries due to working on aircraft, from memory, to other people working near me:
Tornado canopy MDC set off by armourers taking short cut: one lost an eye, the other deaf in one ear.
Mech walked towards Buccaneer to pick up armament safety key off the ground below the bomb bay, pilot rotated the bomb door, mech needed metal plate in his skull. Carried on with employment.
Liney in a HAS, due to poor support equipment, tried inflating a nose wheel tyre straight from the N2 bottle, pressure wasn’t sufficiently controlled, wheel blew apart and took his forearm off. He lived, no thanks to air traffic holding up the ambulance while an aircraft did circuits and bumps. A death threat down the phone sorted that one.
Numerous finger tips lost due to high speed electric fans being started up unannounced while someone is working very close to them.
Head crushed in a leading edge slat, bloke died a few times, brought back on each occasion. Survived ok.
Plenty of falls.
An over-pressurised cold air unit (manual mixed psi and bar in the text, asking for trouble) resulting in one very winded bloke laid on the floor holding his stomach. He laughed about it later.
Two whole fingers lost due to high pressure hydraulic fluid being accidentally directed into them. Good old RAF doctor told the guy to wait as he had a few pregnant wives to see first.
There are more, but I’m enjoying the snooker
Tornado canopy MDC set off by armourers taking short cut: one lost an eye, the other deaf in one ear.
Mech walked towards Buccaneer to pick up armament safety key off the ground below the bomb bay, pilot rotated the bomb door, mech needed metal plate in his skull. Carried on with employment.
Liney in a HAS, due to poor support equipment, tried inflating a nose wheel tyre straight from the N2 bottle, pressure wasn’t sufficiently controlled, wheel blew apart and took his forearm off. He lived, no thanks to air traffic holding up the ambulance while an aircraft did circuits and bumps. A death threat down the phone sorted that one.
Numerous finger tips lost due to high speed electric fans being started up unannounced while someone is working very close to them.
Head crushed in a leading edge slat, bloke died a few times, brought back on each occasion. Survived ok.
Plenty of falls.
An over-pressurised cold air unit (manual mixed psi and bar in the text, asking for trouble) resulting in one very winded bloke laid on the floor holding his stomach. He laughed about it later.
Two whole fingers lost due to high pressure hydraulic fluid being accidentally directed into them. Good old RAF doctor told the guy to wait as he had a few pregnant wives to see first.
There are more, but I’m enjoying the snooker
Tony1963 said:
No major f-ups that can be planted directly at my feet, but…
I was in a hangar, approaching knock off time, disconnecting a test hose from the engine bleed air system, when my chief told me to just finish it off in the morning. Hmm, ok, unusual.
Came in next morning, empty space where the aircraft was. Asked, and it was out at the detuner for engine ground runs. The next second, the phone rang. Brown smoke billowing from the aircraft fuselage, could we go and take a look.
Long story short: a few guys went in early, panelled up the aircraft, dragged it out. What they didn’t do was fit the effin’ blanking cap on the aircraft bleed air fitting! So air at a few hundred degrees C was belting out, frying the One Shot Battery (it was sizzling) and fuel was dripping from the fin fuel low level sensor….
Disaster averted, thankfully. I had to explain EXACTLY was had happened to a string of engineering officers, and I was then offered the chance to move from my team to another. 18 months later, promoted to corporal!
It was a good, early lesson in human factors, and I’ve been well on my guard for something similar since.
Aircraft bite, and they bite hard, given the slightest chance.
What should have happened in that situation. Were you blamed for the way the aircraft was left or was it entirely down to the guys who failed to fit the blanking cap?I was in a hangar, approaching knock off time, disconnecting a test hose from the engine bleed air system, when my chief told me to just finish it off in the morning. Hmm, ok, unusual.
Came in next morning, empty space where the aircraft was. Asked, and it was out at the detuner for engine ground runs. The next second, the phone rang. Brown smoke billowing from the aircraft fuselage, could we go and take a look.
Long story short: a few guys went in early, panelled up the aircraft, dragged it out. What they didn’t do was fit the effin’ blanking cap on the aircraft bleed air fitting! So air at a few hundred degrees C was belting out, frying the One Shot Battery (it was sizzling) and fuel was dripping from the fin fuel low level sensor….
Disaster averted, thankfully. I had to explain EXACTLY was had happened to a string of engineering officers, and I was then offered the chance to move from my team to another. 18 months later, promoted to corporal!
It was a good, early lesson in human factors, and I’ve been well on my guard for something similar since.
Aircraft bite, and they bite hard, given the slightest chance.
Lost ranger said:
What should have happened in that situation. Were you blamed for the way the aircraft was left or was it entirely down to the guys who failed to fit the blanking cap?
Well, even back then in the mid 80s, some bosses understood that just blaming people isn’t necessarily a solution. I was completely open and honest, as were others involved, and I offered possible solutions to prevent a reoccurrence. Nobody was charged for it. The workload on everyone at Marham at the time was huge. Tornado was riddled with issues, we had seemingly endless no-notice exercises, and let’s face it: Marham was and probably still is, a crap posting. So I think the powers that be learned lessons and moved on.
Tony1963 said:
The workload on everyone at Marham at the time was huge. Tornado was riddled with issues, we had seemingly endless no-notice exercises, and let’s face it: Marham was and probably still is, a crap posting.
Despite being the Home of the F-35, the Premier project of the entire RAF, and having hundreds of millions of pounds thrown at the technical site (£500m+) my understanding from folks at Marham is that there's blocks with no hot water with even SNCO's having to shower in a porta-cabin setup in a car-park for a year now, blocks with no heating for over a year, 9 month long Carrier tours for RAF folks as well as RN folks, no "on-base" NAAFI (well Spar now) for the singlies, no bop, no pubs in the nearby village, £40 taxi fee's each way into somewhere decent (Kings Lynn) and an awful road network meaning you can travel up/down easily but not side to side (mostly single track with HGV's) so at the weekends it takes so long to get anywhere that no-one really bothers so the young folks feel "trapped" etc.I avoided the place like the plague when I was in and only managed a 3 month Q-Course down there where we had to sleep in triple decker porta-cabins (TMS Towers for those in the know) which had been condemned for years but were opened up due to the blocks being condemned and that was back in the early 10's.
I know if I was a "new to the RAF" engineer aged 19-20 and, after a long 9 month Det at sea on a carrier, and I got back to unit and found I had no heating, no hot water and had to shower in a car park and that even SNCO's were treated the same (i.e. it'll not improve as I get older), I'd probably be considering how much I really wanted to stay in (or at least at Marham).
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