Forum: General

Last edited by Kaasjager. on Aug 25, 2006 - 11:10 AM; edited 1 time in total

So, what is your worst or most costly mistake in F-16 maintenance?

Here is mine:

When i was an intern at the RNLAF i was working with a Sgt installing a flapperon ISA, when we were installing the aft bolt the Sgt had a call from home so he had to go for a couple of minutes. He told me to just keep wrenching the bolt to seat the conical bus properly, so i did and it went heavier and heavier, when the Sgt got back i told him how heavy it went and he said that is shouldn't supposed to be that heavy. What turned out to have happened was; The aft pin wasn't seated properly in it's slot and because i kept wrenching it was all bent at the head and the ISA support beam was damaged. So we had to get NDO to inspect the beam and all kinds of officers to ask us what went wrong, turned out the repair and replacement of the beam cost the RNLAF about 200.000 dollars... Embarassed

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Elite Joined: May 13, 2004 Posts: 2945 Location: Utah

Thank God I never had (made) one (mistake that is)...seen many though.

I arrive at Misawa AB in March 1987, right in the middle of their conversion from Block 15 to Block 30. I am the only guy who has worked a Block 30, so I am Mister Block 30 from the first day I arrived there. I get used to people asking my advice about troubleshooting, I go to lots of morning meetings, I notice that my hat doesn't fit any more and that I have to keep expanding that plastic band in the back. In other words, I was due for a takedown, and nobody can take you down better than yourself.

So Mr. Block 30 goes out on his first weekend duty to cann a HUD PDU from a family model. Of course, I'm such a hotshot that I take it out all by myself, put it in the truck, and go back to close the canopy. As I lowered the canopy, I heard a scraping sound and looked up in horror to see the CTVS camera gouging the transparency, because I didn't place it down in the HUD well like I was supposed to (as the TO tells you to) and left it instead on the left forward glareshield.

I was sick as I raised the canopy and surveyed the damage. There was a huge scrape mark on the inner transparency layer. At that time, D-model forward transparencies cost about $80,000. I went back to the truck and called out Pro Super to give him the good news. When he arrived, I stuck out my hand (I hadn't met him yet), introduced myself, and told him that I had just f***ed up his canopy. He took it well and called Egress shop to take a look. Fortunately, they determined that since it was not in the prime viewing area it was okay and wouldn't have to be replaced.

There was of course some snickering in the shop on Monday morning and for quite some time after that. My head returned to its normal size in due course. Many years later in Texas, I heard a phrase that has always reminded me of that event, and it sticks with me today:

"Ain't a horse that can't be rode, ain't a man that can't be throwed."

Joe you did exactly what you should have, be a man and admit your mistake.

I was working on News Years eve in 1984 troubleshooting a NWS issue that was very strange. Every time we did a EPU check, we got a NWS fail. I was part of the team as the engine run man, and after 3 days of T/S we had figured we could clear it by going power off. We did it so many times I got way ahead of myself......my ground man still had the EPU pin in his hand and I was still in norm and cycled the power off.....hey I still had power (wonder why?)and people were running everywhere. That EPU worked like a charm. Anyway, next thing I know the DCM (this was at Nellis 474th) walks up to me and said lets have a seat over here on the curb. He said to me "Gary what did you do" so I told him the whole story and all he said was, "go home have a beer a think about what you did, I know you will never do that again"

He was so right....I have the utmost respect for that man even today....sometimes the crime is the only punishment needed!!!!

Purplehaze wrote:

Anyway, next thing I know the DCM (this was at Nellis 474th) walks up to me and said lets have a seat over here on the curb. He said to me "Gary what did you do" so I told him the whole story and all he said was, "go home have a beer a think about what you did, I know you will never do that again"

He was so right....I have the utmost respect for that man even today....sometimes the crime is the only punishment needed!!!!

Another thread talked about good leadership qualities... That is a perfect example. Only punish someone when it needs to happen. Smile

Purplehaze wrote:

He was so right....I have the utmost respect for that man even today....sometimes the crime is the only punishment needed!!!!

Nowadays I would not have believed him. I would be waiting for a ninja ambush when I got home. Or some ninjas to jump out of the beer I just opened.

You got lucky with your punishment. My most costly mistake didn't cost the air force anything, it did however cost me my pride, and resulting punishment.

I was going to run an aircraft for a start problem we were having, well the motor was pickled, and so when the engine started to smoke, and such, I throttled off to let it blow out, and then went back over the horn to attempt restart, it didn't. So I shut down for a bit, read the book, and then jumped back in. Well I ended up having a tail pipe fire, scared the poor newbie airman that was doing fire guard so bad, he attempted to run, and ran right smack into the fire bottle on his exit. When I went to shut down, I did all the emergency procedures, except the throttle off part.

I was decerted from engine run for a few months for that little mistake, but there was no damage to the aircraft, or people, but it definitely could have been worse.

Frequent Poster Joined: Nov 20, 2005 Posts: 67

To everybody, avoid this thread, coz may be used to collect data on mx/other issues suitable for sabotage.

Just being carefull with that you post, this page may be readed by Al-Qaeda, Chinese (pop), and the ultra-left (which remains very active also in the US).

Quote:

To everybody, avoid this thread, coz may be used to collect data on mx/other issues suitable for sabotage.

Just being carefull with that you post, this page may be readed by Al-Qaeda, Chinese (pop), and the ultra-left (which remains very active also in the US).

Do you really believe what you wrote here?

No offense, but there are far more effective ways to cripple a Viper than scratching its canopy, wrenching the hell out of a nut or forgetting the throttle opened during engine shutdown. Let's be serious. You're overreacting.

If an Al-Quaeda operative or an anarchist or whatever would get close enough to a Viper in order to damage it he might as well take a hammer at it or an axe. See here: <a href="news_article1543.html">Peace activist who smashed Dutch F-16s sentenced</a>

Veteran Joined: Mar 12, 2005 Posts: 384 Status: Offline

Quote:

Do you really believe what you wrote here?

No offense, but there are far more effective ways to cripple a Viper than scratching its canopy, wrenching the hell out of a nut or forgetting the throttle opened during engine shutdown. Let's be serious. You're overreacting.

Pull the throttle back a bit their turbo. The dude was making a joke about an earlier, more serious thread about that stuff. I can see how it might be mis-interpreted if a person did'nt see the earlier threads. You could say its kind of an inside joke, no harm meant i'm sure. Very Happy

Well, it didn't sound like a joke to me. But if that's the case, I'm sorry. I guess I must have missed that earlier thread.

I feel sorry for the enlisted airforce guy in Florida who let a flag and metal pin get sucked into an F-22s engine recently.

<a href="f-16_fighting_falcon_airframe-2759.html">88-0522</a>

Had a JFS no start problem. Worked everything the book said. Worked every trick that I am several others knew. Finally after a few hours we found a broken wire below te JFS start panel.

I was so excited I figured we checked everything else it has to be that, being a friday night and single at the time I wanted to get to A-town. So with out thinking I jump in to the C/P ensured its clear and threw the JFS switch to start 2. The JFS started like a champ.

It was awesome.... untill I heard someone on the head set stating that we forgot to close the JFS door... I shut it down to go back and check the damage you know that JFS can sure do some damage to a open door.

I don't know if it was that I only had a few weeks left till the end of my rotation or what but something told me to get the door closed before it cooled off, we did and who would of knew it but the door will actually reformed with a few minor blemishes to the original fit.... Not too costly but a great learning experience... Very Happy

Let's see, I was working <a href="f-16_fighting_falcon_airframe-2959.html">89-2111</a> for an overheat light issue, as in the light came on during launch and would not go out needless to say GAB. I checked the forms from the night before during an engine install and no issues were found.

So being the run guy for my shift I preped the jet for a run. I reviewed the forms, and did the walk around and I&E inspections. Get in and get the jet running and the overheat light comes on. This is where I screwed up and decided to keep running to allow the guys on the ground a chance to see if they could find if we had a Bleed Air leak or not. Come to find out after I shut down that the scoop pnl above the JFS door was quite hot, when we looked in the scoop to our surprise the duct was not installed and wasn't documented in the A/C forms. We ended up melting the engine harness and caused about 3 days of work re-wiring that area.

Needless to say I felt like sh*t causing all of that work due to someone elses lack of documentation. I learned a lot from that one incident... look in all of the panels that you can see into and don't trust anyone. Cheers

akruse21 wrote:

Purplehaze wrote:

He was so right....I have the utmost respect for that man even today....sometimes the crime is the only punishment needed!!!!

Nowadays I would not have believed him. I would be waiting for a ninja ambush when I got home. Or some ninjas to jump out of the beer I just opened.

I feel ya....I still look under my bed at night....and I've been out for 2 years!

Forum: General

Your worst (most costly) mistake in F-16 maintenance