Aircraft Maintenance and Tools

The Loss Of A Member Of Our Maintenance Family

2012-01-25T17:53:00.000-08:00

Recently we lost a valuable member of our Oakland Maintenance family, one that has been in OAK longer than me and was a real hard worker and very dependable. I an referring of course to our Maintenance Van.

I remember when I first met the van. I was working here for a couple of months when we had to make a run to San Jose to fix a couple of planes. About six of us piled into the van. There were at time only two seats in the van, however, so I asked what we were going to do. KW (he no longer works for SWA but I changed the name for his safety) told me to grab some cardboard of foam packing and find a spot on the floor. It was a fun and thrilling time for me as I was new to this whole Line MX thing and it had an air of doing whatever we had to in order to get the job done.

The van, at one time, was our road trip vehicle. We used it to travel all over the Bay Area and I believe it even made the trip to Reno a few times. It was also a popular Midnight shift vehicle since it had a radio and a tow hitch. Guys would load their tools into the back and rock out at their planes with the rear doors open.

Back when we were able to be Badged at different airports I rode in the van to SFO with Trooper and another guy. Our manager told us to park in the short term lot and he would reimburse us for the cost. Well back before the remodel there were these metal balls that hung down on chains from a sign across the entrance to the lot. These balls were supposed to warn you if your vehicle was too tall for the garage. We laughed because the truck in front of us cleared the "balls of death" but the guy had his camper shell aft window up and open. The "balls of death" smashed his window to bits. We knew the van would fit but did not take into account the beacon on top of the van. That beacon stood no chance against the balls and they claimed their second victim in under two minutes.

In the last few years the van has been our parking lot shuttle. Parked out there waiting for the next shift to come in. The van happily fulfilled this duty until late last month when the engine started to make dying noises and finally gave up the ghost.

The van had it's quirks. The side door was welded shut due to the fact that it fell off once when the guys were driving on the highway. The other odd thing was that the front roof section was caved in. As I liked to say in the shop: "all the cool guys know why the roof of the van is caved in."

There is a movement going on right now to buy her a new engine or even get a different van. I kind of lean toward the new engine side. That van was originally a Morris Air van and is part of SWA history. I think it deserves another shot.

New Airplanes Coming Our Way-737 MAX

2011-12-13T16:34:00.000-08:00

When I first got hired at SWA we were still taking delivery of brand new 737-300s. We had many of the old 737-200s still in our fleet at that time. We had a few old, tired, beat up 500s and the rumor was that Boeing was going to offer the 737-700 for us to purchase. Boy how times have changed!

737-200

Since then the 200s have been phased out, we have more 700s than 300s and we are still running those old, tired, beat up 500s. The problem we have at SWA is that the 700s are so reliable now that it has spotlighted how (I don't want to say unreliable) much work it requires to keep the older 300s and those God-forsaken 500s flying. A while after we got our 700s we transitioned them out of the maintenance program that the 300s were in and into a program that was a better fit for the 700s. That program, which uses MV (Maintenance Visits) instead of the old A, B, C, and D checks allows for better utilization of the Next Gen aircraft. Ultimately the program allows the MVs to be stretched out a little farther apart than the old Check system.

737-700

The problem is, in my opinion, that we also put the 300s and 500s on this MV style program. The older planes do not have the component reliability that the Next Gen planes do. As a result the older planes are getting rather "beat up" as a result. Most of the mechanics at SWA would agree that the 3s and 5s are getting to be a little long in the tooth. It was pretty obvious that Management would have to do something about the older planes pretty soon.

Enter the 737-MAX. This plane is basically a re-engined and re-geared 737 Next Gen. The engines are bigger which required a new set up of the landing gear in order to keep them from dragging on the ground! There are a lot of numbers being thrown around right now but it seems to me to be around a 10% savings in fuel and operating costs. The new engine is a CFM-Leap1b which has a composite fan section and some other changes they claim will make it the best thing since sliced bread.

737-MAX copyright Boeing Co.

As any one who knows me can attest to I do not like change. I almost freaked out when we ordered the 737-800s due in March, but I like this 737-MAX for a few reasons:

It saves fuel.
It reduces maintenance issues involved with the 300s and 500s.
It saves fuel.
It's made in America.
It saves fuel.
It's not an Airbus.
It saves fuel.
It's not a re-skinned 300. Thank God that idea seems to be headed out the window!
It's got those cool looking scalloped engine nacelles.

Bottom line is: Fuel is our biggest cost. If we can save whatever percent of our fuel I'm for it. A while ago one of the big wigs in Dallas said a 1% savings in fuel saves the company something like one billion dollars! I know I'm going to sound like a cool-aid drinker here but that is money that can go into my Profit Sharing!

Did I mention that the 500s were old, tired and beat up?

Clothing As Tools?

2011-11-29T21:43:00.000-08:00

A while ago I wrote a blog about these gloves that are out there for mechanics such as MECHANIX brand work gloves. I know that a lot of guys think that these gloves are a waste of time. The company supplies us with suitable rubber-type work gloves for no charge. I have been using the MECHANIX gloves as well as other brands-one from Walmart and one from Big Time Products.

When I started this little test I figured it would be done in a month or so and I would prove that, as I suspected, the name brand work gloves were not worth the extra money. Well that was about six months ago and these damn gloves are still going strong! I have been taking them to work in turn and bringing them home to clean them up. The companies all claim that the gloves are washable but they do not advise putting them into the dryer. In my test I throw the gloves into the washer with my work clothes and then throw them right into the dryer.

I like the gloves! They are WAY better than the gloves supplied by work! The MECHANIX brand gloves are my favorite of the bunch but they do not edge the others by much. All grip better, fit better, and are more durable than the work supplied gloves. I can see now why people use these things. If one pair would last me let's say 3 months of constant use then I would only require to purchase 4 pairs a year. Factor in Christmas and I'm only out of pocket 3 times a year. I think that for $20.00 these things are a good solid investment for a serious mechanic.

Another mechanic at the job got some work pants from BLAKADER. These pants are made from a tough denim material, think Dickies type pants only thicker. These pants are available in different styles. They have good deep pockets and best of all they incorporate a knee pad into the pant itself. For old guys like me with bad knees you know how important that is. The guy really likes them and I am thinking of investing in a pair to try them out.

I did buy some work pants from DULUTH TRADING CO. Duluth offers what they call the Firehose work pant. These pants have very deep pockets for carrying parts and tools, they have reinforced belt loops, and they are made of the same material that covers firehoses. Duluth claims they are water, oil and blood resistant. I bought them because they "Dare you to wear 'em out".

All this may sound like a big sales pitch by me but I recently figured out something. I have tools that make my job easier, I have a golf cart to carry all the special stuff I keep in it to make my job easier. The uniform supplied are good, adequate, but not really purpose built for the jobs we do. I figure if I'm going to do this job for another 20-25 years I should take it seriously and use any resource available to me to make that time productive, safe and most of all comfortable. I'm old now adequate is not really going to cut it anymore.

Clothing can be and should be considered tooling. We pay a lot of money to buy the best tools to complete our jobs. With the clothing out there being more and more useful for our trade as well as more durable than the company supplied alternative I think it is a worth while investment.

Stay tuned to find out if these Duluth work pants are worth it or not...

If At First You Don't Succeed...Try Another Part.

2011-10-30T19:16:00.000-07:00

Last week at work we were presented with an airplane that had a problem which should have been a simple fix but in fact turned out to be a real headache. This is the type of thing that happens every now and then that keeps the job interesting.

The plane can in a day before I started my work week. The original call was for a hydraulic leak at the engine. The fitting that was leaking was identified as one from the Engine Driven Hyd Pump. Ti cut off the hydraulic supply to the pump the fire handle for that engine was pulled which closed the gate Valve for that engine. Unfortunately it also set into motion a series of events that ultimately doomed the troubleshooting and nerves of several mechanics and several days worth of lost revenue for the aircraft.

The fitting had a bad O ring on it, which was changed and leak checked. The plane was dispatched but had to return to the airport after the A system "Low Press" light came on about 20 mins into the flight.

That night the engine pump was changed, the filters were changed, the electric hyd pump was changed after it was found leaking as well. As a hunch one of the mechanics checked that Gate Valve which isolates the engine from the rest of the hydraulic system. Turns out the Gate Valve was sticking and not operating smoothly. The valve was R&R'd.

After a leak check the system operated per the MM and the plane was put back into service. The following morning the plane took off and once again came back the the airport with the "Low Press" light illuminated. The engine pump was so hot it had changed color!

Those of you who are mechanics know that a double air return is now a serious issue and that the FAA is going to be checking it out. It also tends to get the attention of MX Control.

The engine pump was changed again, filters, the system drained and that's where I came in. I was working midnight shift overtime and I was working with another guy who I'll call Gold Brick. Gold Brick and I changed the A system Hyd Module, refilled the system and had to stop and wait for parts due in in the morning. I should also mention that the supply and return line to the pump were also changed.

Once the parts came in we installed them and did our leak check. We also ran the engine at idle for 10 minutes to see if anything happened. After this run we verified that there was fluid in the case drain filter. The case drain system is responsible for cooling the pump while it runs. All was good. By now it was Day shift and I was working with another guy I'll call Hearing Aid. Hearing Aid and I figured we would take the plane out and do a high power run for 20 mins to make sure all was ok.

We taxied out to the run up area and powered up to about 73% power and set the clock to time the run. Occasionally we would power up to about 85%. Everything was good until the 9 minute mark. Sure enough the "Low Press" light came on. Hearing Aid quickly throttled back and turned off the engine pump but the damage was done.

We taxied back to the overnight parking area and opened her up. Sure enough the pump was hot, when I opened the case drain system the fluid was hot. By now it was Swing shift and I had to leave.

As it turns out this is not the first time this has happened on a 700 series plane so we were getting help from all over with further trouble shooting. A Tech Foreman flew in and helped the guys on midnight shift. Again they changed the pump, all the filters, all the lines, all the fluid and finally came to a little check valve which is in the case drain system right before it goes into the hydraulic cooler. That check valve was stuck. Since the valve was stuck the cooling was effectively shut off to that pump which allowed it to run for about 15 mins before it cooked itself to death.

So a little $200 check valve cost this plane a weeks worth of revenue, the cost of six or seven mechanics (several on OT), three pumps, several filters, two sets of hydraulic lines, I would say 15 to 20 gallons of hydraulic fluid and a lot of blood sweat and tears.

The plane flew fine on it's next trip. I know because after all that we decided that we should do a test flight for the plane. I was lucky enough to go on the test flight and monitored the A system pressures. As I said all was good.

It seems that when these things happen it is almost always a little part that fixes the issue. It's one of those things that you remember for your whole career. "Hey, remember that plane with that hydraulic pump....?"

Brute Force and Ignorance

2011-10-10T19:25:00.000-07:00

A while ago when I worked at Delta Airlines I was as green as green could be. When we took lunch or had a break we would talk about what we were working on. That was the first time I heard the phrase "brute force and ignorance". When I would ask how this one guy fixed something he would almost always respond: "with brute force and ignorance". Being a young, newly minted airline mechanic I took this as just another saying.

Fast forward 20 years and it is amazing how true that saying is. How many times have we as mechanics got something to work by hitting it? How many engine driven hyd pumps have you installed by kicking or hitting it into place? How many times have you got something working and were totally ignorant as to how you did it?

Of course most of the time when there is a problem, you replace a part and that solves the issue. Most of the time when your flight crew explains a problem you have some idea of what is wrong. This is why we are professionals and this is why we are paid for our knowledge, but there is the always that one problem that simply goes away. There are always things that get stuck and the only way to un-stick it is to beat it up.

It's one of those things I really love about working jets. Those are the mysteries that keep the job interesting. Any one can change a VHF Receiver, but lets see them change that engine driven hydraulic pump on a turn, while it's hot, utilizing a scrap piece of 2x4 and a huge hammer named "big daddy" by it's owner. Those are the things you remember. Brute Force and Ignorance is not something that should be practiced every day out on the line but those that can apply it when necessary are the all around mechanics that I want to work with.

"That's A Hangar Job!!!"

2011-09-29T16:22:00.000-07:00

We in OAK work Line Maintenance. We do a lot of landing light changes, avionics work, and tire and brake changes. We have no hangar so we do not do hangar work. What I want everyone to know is that while we do not have a hangar we do do work that would typically be described as "Hangar Work".

When I first think of what constitutes hangar work I think of major overhaul and HMVs (Heavy Maintenance Visits). What most people do not know about SWA MX OAK is that we also do a lot of work that some would consider hangar work. We do engine changes, gear actuators, APU changes, strut repacks, gear swings and even have done some pretty substantial sheet metal work.

Some people may think that working the Line would get them away from those types of jobs but in fact they are a lot more common than not. The trick of doing these jobs is that the weather does not always cooperate. I have done all the above jobs outside and in the rain and wind.

People who do Line Maintenance look to not having a hangar as part of the challenge. Way back in the day we used to Taxi over to the Oakland Alaska Airline maintenance hangar. They were nice enough to let us use their roof from time to time when they were still open. We also used to taxi on over to the United hangar when they were still open.

Occasionally I hear people at work complain that some job that they have been assigned is a "hangar job". I think they should watch what they wish for. The company could decide that they are right. If that happens and work is taken away from OAK why do we need 53 mechanics? On the flip side the company may review some of these jobs and start assigning us way more work that does not necessarily require a hangar to complete.

The Maintenance Dictionary of Terms

2011-09-13T11:32:00.000-07:00

We all know that we have our own language in maintenance. I have written blogs about "hog" pliers, "the angle of the dangle", etc. I am sure that we all have our own contributions to the "Maintenance Dictionary". It is an ever evolving language that will change time and time again as long as there are guys swinging wrenches.

There is one guy at our shop who has coined his fair share of terms that we use here in OAK. I would like to share these terms with you guys and maybe you guys have some terms you would like to add to our Dictionary. Thank you to the mechanic I will call- Non-Sched for your library of terms.

Your Turn in the Barrel                                       It's your turn to work the broke plane.

Smoking a Turd in Purgatory What ever you are doing is going to damn you to hell.

Quick Flip                                                            Working a shift-being off for 8hrs and coming back.

IFE                                                                        In Flight Emergency

Change the Big Part                                              R/Ring the largest, most expensive piece in the system.

Rag Wrench It!                                                      Wiping a leak down and calling it good.                                                                                Derogatory remark. "All he did was rag wrench it!"

Change the Carburetor                                          Change the MEC or HMU on an engine.

Putting out Fires                                                    Solving all the issues pilots have.

Take it to the Box                                                   Take the plane to the run up hole.

Men Who Stare at Planes                                      Mechanics who don't work very hard.

Push it to the Pad                                                   Take the plane off line-ground it.

Fielding Gate Calls                                                The process of answering and doing gate calls

Make it go Bye Bye                                               Fix it and get it out of town.

Your on Deck                                                        You are next up for a call.

Is it Taco'd?                                                            Is it messed up beyond repair?

Premium Call                                                         A very easy gate call

Jamalphed                                                              All messed up

Not Enough Bounces                                             Not enough landings

Dolls Eye Indicator                                                 Ball indicator

GSP                                                                         Gravy Sucking Pig

There are more but some are not easily translated into something that would make sense to anyone but a person who was around at the time, like "Swivel Hips".

All these terms are an amalgamation of years of airline experience, people, and actions. These are terms that are used almost daily here in OAK and will be with me long after my time at SWA is over. Some may think that these types of things don't mean much but I argue that they do. If you know that it's "your turn in the barrel" then you may be "changing the big part" because the old one is "taco'd". When you are done you can "take it to the box" and if your good and not just a "man who stares at planes" then you can "make it go bye bye". And that's what we are all about.

The Work Of Team Work

2011-08-17T09:40:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday at work was one for those days that you never forget. From the moment we clocked in we were busy. There were planes to move and a grounded plane that needed the turbo-fan boot replaced. The lead got all the remoters assigned and I volunteered to change the turbo-fan boot. I've R&R'd turbo-fans before so I remember monkeying around with the boot. The part came in from Phoenix around 630 am so I picked it up and hopped into my golf cart for a nice morning drive out to Tango. On the way out there I noticed that one of the other day shift mechanics was following me out. I figured he was just driving to his remote plane so I thought nothing of it.

Once I got to the plane the other mechanic, I'll call him Banyan, drove up. I asked him if he was supposed to remote the plane I was working on but he said that he was just checking out the turbo-fan boot thing. The turbo-fan boot is a flexible duct that gets installed between the turbo-fan and the exhaust duct towards the aft of the airconditioning bay. The boot is held in by two large clamps, one on each side. sounds easy enough. As I started to install the new boot I put the clamp on the aft exhaust duct and then tried to put the forward clamp on. The problem was that I needed to pull the boot forward while positioning the clamp and at the same time tightening the clamp. Long story short Banyan was there and was able to pull the duct forward while I positioned and tightened the clamp.

The next thing was a gate call for an engine bleed trip. The Lead Mechanic, lets call him-Shooter, rode out there with me. We got permission from MX Control to lock out the bleed air system on the #2 engine. I grabbed the core-cowl pump before we left and we had that thing open, the PRSOV locked out, and the engine closed in about 7-8 minutes. The paper work took longer than the actual work.

That Saturday we had a plane with a DEU problem that required mechanic in the office to look up fault codes, a FO seat that had issues, and all the normal Saturday day shift calls (oils, hydraulics, radio issues, window washes, coffee makers, passenger seat problems). The day was simply humming with work.

The last example I will share from that day was a hydraulic leak. The FO did his walk around and found a hydro leak in the right wheel well. Four of us went to check it out, myself, Shooter, Banyan, and another mechanic-El Gato. The wheel well was a fog of hydro fluid. El Gato was trying to find the leak but the fluid getting into his eyes and lungs kept driving him out of the wheel well. The stores clerk brought out eye protection and a mask for him while he and Banyan continued to search out the pin hole leak. Any time there is hyd. fog like that the leak is a pin hole or very small crack in a component or line. Shooter went upstairs to switch the pump on and off and I was relaying when to do that on the radio. Once they found the leak El Gato started to take the line apart and Banyan went to get the temp-line kit. I went to get some gray tubs for the dripping fluid to go into instead of just letting it go all over the ground.

El Gato and Banyan had the line out and the new temp-line in while Shooter did the paperwork and I cleaned up and just helped out by handing tools to them etc. We took maybe an hour total hit on the plane but it was done and done right.

All of the above happened before noon. In the 5 \1/2 hours from 6:30 to 12 we worked all those issues and worked together often with out the need to ask for help or even the need to verbally communicate between us. The teamwork that was displayed was amazing. One mechanic knew what to do and others knew if he needed help doing it. If he went upstairs I stayed down stairs to do what needed to be done. If he is going to remove, whatever, he's going to need this tool or that tool so I better grab it.

The foremen recently asked all of us how to improve the teamwork here at OAK. I'm starting to believe that teamwork comes naturally to some. The thing about last Saturday and the guys working is that they have worked together for a while now, some even before starting at SWA. These guys know how to work and how to work together. Banyan knew that he did not have to ride out to Tango in the morning to "check out the turbo-fan boot". He also knew that, while the job could be done by one guy, the job would be done quicker if that one guy had a hand at the crucial last clamp!

Are these things that can be taught? Remember that in order to learn one has to be willing to be taught! The work of teamwork is that teamwork works, but only if you have the right team.

Batter-OH I Mean-Mechanic Up!!

2011-07-26T17:13:00.000-07:00

In every shop there are guys that the other guys don't think are pulling their weight. I think it is just the way it is. In any work group in any industry you will probably find the same thing.

Last week when I was at work we were pretty busy for most of the weekend. When it finally died down the guys put the show "The Franchise" on the TV. The show is about the SF Giants and the year they are having. A kind of behind the scene take on what goes on when no one is watching and what goes on to the players and their lives. It's a pretty good show, and I'm no big baseball fan.

One of the story lines was a player who got called up from the minors because of another player being injured. The guy did well but once the injured guy came back the called up player went into a slump. The Manager calls him into the office and sits him down. The Manager says "Look you know that you have been struggling, Big Bob is back and hitting good. I'm going to have to send you down (to the minors again). You have proved you can play up here (the major league), once you do some improvement you will be back."

On of the mechanics turns to me and says "Imagine we could do that to the mechanics here. They screw up over and over and they get sent down to the minors."

I thought this was a great idea! If there was a threat that you as a mechanic could be sent to a commuter airline (if there are commuter mechanics that read this blog, I apologize up front, but that is the way major airline people think). I bet that people would be a lot less irresponsible with their work!

I can picture it now: The boss comes in in the morning and calls Joe MechanCant into the office. He sits him down and says something like this:
"Joe you really screwed up that repair last night. On top of that you have two late punch ins and your paperwork keeps coming back because you are always screwing it up. I'm not sure what is going on with you MechanCant but we are going to send you down to the commuters. If you can manage to get you act together we will try to make a spot for you again".

How crazy would that be?!? Think of it from the other side. A guy got out of school, was scouted while there and picked by a commuter or 135 operation out in Colorado. After a few years there he has proven that he is worth his salt. The Airline Scouts hear about him and review his records, they even come out to talk to his boss and watch him work. After a month or so the airline scout has a meeting with his boss. Next thing you know the mechanic gets an offer to come to the big leagues!

If the mechanic is really good he may get a competing offer from another airline. Only the best of the best would be picked.

I know that it seems strange to suggest that everyone starts in a lower position like that at a 135 operation, but, think of the pay off for the airline. The mechanics who make it to an airline are the top of the bunch. There is a reason for the mechanics to strive to do their best. If the mechanic wants to screw off and be lazy he or she risks being sent down.

We all want to be the highest paid in the industry. We all know that there are guys making the same money as we do that are worth a lot less. We want to solve the industry problems we need to reevaluate how we hire and keep employees.

Let's scout the good ones out!!

The Lost Art Of The Practical Joke

2011-07-06T13:32:00.000-07:00

When I first started at SWA there were a few characters in the shop who were great at the art of the practical joke. As the years have gone on the majority of those guys have transferred out or quit or have been fired. Those few who remain have been corralled by MGT into toning down the joking and pranks in our ever growing PC (politically correct) world. "Someones feeling may get hurt so it must be a bad thing."

To honor the old days and the guys who knew how to have fun at work I am going to share some of the pranks we used to pull. I can't recount them all because this post would be too long so I will only recount a few now and maybe it will be a recurring post.

The first is an old airline standard: The New Plane Air Sample

To pull this prank all you had to do was find a relatively new AC and some new hire Flight Attendant or Ramper. We would go up to the cabin find the newbie and give them a garbage bag. The would be told that since this was a new plane we needed air samples taken and ask them to go to the aft galley and wave the bag around to fill it up and then quickly tie the bag shut. Then they would go to the back and we would marvel at how seriously they would take their new job. This also works for Rampers and Cargo Bin air samples.

The Mechanic or Supervisor in training prank.

There was a guy who I will call Picard. Picard was one of those guys who was good at thinking up pranks and very good at execution of the prank. Picard would find out who was going to DAL for training and then figure out what hotel and room they were staying in. We all worked graveyard at the time so at around 3am DAL time he would call the room and tell the guy he had to move his rental car because he parked in the wrong area or whatever.
When the guy came back we would ask him about it, and they would all admit that they got up and moved the car or that they were in the elevator before they realized that Picard had got them.

Mice and Rats

We had a mechanic who I will call Prince. Prince was easily scared. When he was frightened he would scream like a girl!! You could sneak up behind him when he was changing a tire and yell BOO and he would jump three feet.
The guys found a dead mouse one day and tied a string around it's neck then taped the string to the inside of an Altoids tin. When you opened the tin the mouse's head would pop up out. This tin was left on the table in the break room and of course people would open the tin and get a surprise. When Prince opened the tin and the mouse popped up he screamed and jumped and the tin went flying across the room.
One of our best capers was when we cornered a killed a huge rat. This thing was the size of a small cat and had huge sharp teeth. We knew Prince was working day shift the next morning so we came up with a scheme. We tied the dead rat to an inboard landing light box with safety wire and tape, leaving about a foot of slack between the box and the rat. Then we positioned the box on the shelf so that it was closest and so the natural choice of anyone who would grab a light. When Prince came in we got in a place where we could see the show. Prince being a smoker was out in front of the shop near the landing light rack. We put out a fake call for a landing light change. Prince said he would get it and grabbed the box. To his surprise a huge rat came jumping off the rack from behind the landing light box! Prince went screaming and jumping out the parts room door. The best part was that he held onto the landing light box and so the rat was swinging after him all the way out the shop!

We had probbies trying to recylce old landing light bulbs (another Picard stunt).
We used to put Dave's Insanity Sauce (a really hot hot sauce) on cookies and popcorn and even in coffee.
Picard was a master at putting tiny holes into the coffee cups and watching people spill all over themselves.
Back in the day before computer orders for uniforms we would change peoples uniform pant size to something like 28 waist 42 length.
We used to tell the probbies that Wed was free coffee day in the terminal for SWA employees, they would go up stairs and show their badge and the coffee shop lady would look at them like fools. We had to stop that when one probbie took orders from everyone and ended up putting over $60 of coffee on his credit card.

All this does is remind me how much has changed at SWA MX in Oakland. These things would never fly these days. Too much babying of grown men. I couldn't imagine scaring someone with a dead rat these days. I would get time off with no pay because I hurt their pride or something. Stay tuned for more pranks from back in the day.

Maintenance -A Language Of It's Own

2011-06-23T14:33:00.000-07:00

My wife is a pilot. A lot of my wife's friends are pilots. When her pilot friends come over or we are spending time with them they always start talking pilot talk and I have no idea what they are saying! I started to wonder about aircraft maintenance and mechanics. Do we have our own language? When outsiders are amongst us aircraft mechanics do they have trouble understanding what we are talking about?

Of course the answer to both of these questions is: YES! We at SWA have our own lingo we revert to when we are in the break room or trouble shooting, etc. We have the tried and true 3 letter (or more) acronyms such as APU, CDS, EGT, FMC, and on and on and on.

There are other things that we say which are airline maint. specific. I started to compile a list of these sayings. Although I am not close to being finished with my list I figured I would share some with you guys and see if you readers have anything to add. With just one weekends work we at the shop came up with the following:

Aisle Donkey          a flight attendant

Dip-Shittery            your basic cluster in progress

Angle of the Dangle          this refers to using wrenches or tools and how the angle of the fastener relates   to the angle of the wrench you are using to remove it.

German Torque          unspecified torque on a bolt or fastener.

Pretzelized          when something is totally out of shape or crushed up

PBA          Prolly-Be-Alright

Lick it, Stick it and Kick it!!     MEL the thing and get it out of here.

Pushin' Tin          The process of keeping planes in the air. Doing maintenance so the plane keeps flying.

These are just a few of the things we say at work and I will keep adding to the list as time goes on. Until then keep Pushin' Tin!!

Things You See At The Airport

2011-06-13T10:23:00.000-07:00

I recently wrote about an American Airlines MD-80 that had it's nose gear pulled out by a huge jet tug. That got me thinking about all the cool things and all the strange things you get to see at an airport. I'm going to try and recount some of these things in this post, they are in no particular order and some of the pictures are from the Internet.

One of the nicest rituals practiced at an airport are the fire engine salutes to pilots who are retiring. When the pilot taxis in for the final time the fire engines line the taxi way and shoot arcs of water over the taxi way which the pilot taxis through. I know for those of you who have not witnessed this it seems kind of strange but it really is cool.

This same thing was done recently in OAK for Alaska Airlines. The airline was phasing out the MD-80 and the last MD-80 flight out of OAK was saluted in the same way.

Although the next picture is not as dramatic it shows the sense of unity that work groups at SWA have. There was a Provisioning guy who either retired or was hurt and way from work, or just buried a loved one, or had just returned from Iraq,I can't remember which. Anyway to show their co-worker that they were thinking of him the provo guys lined up their trucks and raised them as a salute.

Of course you get to see all kinds of cool airplanes while working at the airport. One of the first strange planes that I saw come into OAK was one of those huge Russian cargo planes. This one was not the six engined monster but rather it's little brother with four engines. We went over to check it out and it was a tank. The thing I remember most about that plane was the tires. All the tires were bald and most of them had patches on them. This stuck in my head because we at SWA change tires when they first show patch so for me to see these bad tires was crazy.

We also get to see a lot of fighter jets doing fly bys and buzzing the field. One time during Fleet Week in the Bay Area a mechanic and I drove over to the old United/World hangar to check out the Blue Angels who were using the area to set up for the show. We drove our little pick-up over there and stayed a respectable distance from them as they set up. One of their mechanics strolled up to us and we figured he was going to tell us to leave. Instead he says that he noticed our truck had a tow hitch and would we mind towing a ground power unit over to one of the planes for him? HELL YEAH we will. That was pretty cool in a maintenance geek type of way.

On another day I was out in the remote parking area trying to start one of the piece of junk man lifts that we had back then. I had my back to the airport and was facing the bay. This tremendous roar swept over me and about 100 feet passing directly over me was a B-17. I think he got permission to do a low pass over the field, saw me up on this man lift with my back to him and decided to have some fun.

At night I have seem falling stars, satellites, and even the space shuttle as it passed over head. I have seem all kinds of birds and I've seem all kinds of birds that have been hit by the airplanes. We got called for a bird strike once and found a whole bird wrapped around the number two brake.

One of the coolest things I saw was when Delta Airlines brought home the body of a soldier killed in Iraq. The whole airport was silent. Normally there is constant radio chatter but they requested that no one make any calls as the plane taxied to the gate. The family was escorted to the plane by some military vehicles and watched their kid get unloaded and put into a Hearst. The family drove away and there must have been over a hundred guys on Harleys waiting at the gate who escorted the family home with American flags flying on their bikes, very emotional.

I'll try to remember some more but a lot of these things happened before I got into the habit of taking pictures at work. These things are all the stuff that make working at an airport fun. Away from all the union things, job security issues, TSA garbage, its things like this that a guy in an office building some where down town will never get to experience.

Oil, oil and more OIL!!!

2011-06-08T10:09:00.000-07:00

Those of you who work Line Maintenance know that a good portion of the calls we get during the course of the day are for things like coffee makers, seat belts, window washes, and of course oil. This past week started off normal enough. I start work mid week and one of the first calls was for oil. This is not unusual but as the day progressed it seemed like all the flight crews wanted oil. There were 5 or 6 of us on shift that day and I would bet that each of us went through 2 or 3 cases of oil EACH!!

We have a table that we put our empty oil cans on to drain out the last bits of oil and make the cans clean for the recyclers. The table was full and the cans were stacked! I know that this happens every now and then but this seemed to be excessive. Easily every other call was for oil I was amazed.

Turns out that the flight crews have a new requirement that says they must call Maintenance Control if they are at a station with no SWA maintenance and their oil qty is 65% or lower. I can only guess as to the reasoning behind this but I'm sure that if the dollars and cents, nitty gritty, nuts and bolts were explained to me, then it would make total sense. What I do know is that the flight crews do not want to talk to Maintenance Control. They like talking to them so little that they make sure that they get the oil filled up at a Maintenance Station, like OAK.

I admit that it is tiresome to go out and put 2 or 3 quarts of oil into an engine. I start to think things like "It's raining out here, the Captain is nice and dry upstairs and called me out in this mess to put a lousy 2 quarts of oil in the engine?!" Of course there are times when I have put over 10 quarts into an engine and that pisses me off too. "How could these fools leave whatever station they were at with the oil being so low?" It really irks me that they would treat the engines, my engines like that.

I think whats going on is that the company wants to save as much money as possible and it really is kind of silly to have to pay contract maintenance to put oil in a plane that just left OAK (or where ever) one or two legs ago. Saving money helps SWA put food on my table so I guess I will go oil up that plane in the rain, snow, heat, dark even if it's a mere two quarts. It's taking care of our engines and our bottom line, two birds-one can of oil, type of thing.

An Incident From Back In The Day

2011-05-30T18:33:00.000-07:00

When you work at an airport you get to see a lot of interesting things. I have witnessed near miracles and near tragedies. This following story falls some place in the middle.

I was working day shift with the usual band of odd balls. In OAK there are 32 gates. SWA has 12 of them. On any given night there are 22 aircraft that spend the night, as a result we have to move up to 10 planes each night to our remote parking area. When this incident happened there were were fewer gates, a total of 27 of which we at SWA used 11.

We were not the only game in town and there are other airlines that also push their planes off the gates at night. One of those airlines was American Airlines (AA no longer flies into Oakland). After all the SWA planes had been brought to the gates we noticed a commotion over by the MD-80 which AA has parked out on the ramp over night parking.

I rolled out there with my buddy SkyWalker and the nose gear on the MD-80 was pulled out of the strut.

The picture above is how she looked when we got there. When I worked at Delta we used to move MD-80s around with bag tugs, but that was not going to do it for this bunch of idiots! The contract ramp company had hooked up a wide-body tug that looked like it could have pulled the airport terminal building itself across the ramp up to this poor little MD-80.

The communication between the cockpit and the tug driver was not what I would call ideal. It seems that the aircraft brakes were set when the tug driver decided to FLOOR IT!!!

As a result the plane did not budge but that was not going to stop this gigantic tug. The tug proceeded to pull the nose tires/lower strut completely off the plane!

Well as you would expect all the AA big brass managers were all standing around scratching their heads. There was a lady who I assume to be the top OAK manager who asked my pal SkyWalker to stop taking pictures of the plane so naturally in fine SWA fashion he started taking pictures of her instead.

The AA Go-Team or Top notch Mechs showed up a few hours later with airbags and lifted her up.

That part was pretty interesting. The huge bags were inflated and they put in a new strut and the plane was gone the next day.

When she was up off the ground they put some chocks under her from the contract company that did the damage in the first place.

These types of things are happening all the time at airports. I have probably forgotten way more things like this than I can remember but I'll get with SkyWalker and see if he remembers any more.

Black Clouds

2011-05-25T16:22:00.000-07:00

As a person who goes to work a lot I will be the first to admit that the majority of the days/shifts I spend at work are pretty unremarkable. Things break and we get them fixed. So why is it that the only days that you remember are the days that the "black cloud" comes out and hovers over you. For example: One night when I was working midnight shift I was assigned two or three planes (I don't remember) and it was raining. My assigned planes were pretty clean on the white board. The white board is where all our planes for the night are written down and any work that is to be done on the plane is written next to the AC number. The problem with the white board is that once the plane is terminated those nice "clean" planes become a nightmare of pilot write ups and items found during your walk around.

As usual when its raining two of my planes were arriving at almost the same time and both remoting out to Tango. The first one comes in and when I got up stairs the pilot was writing in the log book (not a good sign). He tells me that the FO's windshield wiper is inop, "has been the whole day." One of the long standing jokes in maintenance is that those windshield wipers only seem to break when its raining outside!! I parked that plane and went back for my second one which had a forward position light out on it. Usually not a problem but like I said it was raining. I knew from experience that changing a fwd position light in the rain means that, no matter how much rain gear you have on, you are going to get wet.

The following week the black cloud seemed to stay with me. Most of the gate calls I went on turned into huge events with delays and cancelled flights. I grounded a plane on Monday with a Weather Radar problem that I had never seem before. To my amazement I grounded another plane on the following Thursday with the same issue. PSEU lights, Up Lock sensors, Stab Out of Trim lights they all seemed to follow me all week long.

The last thing was the aft lav issue. I had a gate call that was reported to be a lav switch intermittent. When I get up there I figure out pretty fast that the toilet itself has to be replaced. Of course it has been messed up for like three or four legs now so its full of stuff. To make sure the problem was not the switch I had to take the cover off which flew out of my hand and directly into the toilet. To make matters worse when it hit the stuff in the toilet the stuff splashed up and went all over the front of my speed suit. Like a trooper I soldiered on and had to take half the wall apart, the cover for the shut off valve apart, the frozen in place mount bolts out.

About this time the FO decided to come to the back of the plane to argue with me about holding passenger boarding. Of course the new toilet had to fight me going back in.

I am headed back to work tomorrow and I hope that the black cloud is gone by then. The work is the same work that I do everyday but on those days when the black cloud is following you the everyday jobs turn into a grind.

Spending Money

2011-05-10T13:58:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I had an opportunity to assist three guys who were changing a C-Duct (a thrust reverser half) on one of our planes.This plane had been down for two days now costing the company big money. TR halves are very expensive (about half a million bucks I've been told) so we were spending some money that day. These guys had the old TR half off by the time I got out there. I was just going to snap a few pics and be on my way but since I had never changed one before I wanted to check out what they were doing.

Rare sight. No fan cowl and no core cowl!

It turns out that I was able to help out a little with the installation of the new TR half. It was really windy that day so it was good that I hung around. When Brooklyn picked up the TR half the with the fork lift the wind caught it immediately and it took two of us to steady the thing while it was positioned.

The different slings and hoists that are engineered to accomplish jobs like this always amaze me. The set up they sent for this was a chain hung from the forks on the fork lift going to a block and then to a pole that connects into a big C shaped frame that connects onto the C Duct.

Muscling the new C Duct in

Those guys got the old C Duct off and the new one on in about two hours! That's a pretty good time. I learned a little along the way and except for the wind it was a very smooth job.

Questions Of The Month

2011-04-18T09:47:00.000-07:00

Imagine paying a group of people to troubleshoot, diagnose, and fix a problem but then requiring them to call you EVERY time they change a part to get your blessing on putting the correct part in. Why would you not just pay some non-skilled person to describe the problem to you and change the part you want them too? What does this do to the employee? How can it be fixed?

A Series Of Unfortunate Events

2011-04-11T21:34:00.000-07:00

These past few weeks at Southwest Airlines have been very busy. The incident we had with a lap joint on top of the fuselage of one of our 737-300s has been well documented by the media. Planes have been inspected, inspection methods have been changed and we all have been educated by this unfortunate event. Of course if any of you mechanics out there are like me I had to answer to an even higher authority than the FAA-my father.

As soon as I heard about the airplane I knew that I would be getting a call from my father very soon. My father also went to Aviation High School in NY. Although he never got to use his licence he did spend his working career in maintenance working for the NYC Transit Authority, rising through the ranks eventually to become the first black supervisor of the Structures Division in the Transit Authority. As you can imagine he had some questions for me regarding exactly what was going on at SWA Maintenance. He did call and we discussed the whole aging aircraft thing and that was that.

Being a mechanically minded fellow he handily understood most of my airline jargon while I jabbered away about lap joints, aircraft cycles, etc. This has been going on for my whole career, any incident that Delta Airlines had while I worked there was discussed. Any kind of cargo carrier that had mechanical issues while I worked at Ameriflight was cause for a call and discussion. As a matter of fact any plane incident can spur on these types of calls. While these unfortunate events are not something that any mechanic hopes to see they are a reality of our industry. My fathers calls help me to keep in the forefront of my mind that my family flies on these planes that I work on. I like most mechanics know that if we do not stay sharp and perform to the utmost of our abilities that bad things can happen. When I first started at SWA and was a little unsure of my self I asked one of the "vets" if he thought I should change a tire or not. This guy was a wise, older gentleman and he said that any time he is not sure about working on something or not he just thinks "would I feel ok if my wife and kids got on this plane in the morning and I had not changed that part." That was all it took for me.

These calls from my relatives (mostly my dad) remind me that the job I do is a very important one. The job we do is not easy, the job requires us to say no a lot and disappoint and inconvenience travellers now and then. Sometimes we are heroes but a lot of times we come off as the bad guys. That is simply the nature of the business. I love my job and I love working at Southwest Airlines there are people I work with that can not honestly say those things. Those people can make it harder for the others but no matter where you go you will find those types of people. I hope to never see something like this last incident happen to ANY AIRLINE but it is especially rotten for it to happen to MY airline. Southwest Airlines have the best maintained airplanes in the industry and we will remedy this issue.

New Tools! And Why The Tools At Lowe's Are Wack!

2011-03-16T16:08:00.000-07:00

This year I have decided to go through my tools at work, reorganize, clean out, and try to make my tool bag and "tool kits" more professional. Maybe professional is not the correct term but just easier for ME to use and a little more presentable. I also made the decision to have another tool bag. I wanted to make a small tool bag for what I consider small or light jobs that I do upstairs that I am tired of carrying my big heavy tool bag to. A smaller bag, with a common (slotted) screw driver, small pair of hogs, phillips screw driver, my leatherman, a pair of dikes (diagonal cutters) and a small set of allen keys. I had a bag that I used for a while a few years ago and decided against. I also had a small pair of hogs, the leatherman, and allen keys. I unretired a pair of dikes from home and went to Lowes' to buy the rest.

I had a gift card form Lowes' that I got for Christmas so I figured I would get the stuff I wanted from there. Sounds easy but I spent two hours in Lowes' looking for something worthwhile to purchase. All I wanted was a slotted screwdriver, phillips, or even better a flip flop that could do both. My troubles started when I figured out that ALL of Lowes' tools are cheap plastic things that look like they would not last a year out on the line. ALL the flip flop screwdrivers were garbage units that tried to do too many things and as a result everything they did was wack. When I look for a flip flop I either want one that is simply one handle with one shank that has a slotted head on one side and a phillips head on the other. ALL the ones at Lowes' where gimmicky with special apex heads that could be flipped around but that if you lost them-the tool becomes useless. The one half decent one they had had an awful plastic handle with a cap on top to hold the apex heads. The cap was cheap plastic also and you could tell it was going to fall apart.

I ended up buying a slotted #3 Husky screwdriver with an acrylic handle sort of like the old school Craftsman screwdrivers. Since I could not get a flip flop I tried to find a apex holder, or a screwdriver that could hold a standard apex bit. Lowes' does not carry one of those. What I did find was a little apex holder that came in a kit that included a small pair of hogs, the apex holder with bits, a small tape measure and a knife. The apex holder was small (about three inches) with a magnetic apex holder and the rest of the stuff I just kept at home. The little kit was about $10.00 so I thought it was worth the risk.

Since I started using my small tool bag the little apex holder has helped me out a few times and I think I like the idea of the smaller tool bag. I also added a small waterproof pouch on the side for my apex bits.

In addition to my tool bag, I got my golf cart cleaned out, and organized. I was able to make enough room in my cart for my own environmental splice kit that I just made. The kit includes splices, barrels, wax cord, zip ties, a small wire stripper, lighter, shrink wrap, and a small portable butane torch. I always hate having to go back to the shop to get the environmental splices when I'm out on Tango so I now have my own small kit.

This may seem like overkill to a lot of people but the world of a Line Mechanic is a fast paced one. I still believe in trying to do my job as quickly and efficiently as I can. I hope these new tools will help.

It's Hard To Let Go

2011-03-06T22:15:00.000-08:00

I work with tools for a living. Tools have allowed me to own a few homes, buy nice cars, go on vacations, put clothes on my families back, and feed them as well. Tools have been a major part of my life since high school and like most mechanics I have come to love tools, all tools. I can spend a lot of time in the tool section of any store. I like ALL tools, I even collect old and antique tools so when a tool breaks and is no longer useful to me it is understandable that I have trouble throwing it away. Like a lot of mechanics, I think, I end up with a lot of broken tools in my tool box at home.

The other day while working at home I needed a pair of Channel locks or slip joint pliers. I went and pulled the largest ones I have out of my box and went to work. Well these pliers came to me a few years ago from a person who was working on my back yard. This guy disappeared and later I found out he got arrested! When he got out he called and said he was going to finish the job and come by to get his tools. Long story short: two years later I sold all his stuff but kept some of the things I thought were worth it.

When I tried to use these pliers they would slip, every time I went to apply pressure to the stupid thing the joint would slip and the pliers would not be tight anymore. I tried tightening them with the same result and by now I was pissed off so I chucked them in the trash.

Sounds like an easy choice but those pliers sat in the trash for two days and every time I went into that room I saw them. Being a tool lover I kept thinking "maybe I could fix them" or "maybe I can use it for something", "hey I could always use the handles as levers". I stayed strong and they ended up going away. But this brings to light how hard it is for a mechanic to throw away a tool.

When a tool that I use at work breaks I "retire" it. When I retire a tool I bring it home and put it in my big tool box. These tools have been to battle and war with me, they have been on the cold ground with me, they have fixed millions of dollars worth of equipment in their lifespan. When they get too old or busted up I bring them home. The nature of my job requires that the tools I use work when I need them so when they get too old they have to be replaced. When I worked in the hangar I was able to keep my older tools at work and in that setting it is often handy to have some wrenches that you no longer use around which you can cut up or weld on to make special tools.

For me are my life. I will always have a hard time getting rid of them and truth be told, if you take care of them they do not need to be replaced often. I have a hard time letting go of them, some of them have been with me since Aviation High School and are really a part of me. They say that you always remember your first love, well you always remember your first flip-flop screw driver, or good pair of safety wire pliers. I may be a "tool nerd" or "airplane junky" but that's ok, I keep planes in the air, sounds simple but requires a lot of tools and some knowledge. Tools are to mechanics like a computer program is to a tech guy, we use them to figure out (in our case) what is wrong with a plane. Simple concept and when done right it's like a little miracle.

"WOW It's Cold Up Here!"

2011-02-20T16:29:00.000-08:00

I have had the unique opportunity to spend a bit of time up in Anchorage Alaska while my wife is stationed up there. As you can imagine it's pretty cold up there and I got to thinking about all the different weather scenarios that I have had to deal with as an aircraft mechanic and indeed all the mechanics around the states or even the world have to deal with. I will start with myself:

It is true that I grew up in NYC and it does snow there, but I have never had to do any maintenance work in the snow. The bulk of my professional aircraft maintenance career has been with SWA in Oakland California. While some of you are saying that it must be nice to work in the Bay Area as far as weather goes, and it is-most of the time! For those of us who work there know that it is very often wet and cold in the Bay Area. We spend a lot of time in our rain suits. We battle the fog and rain on a weekly basis pretty much all year round. When I first got to SWA all we had were the old school banana yellow rain coats and pants. They were good as long as you stood still but any movement would allow water to find the numerous gaps in the coat. The pants would last about a week before ripping and we all had tape on our pants. As you know it's hard to get anything done by standing still so by the end of the shift you were going to be wet.

I clearly remember Dawg going out nice and dry to change a wing tip nav light and coming back inside about 40 minutes later soaked! Some one asked why he didn't ask for help if he was getting soaked and he simply said "once you become one with the rain you hardly notice it". That was very true back in those days, if it was raining out you knew you were going to get wet. The old yellow suits were just not that good. A few years later one of our foreman, I'll call him Tahoe, ordered us new rain suits that were light weight, breathable and very high quality. The wrists and ankle openings could be cinched closed, they zipped up tight and the hoods had bands that could also be cinched closed. All of a sudden it was almost pleasurable to work out in the rain again. I still have my original Tahoe rain suit and it still works fine.

Now a days guys (smart guys) go out and buy some real high quality rain gear at places like REI. The rain gear to us Oakland mechs is what I would say is an essential piece of equipment. We do a lot of road trips and before we go often check the weather to see if it is raining at the station we are headed to. I think that today's rain gear is so compact and light weight you should always take it with you on any road trip. Put an extra set in your fly away bag since its hard to tell when you may need them. One time Tuna and I went to San Diego to work an engine issue and since it was summer and we were headed to SD we took no rain gear. You know where I am going with this and of course while we were working a thunderstorm opened up on us. While we were relatively dry under the cowling our tools were soaked. If I had a set of rain gear I could have wrapped my stuff up and saved me a long weekend of cleaning and drying my tools and tool bag.

Of course we also to road trips to SD and other southern California cities where it gets very hot. I have been to Burbank when it is over a hundred degrees out and it is pretty much miserable. The temp on the ramp is usually a few degrees hotter that the air temp so anything over 100 sucks. All I can say for that is to drink plenty of water. I personally do not like to wear the uniform shorts at work but I know that a lot of guys do. I have dropped too many hot parts and had too much hot liquid on me to expose my chicken legs to the type of dangers out there. Those poor guys working the line in Phoenix must have to endure some amazing temps at work.

I have had hail, rain, thundersorms, lightning storm, and even tornado warnings at work. If you think about it mechanics have to be ready for all weather scenarios. Unlike our pilot counterparts we actually have to go out and work on the planes in the snow, or rain. I'm sure that when a pilot reports to the Phoenix Line that there is a problem with a tire (or god forbid a brake) he does not think twice about it being 120 degrees outside. These Alaska mechanics have to not only work in the snow but what I have noticed is that the ground is not clear, the ground is covered in ice. When they open the cowling they are laying on ice, plane being jacked, the jack is on ice. It really is astounding to think about the mechanics working around the globe in all weather, on varied surface.

One more thing: SWA has made available to us a new type of rain suit. We can order it form our uniform supplier. The thing is very nice and seems to work great but has a very major design flaw. If you compare the Tahoe rain suit with the new SWA suit they look very similar. One of the few differences is that the SWA suit has a nice big flap in the back to allow your body to breath better and not get too hot while you are wearing it. A few weeks ago while it was raining one of the mechanics and I were closing an engine cowl and of course we had to lay down on the wet ground in the puddles that always seem to be directly under the engines. We both laid down and about three seconds later he jumped up cussing. That nice big flap had turned into a nice big scoop and his whole back was wet! Don't forget that we have to lay down in these suits too!

My High School: Aviation High School NY

2011-02-09T13:32:00.000-08:00

This summer I will be on my way back to NYC to attend the 75th Anniversary of the founding of Aviation High School. The school is celebrating by having a banquet and an all year reunion. For those of you not familiar with the Aviation High School in New York it is the oldest (I believe) operating high school in the country dedicated to teaching its students the art of aviation maintenance. The graduates of Aviation High School are a very proud bunch and I hope to see a good number of them there that evening.

In NYC there are several specialty high schools like Aviation High. There is the New York City High School for the Performing Arts, made famous by the movie/tv show Fame. There is the Bronx High School of Science, Automotive High, Transit High, and several other vocational type schools available to NYC 8th graders. It is a system that I wish other major cities would use as it gives kids a leg up on their career paths-post high school. I know that most of the guys I work with had to pay for their A&P licences and are shocked to hear that I got mine for free from high school.

When I was an 8th grader they handed us this book which had all the specialty school listed in it. I took it home to check it out since I really had not thought about going to any high school other than my local one. I thumbed through it and finally saw Aviation High School. I liked the idea so I went to talk to my parents about it. My dad tells me that that was the school he went to!! I did not know. As with a lot of these types of schools I had to go and take a test to get in so on the right day I went down there and did the test, waited a few days and was accepted into Aviation High School, Long Island City, NY.

The first day there was an eye opener! Not only did we have a full high school curriculum, we also had to do shop classes to learn all the aspects of aircraft maintenance. This translated into the longest school day in the NYC School System. A lot of us had "zero period" at like 6:50am (I'm not sure if that's right but it was early!) and didn't get done with classes until 3:40pm. Me personally, since I lived way up in the North Bronx, I had to leave my building by 5:30am to be able to make it to school by 7:00am. Since the school was training us for a federal licence we had to have a certain number of hours of training. This meant that the school had less holidays and half days than other schools and when it snowed and other schools were shut down ours was open!

These things were all sort of PITA (Pain In The Ass) at the time but made for a fiercely unique and proud bunch of students. We worked hard because it was hard work, just to attend that school.

The pride you felt as a 14 year old when you finished your first project in your first shop class was amazing. I started out in Wood Shop working on a jig for wing rib. A simple board with blocks attached that were used to make the ribs that create wings on older airplanes. When I was done and finally got my last signature from my shop teacher I was so proud of myself. I made something that was made to a standard that would hold up in any real world application, had learned about how to use tools, how to form wood, how to fasten wood and the kids that went to my local high school were just learning the basics of reading, writing, and arithmetic.

Recip. Shop

Aviation High School has a hangar attached to it and by the time you were a Junior or Senior you were actually working on the airplanes that we had in the hangar, actual real live airplanes! When Senior year can around you had learned, Wood, Dope and Fabric, Sheet Metal, Electricity, Avionics, Carburation, Reciprocating Engines, Turbine Engines, Propellers, and a bunch more that I am sure that I am forgetting. As a Senior you attended shop for 3 or 4 hours a day! Every minute of it was like heaven to me. I stumbled like all teenagers do, had to take a class over (electricity, which I am strangely good at as a practicing A&P mechanic) made some life long friends and most importantly found out what I was good at and passionate about at a very early age. Aviation High School has steered the direction of my whole life.

Turbine shop

I remember when I became a Junior and really decided that I was going for the A&P licence. I got the FAA Test Prep book and read it over and over again for the next two years! The pages were literally falling out of the book by the time my test date came, but I knew that thing inside and out. I passed and was able to graduate with both my Airframe and Powerplant Licenses. I made friendships that have lasted up to this day, I learned how to use tools (more important that I thought it was), I learned that hard work is rewarded, I learned how to make things (another thing that is very important), I learned that graduating from a school like ours is very unique and not all that easy, and I learned about my love for airplanes. That love has seen me through a lot of good times and a few bad times, that love has fed me and my family, clothed us and put a roof over our heads. The Aviation industry is not an easy place to work and the Airline Industry is and always will be a mess but God willing there will always be an Aviation High School at 4530 36th St. Long Island City, NY to help kids like me fulfill their dreams.

As a foot note I have met a lot of people while working in this industry. I attended Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University after my time at Aviation High School and knew a lot of people from there as well. When you meet a fellow Aviation High School grad there is some thing about that person that is different than all the others. There is a little twinkle in the eye, a nod of the head, a way they walk, that lets you know they have shared an ordeal with you at such an important age in their life and the bond is there instantly. A few years ago (2003 or 2004) I went with my wife to an OBAP (Organisation of Black Aerospace Professionals) Convention in Phoenix AZ. While we were checking in at the hotel front desk there was an older guy standing next to me I do not recall if I mentioned Aviation High School or he simply saw my high school ring or what but he politely introduced himself and was a graduate of Aviation High School also, in something like 1952! We talked for a long while and he even gave me his email address. He still had that confidence and swagger of an Aviation High School grad.

Happy 75th Anniversary!!!! I hope to see a lot of you grads on June 9th 2011 for the dinner and school tour. Here is a link to a video tour of the 75 years of Aviation High School: http://www.teachertube.com/viewVideo.php?video_id=202662

Planning

2011-02-03T09:15:00.000-08:00

You may not think of planning when you think of aircraft maintenance but a good mechanic is a good planner. Of course you can see that planning is involved when you are disassembling an item, in order to get it apart and back together again. When going to a gate call at work a good mechanic will try to bring with him or her all the parts or tools needed. Sometimes this is easier said than done due to the intentionally vague descriptions of problems that some pilots report.

With proper planning the evenng clouds will be the most dramatic part of your day

The worse gate calls to deal with are what we call "cockpit chats". When a crew calls you up to the plane to chat it can mean anything. Hard to plan for any and every eventuality so I usually just bring my small tool pouch up with me in case it is something I can fix real quick. I have had cockpit chats to fix everything from a missing cup holder in the flight deck to aircraft damage. I can understand being discreet in some cases but a few (a lot) of the crews take this a little too far. We mechanics only have about 20 minutes to trouble shoot and fix problems and playing the guessing game slows that down. I have had crews tell me that they do not like to transmit the problems they are having over the radio because "they" might be listening. Who "they" are is unclear to me. The FAA has a lot more to do than listen in on our OPS frequency to see if the pilots are using the correct radio protocol. Back in the day people used to use radio scanners to listen in on airport traffic but even that got boring real quick, so I think that it is safe Mr. or Ms. Pilot.

When I passed probation all those years ago and started to evaluate the newer guys on their performance while they were on probation I realized how important being a good planner is. My boss at the time was a guy I will call Tator. Tator would watch the new guys work. He often remarked how this was that guys third or forth trip back from the plane to get parts or something like that. His concern was simple: if you are spending all night running back and forth to stores you are taking longer than needed to finish your jet. Back then we had fewer people at night so every mechanic had to do more than one plane a night just so we could make launch in the morning.

When I terminate a plane I write everything down that I find wrong and I put the discrepancies on the big board where our planes are listed for the night. This used to be common practice but not too much anymore. I sometimes get flack from the mid night shift guys for writing all these things that I found wrong on their plans onto the board. This is confusing to me because I saved them a trip by telling them what they need before they get out to plane and have to turn around to get it.

It is simple we have to get our planes out on time. Unfortunately it is part of our job to ensure on time departures for our customers. I will be the first to say that if you as a mechanic have to take a delay in order to properly fix a jet than go right ahead, safety first. Planning and being a good planner will, however minimize those delays.

When a call comes in OR when you get your assignment for midnight shift think to yourself: what am I going to need to bring with me in order to fix this plane? When a call comes in about a coffee maker-bring a coffee maker. I know that 9 times out of 10 we can fix the original coffee maker but when that one time comes up it is a lot easier and quicker to change one out if it is with you or at least on your golf cart waiting for ya. We have a guy at work who never brings things with him to his gate calls and he annoys everyone by going out and ALWAYS calling for someone to bring him parts. Don't be that guy!!

A Guy I Used To Know

2011-01-25T14:39:00.000-08:00

When I first started at SWA I met a lot of really great mechanics. The very first night I was there I worked with a mechanic I will call "The Dawg". The Dawg showed me around and tuned me into the way to do my job and ultimately become a successful member of the team at OAK MX. The guy I wanted to write about today is a fella I will call "The Trooper".

When I first encountered The Trooper he was an intimidating figure. When you think of the term "gruff" that would describe The Trooper. Think of a Marine who had a look in his eye that said "I know what I am doing, and I see what you are doing, and I can kill you and eat you". He was mostly unshaven, swore a lot, and for the most part liked to work alone. To say I was intimidated by him is mild.

My first week at the job I was working a plane on gate 12. It was probably around 1 or 2 am when all of a sudden I hear "FUUU&&&%%%%!!!!". I look up and see sparks flying across the ramp. I found out later that The Trooper was working an APU problem on gate 23 (which by the way is about 3/4 of a football field away from gate 12), something went wrong and he yelled out and chucked his 3 D cell MagLite across the ramp. By the way he never did find the light. Over the years this repeated and no wrench or flashlight was safe from his rage.

After a while I realized that The Trooper was one of the more fun guys to hang with and work with. The Trooper was a good wrench. He was a wrench in the way that he worked on what he was assigned (even though we were not assigned work back the, we volunteered for our work). The Trooper never complained about hard jobs or working all night.

One of the things that you could never forget was going downline with The Trooper. In OAK back in those days we would send three guys down to San Jose to work a Service Check and any airplanes with MELs that happened to be spending the night down there. Since The Trooper used to work at that airport he liked to go. One of the first times I went down to San Jose with The Trooper we had four guys. We finished up our work and as we were driving to make our way out The Trooper says "whats that fluid over by that landing gear?" It looked like a hydraulic leak from a brake on the wheel and under the strut. One of the guys jumped out and ran over. Most mechanics know that when we come across a leak the first thing we do is dab our finger in it and smell it. Well this guy dabs his finger smells and immediately scrunches up his face, wipes off his hands and runs back cussing. it turned out The Trooper had to take a leak and he did it behind the strut!

On another visit to San Jose in the MX Bread truck it was The Trooper, another guy, and I. The way we operated our downlines was that one guy would knock out the three planes on at the gates and the other two would drive a belt loader and the bread truck to the two planes on the pad (remote parking) finish them up and return to help the guy at the gates. I grabbed a belt loader and The Trooper drove the bread truck with the lift bed down. I'm driving along slightly to the left and behind the bread truck when I hear "Who's driving this truck?" I look up to see The Trooper standing on the lift bed doing his best George Washington crossing the Delaware pose while the truck is motoring on its own down the ramp. These were typical types of nights when working with The Trooper.

Once while on a road tip with The Trooper we had to go to San Jose and then swing by SFO when we were done. About half way through the San Jose portion I got real sick. I could hardly stand up and felt like I was going to pass out. The Trooper had me sit down in the bread truck where I passed out. I briefly remember coming to when we got to SFO but only long enough to realize that we were there. The Trooper and the other mech with us finished up all the work with out me, no complaints! That's the way it was back then.

Always on the road back to OAK he would stop to get a box of Entemanns Chocolate Doughnuts and consume the whole box before we got back. He ate grasshoppers and moths and belched real loud and talked with his mouthful. He was loud sometimes scary and could tell you off real quick but he was a great guy to work with.

The Trooper no longer works with us, unable to change with the increasingly political environment at SWA he was a victim of being too real at a time when being real with people could get you in real trouble. He never gave up and he didn't back down through the end. We still hear from The Trooper every now and then and the shop is a little smaller without his over the top personality. I miss The Trooper and I am sure he misses us too. He is chilling at his house in his barber chair, with about twenty or thirty caged frogs, watching questionable movies, eating chocolate doughnuts, wearing his Marine too short shorts and his Boony Cap A mechanic from another time trying to make it in the present world. A guy I used to know.

Congratulations SWA Huge Quarterly Profits! Now What To Do With The $$?

2011-01-24T12:16:00.000-08:00

WOW!!! We at SWA made over 400 million bucks last quarter! I say we because it is truly a team effort to make such an amount of money. For those of us who work or who have worked at an airline know that it takes everyone doing the right thing for the company to succeed. I know that I worked hard and I know that the company appreciates those of us who work hard so that SWA and all of us can enjoy the good years.

The thing I was wondering is how SWA is going to spend that money in a way that can help us poor Mechs at OAK MX. I know that SWA is a frugal airline and I know that half of that 400 mil is going straight to the bank. I have a few suggestions for items we could use in OAK that would make our jobs easier and that in some cases have been a long time coming.

1. A lift truck. We have been needing a lift truck since I got here in 1996. We are an airline that operates in 20 minute intervals. The 20 minute turn gets real hard to do when we mechanics have to fish around for a JLG lift or some kind of stand just to change a Logo Light or Nav Light.

This style is good. A nice lift bed with an air hose on a flat drivable platform. The one that I am more familiar with is a pick up truck with a scissor lift in place of the bed. Very handy items and could cost about $30k tops.

2. Daniels Kit. A Daniels Kit is a collection of pin pushers, crimpers, wire strippers and extractors used to repair wiring and cannon plugs. These things are expensive I know, but the planes are getting more and more electronic. As a result of the reliance on electronics more and more wiring problems arise. We have been making do with plastic pushers and throw away extractors. A real Daniels Kit would be a nice addition to our tool room.

There are only two down sides to having a Daniels Kit:

a. They cost a lot of money some thing like $10k.

b. The numbnuts at the shop would most likely destroy it within a year. There are a lot of little parts and if not taken care of the kit will be missing pieces and end up useless.

3. Some real window wash. The window wash we have is horrible. It dries up before you can wipe it off and leaves streaks on the windshield. I'm not sure why they changed to this current stuff but it simply sucks.

4. Some free stock. We need more free stock in OAK. Free stock is the stuff you take like screws, bolts, washers, etc. to replace missing hardware on the plane. Our selection in OAK is not very deep. Several times we have had to ground planes because we don't have the correct length 1/4 inch bolt and end up having to but one from United or Alaska Airlines.

5. Some Jack Covers. Months and months go by between our using the aircraft jacks. I am talking about the wing jacks, nose, and tail jacks. There are times when we need to jack up a plane to swing the gear or re-pack a strut. We have a wet climate here. When it is not raining it is cold and foggy in the morning and at night. The jacks need covers to keep the cylinders dry. If the cylinders get too wet they pit as they corrode and that messes up the seals inside of them. A set of real cover for our jacks would likely run about $1000.00. Right now we have some busted up Home Depot buckets on top of them which are always getting blown off.

These are just some of the things that I can think of off the top of my head. It seems like every week when I am at work I find myself wondering why we don't have this or that. I don't think that a couple or maybe $100k is too much of an investment for old OAK MX.

Why I Love Working On Airplanes

2011-01-05T10:11:00.000-08:00

I think it's time to focus on the positives of our job. Too often we get caught up in the industry and the politics of the airlines that we work for. I know a lot of guys at work who no longer enjoy what they do and that is really too bad.

When I know I have to go to work I do not get the sense of dread that it appears some people do. I truly enjoy working on planes and I enjoy (for the most part) the people I work with. My vision is still blurred by the "next new plane" that some company is building, and for the most part I still enjoy learning about new and different ways to fix my beautiful old 737s.

I think that one of the things I find fascinating about our line of work is the multitude of different ways in which different mechanics will attack similar problems. One guy will do what he has learned will work and another guy/gal will go another route ultimately arriving at the same destination. I know that the FAA does not believe in this and thinks that there is only "one way" to fix any problem on our airplanes but from my now 20 years of airline work I have to say that it is just not true. The good mechanics, and I mean the really good ones, have honed their skill over the years and know exactly how they want to approach issues that come up on the plane. In fact even when a call comes in over the radio and I know that it is not going to be my turn to go to the gate call I still go through what I would do in my mind. It is something that we just do, we do not think about it, we just do it.

This process is also good because often the different perspective of our fellow mechanics is just what it takes to get a problem fixed. I can't tell you how many times I have been stuck on a broke plane, running through BITE tests, chasing wires, hitting things with hammers, cussing, just doing battle, only to have a guy/gal stop by and say "hey have you tried _____?" Sure enough that one thing or different view will fix the plane. I think it is an important dynamic which the FAA does not take into account. When you are the person who offers help and the help actually ends up fixing the problem I kind of feel like a rock star!

I also enjoy knowing that the 137 folks sitting in the plane are going to make it to their destination because I was able to fix the plane. There is an ego thing there, sort of a longing to be the hero which comes to the surface when a plane is down hard and you can figure out the problem.

You put these first things together with a curiosity on the way things work mix in a little bit of knowledge on the way things break and you have a happy aircraft mechanic. I know some of you are saying "the way things break?" I have always contended that this job is equal parts knowing how things work and knowing how things break. Think about this: when I am at home and something in my house breaks I can usually fix it. Not because I necessarily know how a washing machine works but rather I know that if no water is getting to point "A" then something downline of that is messed up. I know how things break. I credit thirteen years of driving a 1966 VW Bug for a lot of that.

After all these years I am still an airplane nerd. I like airshows, air museums, Airliners.net, shows about airplanes, books about airplanes, etc. I do not think any of the airline industry BS will ever make that go way.

What sort of things do you like about being a mechanic? Let me know, now is the time to focus on the things we like about our jobs!

Happy New Year!!!

2011-01-03T14:59:00.000-08:00

Well it's 2011!! I think it looks like 2011 is going to be a good year in the airline biz. I also am going to make the personal challenge to better my craft of aircraft maintenance. It is important to always try to learn new things in our profession. With all the information available to us at work or on the Internet I think it will be a very attainable goal for all of us to become better versed in aircraft maintenance or the airline industry. I wish you all good luck and a prosperous New Year.
Goat

I Just Do Not Understand

2010-12-13T11:54:00.000-08:00

Blade damage-Big Time!!!- Thanks AzWoman

I claimed I was not going to complain anymore about how people work, but I can not let this go. I really love being an aircraft mechanic and I come from a pretty strong background of folks who work hard. I know that I am not always motivated and have off days-everyone does.

Why would a guy complain about me not doing his work and then complain about having to do his work? I know that's not real clear so let me give an example. This just happened to me:

I'm working swing shift on a Saturday. Saturdays in OAK are not the busiest days. The terminating planes usually come in early on Saturday as well. There were four of us working, me and three midnight shift mechanics. Now this whole thing between midnights and swings has been going on for a couple of years now. The midnight guys want the swings guys to "bust out" or work on planes that come in early, reducing the amount of work they have to deal with at night. Sounds good. The problem is that even when two or three planes are knocked out there are a number of midnight shift mechanics who will still complain about what they are assigned to work. Then there are the guys who say "wow you guys could only finish up three planes?" or "yeah swings did three plane, but they were only MV-1s."

These kinds of comments do not sit well with people who are on swing shift. They get no benefit from working the RON planes and then they get complaints about doing it. So the thing is-why help RON knock out planes when the RON guys just say that it is not enough?

We have all worked midnights and we all know how it is to stay up all night and get broke planes when you thought you had a relatively easy night. ALL the guys on days and swings worked graveyards, and a lot of us worked graveyards at other airlines that had no "down time" when you finished a job, only more work brought into a hangar etc. We know what it is like. To say things like "you could only knock out one plane?" to us is very condescending.

Back to my story:

I was Lead and I like to run the shift with out having to keep a "list". A list is simply that, we list the mechanics working on a piece of paper and go down the list in turn when a gate call comes up. Most grown up people do not need a list to govern their actions but apparently a lot of mechanics do. Usually when no list is used we simply take turns and believe me you know who went before you and when you need to volunteer to get up and do something. Again this only works with grown ups!! As I was the lead I went to the first terminating plane. While there a gatecall came in for hydraulics at gate 25. I got on the radio and asked if someone could get it and after a pause one of the guys said sure. About this time the terminaters started to come in hot and heavy and of course the three guys went out to work on them so they could have a few less planes at night, I understand that. What I do not understand is that when SWING shift gatecalls came in and I asked someone-anyone to get the call I got no answer on the radio. It went like this:

Ops: "Maint. Gate 28 wants oil"
Me: "Copy that, can any one get that?"
Others: ".........................." (silence)

So I had to call out names just to get the gatecalls done. Then I come to find out (the next day) that one of these guys was overheard saying that there were four guys on swings, but only three guys working. He thinks that I did nothing all shift!

I can't believe this but I should not be surprised. I did not work on any terminating aircraft. My job, my responsibility is for through flight planes. We were working SWING shift, not coming in early as sometimes happens to knock out RON planes. Plus the three of them were ALLOWED by ME to work on those planes. I could have stopped them but I didn't. Why would this guy say this about me? Why let me do you a favor and then turn around and spit in my face? Why complain about the work you are assigned? Why get so mad as to kick tool boxes, throw tools, yell at the work board? The simple reality is that some of us are not mature enough to have reasonable responses when things do not go our perceived way.

It's amazing how the same 8-10 guys are the ones who have problems with their work assignments and these same guys are the ones who concentrate more on what other shifts are doing than how they themselves are behaving on their own shift. It's called projection folks! You know you suck so you try to PROJECT that same attribute onto others.

I learned my lesson, I will ALWAYS take the Lead when it is available to me and I will ALWAYS keep a list when those guys are on shift. And I will ALWAYS make it clear that the gatecalls will take top priority. I guess the days of working with grownups are over. Oh and I will be having a "come to Jesus" talk with this one loud mouth.

It Started Out Like Such A Normal Night....

2010-12-08T10:57:00.000-08:00

I had the pleasure of working mid-night shift one night this week. I actually enjoy working mid-nights every now and then. Because of the Thanksgiving holidays I have been off for two weeks and this was my first mid-night shift worked since my return. I got to work early. Usually I like to show up early to eat my dinner since I do not think it is cool to clock in at 9pm and then spend the next half hour eating as a few people do.

When the work was assigned I had two MV-1 checks. The checks are Maintenance Visits (MV) that we do nightly at OAK, they range from MV-1s to MV-3s. Other stations do heavier checks but in OAK we have limited space and part resources so we are relegated to the lower range of Maintenance Visits. To hear some guys you would think that doing an MV-3 is like the end of the world but truth be told none of the checks we do in OAK are all that bad.

We do get a lot of MEL and Non-Routine work through the shop and this night was no different. In an ideal world the guys with very few extra items on their planes would finish up and help the guys with a lot of items to work. This, however, is not the case as a fair number of guys only help their friends, will not help people who have ticked them off, won't help slow people (I may be in this group), or will not help anyone. What ever it all seems to work out and at the evening the planes are all done. Back to my typical night:

As usual the Leads try to assign one "clean" plane and one that has some work on it in an attempt to even out the work load among the mechanics. One of my MV-1s had two MELs on it: A broken lav fill port, and a slat in transit light. The MEL plane came in at 9pm and was terminated by swing shift. My clean plane was nearly in range so I decided to wait until it arrived, knock it out quickly, then hit my MEL plane for the rest of the night.

One of the draw backs to assigning work like we do is that often airplanes arrive with problems that can at times be pretty time consuming. (I think you can guess where this is going). When my secoond plane got to the gate I did my walk around and went to talk to the crew. They told me that the plane was good "EXCEPT" (these are the words we mechanics hate to hear from the flight crews) the two MELs that were on it. So here we go, the #2 N1 target will not drive when set and the left turn off light is inop.

All in all not very hard items to work so I am thinking my original plane is still intact. Once I remote the plane I change the landing light and do my outside stuff. When I go upstairs to test the light it still does not work! My whole plan was to not have to drive back and forth from remote area Tango and the shop. My golf cart has VERY old batteries and they do not hold up for the long drives. I decide to wait and check out the N1 gauge issue. Once I got that squared away, which was a lot quicker than I thought it would be, I figured I had to go and get a Multi-meter to check the power to the light, cb, and switch on the landing light.

Time is ticking away and I still have that slat indication issue on my second plane-Damn! So I check power at the circuit breaker-checks good, check power at the switch-checks good, check power at the light-no good! Now I am thinking that there is a bad wire from the switch to the light but just to be sure I want to get the part number for the switch. When I am shining my light in behind the panel I notice a little piece of metal laying on the bottom of the panel. I fished it out and it turned out to be a small strip of spring-steel that moves when you throw the switch in order to push down on the button that is incorporated into the back of the stupid switch. Back to the shop for a new switch.

Time is still ticking!!!

Got the switch all squared away now it all works great. Called for clearing numbers and go to sign off the book-the logbook needs to be changed! This plane is eating away all my time. Back to the shop for a logbook! Finally I can go to my MEL plane and get going on the slat issue.

This all tells you that the old saying "The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry" is alive and well. My quick "clean" MV-1 was not so quick and clean after all and took a lot of work. As you mechanics who have worked 737 slat issues know even to trouble shoot the thing a panel or two must come down. The rest of my night was full of screws, speed handle, and drill, but it all got done.

That's the moral of the story: We get it all done, just not in the order we plan on getting it done.

New Email!!!

2010-12-04T15:35:00.000-08:00

Just wanted to let everyone know that I have changed the Blogs email due to some privacy concerns brought to my attention by Az-Woman. Thanks Az-Woman!!!

Goat

Imagine A Movie About Line Maintenance

2010-12-01T15:37:00.000-08:00

This past Thanksgiving holiday I went and saw the movie "Unstoppable". This is a movie about a runaway train and how they get it stopped, but it also goes a long way in demonstrating how difficult and dangerous the job of Railroading is. The movie even touches on layoffs and worker strife.

I got to thinking what a movie about aircraft maintenance would be like. I can not for the life of me think of one movie that showed aircraft mechanics in a positive light. The early Airport movies showed Joe Patroni as a loud, obnoxious, foul mouthed, dude who really knew his stuff and took very little guff from the flight crews or airport brass. This is a good description of mechanics. Let's face it: the language in most maintenance shops is a little "colorful". Mechanics are often loud (we have to speak up over machinery etc.). We often have to face pushy flight crews who think they are all knowing and those confrontations are often heated.

But what would an aircraft maintenance movie be like? We have a dangerous job. The dangers run from falling off the crown of the plane to catching some crazy disease while fishing a cell phone out of a toilet.

There are labor/company relations in the industry that are strained. Most of us have been laid off at least once in our careers.

There are times when there is great excitement: The first engine run after a fuel pump change, correctly solving an on going electrical issue, etc.

The problem is that there are times of great boredom and repetitive work: I know when I worked overhaul I received a turn over of "We drilled these 284 holes, now you countersink these 284 holes" or the like more than once. On the Line there are very quite days when we get very few calls.

So what would this movie be like? Any ideas? Would it have to involve some kind of emergency? What do you think?

I Knew It Would Happen One Day

2010-11-11T15:43:00.000-08:00

When I first started this blog I knew that people at work would be reading it. I also knew that some of those guys reading it may figure out that I am talking about them. To that end I have changed names to "try to protect the innocent". You can figure out if I am writing about you or not. I also do not write about things that may be safety related, FAA type incidents, or any thing that the flying public may strike out at SWA for. As a lot of you know this still leaves me a lot of room for stories and advice for the readers or up and coming A&P mechanics.

Recently I was made aware of the fact that a certain person at work does not appreciate my use of a blog to "air our dirty laundry". For the life of me I can not figure out why this particular person feels so vexed by the stories and tales I recount. If a story about me and another guy going on a field trip and troubleshooting a problem to find a solution threatens him I can not be to blame. As a matter of fact of all the blogs that I have written-none of them pertain to this person. That's not to say that he does not have a bunch of stories associated with him. It is to say that this person has done things that fall into the above set of things that I do not write about. (Now that's scary).

The stories here are not intended to intimidate or bad mouth the guys I work with. As with any job there are mechanics here that I do not enjoy working with. If saying that means that this fellow will no longer read my blog or not like me or working with me then that's fine. Keep in mind that I had to hear all this from third party sources so....maybe my facts are wrong. Let me know, I'm a grown ass man, I can take it.

The More Things Change........

2010-11-03T12:14:00.000-07:00

The longer I am in this line of work it never ceases to amaze me how many things have come and gone that were supposed to make the life of an aircraft mechanic easier. It seems that every year a new computer based maintenance program comes out with the latest and greatest techno gizmos. There are safety harnesses to keep us from bashing our heads, safety vests to keep us from being run over, new tools to help us troubleshoot, on and on.

With all these new tools it seems that the guys who get stuff done. The guys you can count on to fix a plane all have the same traits that the guys who can't fix planes do not have (no matter what fancy new tools they show up with). I know at my job there are guys who I will go on a road trip with and guys I will not go on a road trip with. The ones who I go with have to know how to work. By work I mean not give up when the first thing that someone else (MX Control) tells them to try does not work.

I'm not sure if there is some God given traits or talents that make a good mechanic. I do know that some of the best mechanics that I know all have certain things in common. They all:

Have common sense.
Know how to use Maintenance manuals.
Know how to read a wiring diagram.
Carry a surprisingly small number of tools with them.
Take very good care of those tools.
Work very smart.
Can be trusted to work alone.
Do not get pushed around by MX Control.

There are those who get by. There are those who rely on others to get by. Some hide. Some simply do nothing.

To be a good Line Mechanic you can not be burdened by all the new techo gizmology that comes out on a yearly basis. Bleed air test boxes for example will give false readings if not hooked up correctly. The reason to know how a system works is to not be overly dependant on test boxes or others (MX Control) to do your troubleshooting for you.

I have always said that you can fix any thing with a srewdriver,visegrip, and a hammer. Everything except laziness.

AirTran ACQUISITION

2010-10-21T12:09:00.000-07:00

I'm sure everyone knows about the recently announced acquisition of Airtran by SWA. As a frontline employee I must trust the decisions that are made by management with regards to the direction that the company goes in. The reason they get paid the big bucks is to do things like this that will likely impact the company years and years down the road. As a mechanic I make decisions that affect the day to day running of the company and the upper management trusts me to do so.

I have no problem with the acquisition of Airtran but I do not understand why everyone keeps calling it a merger. SWA is buying Airtran. We are not merging with them. All the talk in the shop is about how to fairly integrate the 350 or so Airtran mechanics within our seniority list. While I am a little worried about the competence of AMFA in such negotiations, I do not think it will make all that much of a difference to me.

Lets review some of the options that I have heard thrown around the shop.

Option 1:
Add the Airtran guys to the bottom of the seniority list. Basically treat them as new hires.

Option 2:
One for one seniority. What this means is that the top Airtran guy goes right under our top guy, so on and so on until they reach their last guy. This would put all their mechanics ahead of me.

Option 3:
Fold them into our seniority list. What this would do is put an Airtran guy with a date of hire of Dec. 1 2000 right above one of our guys who has a date of hire of Dec. 2 2000. Their top guy would get all of his seniority as would all the rest of them.

These options seem pretty cut and dry but there are emotions involved in this thing. As we all know seniority is king in the airline industry and no one wants to give any up. The Airtran guys will be getting something like a $10.00/hour raise so the question of should they get a the money AND the seniority comes up. Added to all this is the fact that the Airtran guys were non-union until 2000 so how do we treat the portion of their time spent outside the union. I'm not the biggest union guy but that has to count for something.

For me I think option 3 with some kind of consideration to the fact that some of the Airtran guys spent time outside of a union. I also think that if they get the raise then some kind of 2 or 3 year for one trade would be fair. In other words a 6 year Airtran guy would now be placed at the three year level on our seniority list. We have to remember that we have ACQUIRED Airtran. This is NO merger. The has to be some give on the Airtran side of the table. I think the 2 or 3 year for one trade solves this as they give up a little and we give up a little.

In the end I think it will be ok for all of us. There are only 350 of them so we will have no problem absorbing that number of mechanics. What will happen is that we will do very little hiring for a while as we will now have more mechanics than we currently need. Watch out LAX! There may be some guys willing to work in Southern California after all.

To Cargo Door Or To Not Cargo Door

2010-09-29T15:09:00.000-07:00

This past weekend an old -300 came in and I had the pleasure of Terminating the plane. While doing the walk around I noticed that the rampers were having trouble opening the aft cargo door. This is not unusual and in fact happens a lot. Usually there is a bag or box that has fallen on the door or the door was closed with the cable or cable handle struck in the door jamb. This was what I suspected was the trouble but once the ramp supervisor and I got the door open it was clear that the threshold plate was damaged.

The plate was cracked and peeled up in such a way that it formed a pointy triangle that stuck up about and inch to an inch and a half. The rampers still had to get the bags off and I had to move the plane from the gate to Tango remote area. I got a hammer and beat the section back down so I could close the door for the remote and the rampers could off load the bags. The threshold is stainless steel and once I got it bent back, the piece broke off. I was able to remote the plane and wrote up the threshold plate on the board in the shop so that the mechanic who worked the plane that night could inspect it.

The next morning I found out that the threshold needed to be replaced (big surprise) AND the cargo door needed to be replaced as well. I admit that I did not look at the door when i was terminating as I should have done once I saw the condition of the threshold. I was surprised even more when I was told that the cargo door was being flown in on a ferry flight for US to change out! I know that we are mechanics and the this is a job that we SHOULD be able to accomplish in OAK. The reason I was surprised about it is that we have very little tooling in OAK and even less hardware etc.

Old Threshold with piece missing that I broke off.

Those of us who have worked hangar work or non-sched type maint. know that work like this is not as straight forward as it sounds. There is always something that will go wrong or some part that will be needed which is not originally thought of. In other words the can of worms will be opened!!

The plane should have been ferried out to PHX as was originally planned but as we know MX control knows better than us when it comes to such things. Instead of ferrying the plane to PHX the door was ferried to us and of course the plane sat here for three days because:

We have no parts.
We have no tooling.
The new threshold plate came without any holes and was then mis-drilled.
PHX mechanics had to come and RESCUE us.
The new door had to be fitted into the old opening.

On day two I went out to the plane to get some grip lengths for our manager, this was before the PHX rescue mission, I decided to check and see how far off the new mis-drilled threshold was. when I put it on I saw that only two of the holes were off, and those holes were not off by much. One hole was almost off by half a hole the other by about a quarter of a hole. I hate to say this but I think that I could have made it work. The persons assigned to the job were not real happy about doing it and so I think they found a convenient stopping point once they saw that the holes were a little off.

This is a recurring theme at OAK. We have people who are not interested in going the extra mile of trying to solve problems in order to get planes fixed. As I keep saying we in OAK cried, and cried about doing OPC mods (moving the On Board Computers in the -300 AC) until they stopped assigning them to us and MX Control thinks we will be able to hang a new cargo door? Any non-sched mechanic would have drilled out those holes and put larger fasteners or washers or something on it to make it work. Like I said this was an old plane and it has no winglets, and only one FMC so I believe SWA is going to be getting rid of it soon. A couple of button head fasteners instead of flush ones would not hurt this plane in any way shape or form.

The PHX guys came in and actually did the real maintenance work that the OAK guys didn't want to do. When they were half way through they came back to the shop and what really amazed them was that no one came out to watch them and maybe learn how to do the job for the next time. That says a lot about the level of work ethic in OAK and about what we once had that seems to be missing now-pride of workmanship.

Guys are more interested in resting than working and god forbid you ask them to try and learn something new. This is one of the things that is chasing me out of this station. Sure it's expensive to live here and I have personal reasons for leaving but this laziness is one of the things that makes it all little easier to make the move. I'm not sure if any of that exists in DAL but I am sure that it has been lost in OAK and that's a real sad thing for me to think about. I have learned a lot from a lot of people while working in OAK but now there are way more people who need to learn way more but don't want to. They have us out numbered.

Boise Road Trip

2010-09-21T16:46:00.000-07:00

Last weekend we had only four guys working on day shift. As usual when there are only four mechanics working everything went to pot quickly. Amid the din of the radio calls for remoting, gate calls, and general upheaval, there was a phone call. The call was from Maint Control, and pertained a broken plane in Boise.

Those of us who have been to Boise know that once we get there (from Oakland) there is no way to get back until late in the day. The only return flight after like 9am is one at 6:45pm. This makes Boise road trips very desirable. A guy on day shift (me) could fly up to Boise, fix a plane and wait until 6:45pm to fly home, thereby getting a whole shift of OT.

Boise Terminal

Of course I agreed to go. I went on the trip with a guy I'll call Tang. Tang and I got all our tools and, with the help of the stores guy, all the parts needed. We were told there was a hydro leak and to take an electric pump with us. Once we got on the plane and settled I sat back and tried to relax. When we pushed back from the gate I closed my eyes to sleep on the way up when Tang says "why are we turning around?" Sure enough we were turning back toward the terminal. The Captain comes on the PA and says that there is a light on in the cockpit that should be out. Tang and I went up front to talk to the crew and found out that the FO Pitot Static light was on.

Make a long story short we had to fix the plane that we took to fix the other plane. After changing the Pitot Tube the rest of the flight was uneventful.

Tang and I got to Boise and checked the plane out, sure enough there was a leak but luckily the pump itself was leaking so we just had to swap it out and go eat lunch and wait the 4 hours until we could make it back to Oakland. Boise sure is a premium road trip, when it comes up. These days road trips are getting scarce since LAX MX is the road trip station now.

Tool Spotlight-Cordless Drills

2010-09-15T15:54:00.000-07:00

The cordless drill is one of those things that a Line Mechanic needs to do his daily job. It is as essential as the screwdriver these days. You may think that since we typically do not remove panels and drill rivets out that you can get away without a cordless drill but you would be mistaken. I will say that the drill is not so much used as a drill but as a screw gun. The typical usage for a Line Mechanic would be removing landing light lenses or cover to get at position lights, etc. I have a Hitachi 12V cordless drill which I carry on my golf cart to all gate calls.

The drill came with the light, the apex bits, two batteries and the charger. It also came in a case which I keep it in, in my cart. The one pictured is an 18V but I went ahead and bought the 12V model instead. When I went looking for a drill to buy I wanted to keep it under $100 and I wanted something on the small side of the spectrum. For our work I figured it was useless carrying around a huge, long, heavy drill. Plus a drill my size fits into spaces like the airconditioning bays on the plane and other small spaces quite easily. I went with the 12V because it is the smallest of the Hitachi models (at that time) and it was a lot cheaper than the 14V, 18V or bigger models. I know that a lot of guys would not dare buy a 12V because the higher models provide more...something. We at SWA have been using company provided 12V drills since I got hired so I figured that 12V was good enough. The light has even come in handy, especially working in the wheel wells at night.

Recently the Lithion Ion batteried tools have come out and they are much lighter than the Nicad batteries like the one in my drill. A few of the guys at work have purchased the Makita Impact Driver and Impact Drills.

I like these bad boys! They are real light, real small, and real powerful. They are a little expensive but seem worth the cost of about $200.00. I like the case and we all know Makita is a good brand.

While on the subject of cordless drills there are some people who use them TOO MUCH. I can't tell you the number of times I've had to get out my hammer and large flat bladed screw driver to notch the safety screws on the nose tires because some fool used a drill with a clutch set on like 10 to install them. These screws should be hand tight plus like a quarter turn. I have seen guys use drills to remove and install 1/4 turn fasteners! My all time favorite is removing the wingtip on the 737-300s to replace the position lights only to find out that some goon has installed them with their drill clutch set on 10 or even to drill!! Lets start to think about the next guy when we are working.

Just Imagine!!

2010-09-09T19:35:00.000-07:00

Some Concept Airliners.

You Have Heard Of Morning People? What About A Morning Plane?

2010-09-05T14:02:00.000-07:00

These past few days have been busy here in Oakland Line MX. The crew is now staffed to four guys on the weekend and Saturday happened to be one of those days when we only had four guys. Sounds like four should be good but we also had 10 aircraft parked at the remote parking all of which had to be moved within about a two hour period. Our remote parking area "Tango" has provisions for "stacking" the planes, in other words spot Tango 10 has a fwd and an aft position. For Tango 10 aft to remote it must wait for Tango 10 fwd to move first. Once you figure in late rampers, late operations people, late mechanics, you can see how four guys can get overwhelmed by the number of moves that have to go on.

This was the case on Saturday morning when two guys were trapped on planes waiting to remote by a ground stop in Burbank due to fog. The ground stop prevented the plane on the gate from pushing which kept a plane on Tango, which in turn trapped another plane in the aft position at Tango. It was very busy and crazy but not what I was going to write about.

There was a plane, an originator, that called with a question. I had actually moved the plane from Tango 7 about 40 minutes earlier. When I first boarded the plane when it was at Tango the APU would not start. After two tries it finally lit off and I moved her. When the crew called I was stuck on Tango so another guy went to the call.

Apparently what was happening was the FO's instruments were losing power. This sounds like a problem that can be troubleshot but not this time. The problem was that this would happen occasionally when the ground power was powering the plane, then it would fix itself and the problem would shift to the APU power. I'm not sure I said that correctly so: The FO's instruments would go down when the plane was powered by the ground power. it would work fine while the APU generator was powering the bus. Then it would go away and come back but this time the problem would be while the APU was powering the bus.

After deplaning and grounding the plane everything worked fine. We all went back to the shop and sat around the table trying to decide the correct course of action. After some discussion we figured that we should run the engines to see if the problem would show up while the plane was on the engine generators. If all worked well we would MEL the APU generator, which is what we ended up doing.

I came to work for midnight shift and of course the plane was spending the night in Oakland! One of the guys changed some relays and could not get it to break.

The next morning: "Maintenance, electrical question at gate 23". Guess which plane it was?? Once again after some switching and prodding the problem went away.

I figure, and I have experienced, this morning plane syndrome. There are some planes that take a long time to wake up for that first flight, but then seem to work fine the rest of the day. These temper mental planes need an extra start attempt, another power switch, a good swift hit with the trusty MagLite to get them going. Ever wonder why people refer to planes as she or her. I submit that this is the reason.

The View from The Ground

2010-09-01T16:04:00.000-07:00

When you were a kid and you flew on an airplane I can guarantee that you begged your parents for the window seat and sat in awe of the people who worked outside getting the plane ready for your flight. I know I did and I affected me so much that I started my career in aviaiton at a very young age.

Although that kid is still inside me somewhere the view from the ground, working on these beasts has somewhat tarnished. I'm not sure if it is the fact that the work is hard, the work is often thankless, or the work sometimes has to be done under extreme pressure or circumsatnce. I love airplanes and I love working on them and I don't think that will ever end. What has ended is my desire to go the extra mile while I'm at work. I still do more than most I think but there was a time that I did way more than was required of me.

This may be a normal "growing" process that I am going through but the "edge" or the "eye of the tiger" has left me. I am an "old school" guy and the way things have changed in our industry has left me behind. I recently took an on line test to renew my Taxi and Run up privledges within SWA. Fourteen years ago when I began my career at SWA I took a similar test. The test was not on line of course but instead relied on one of the Senior mechanics to instruct me on how to safely operate an engine and perform taxi manuvers with proficiency. This process probably took 3 weeks in total. I had never taxiied an airplane or even had run up rivledges at Delta Airline so I soaked all the new info up like a sponge. The mechanic teaching us was methodical an often predictable with the emergency scenarios he threw at us but it was a very effective way to teach.

The first time I taxiied there were a couple of flight attendants on board watching us. As you know when you first throttle up and the plane just begins to move, you do a break check to ensure they are working correctly. Being the first time I was doing this I really slammed on the breaks, the plane STOPPED and our guests went sprawling forward and into the flight deck. The first time I taxied to the gate I was off the J-Line by about two feet so I had to buy Doughnuts for the guys.

Long and short of it: I learned by doing. Fast forward 14 years. I'm sitting in front of a computer which gives me a lesson and the a test. Much to my dismay there are 11 parts to the Taxi and Engine Start each one taking about 45 mins to go through, test, and review if necessary. At the end of the thing is the Final Exam. So that's a total of 12 tests and about two shifts of course work to go through. I have to say I feel like this is a result of the company not taking care of those mechanics who mess up, while taxiing, there by requiring all of us to sit through this torture. I learned less in those 11 lessons than I did 14 years earlier and I killed a bunch of brain cells by staring at a computer monitor for 8 hours over the course of two days. Add to this that I still had to go out and do gate calls when it was my turn and you can see that for a guy like me this is no way to learn something. I passed, and I passed with a very good grade, but I hardly learned any thing new.

That is the direction that this job is going for me. More and more rules and procedures with less and less reward. It's like the growing trend for a second mechanic to check your work when you are done. I do not like this and I'm sure there is more stuff like that to come. I will still work my best and do my job as well as I can but the atmosphere at work has changed and I do not seem to be able to change with it.

ASAP Questions About It's Fairness

2010-08-16T07:35:00.000-07:00

We all know about the ASAP program that the FAA implemented a few years ago. Recently, although the spirit of the program is such that it keeps mechanics from getting in trouble, the ASAP "Committee" has denied some ASAP reports. I know of some people who do not even file any more because of the predatory nature of how the FAA has been dealing with them.

I myself have not filed an ASAP report and I do not think that the ASAP program is doing the job that it was intended to do.

Recently Comair Machinists have elected to withdraw from the ASAP program stating that they "no longer have faith that the program will ever be managed according to regulations." This comes after Comair disciplined mechanics after they filed ASAP reports.

JetBlue Flight Attendant Goes Bananas!!! Our Industry Is Fighting Back

2010-08-10T20:10:00.000-07:00

I'm sure most everyone has heard of Steven Slater by now. Steven Slater is the JetBlue flight attendant who had a break down on Monday and basically told the flying public what they could do with themselves. There is no excuse for some of his behavior, however, the flying public does take some liberties when it comes to flying and airline employees.

My blog is about airline maintenance, but being a line mechanic I have seen the ugly side of the flying public that made Steven Slater snap on Monday. The JetBlue flight attendant is likely similar to any of us airline employees: over worked and underpaid. The industry is not the glamor job that it may have been in the sixties or seventies.

Steven Slater was up against then same thing that a lot of us are: spoiled people who cannot seem to bend a little or even want to follow rules. I have witnessed arguments over seats, people who suddenly revert back to high school when they get into an airplane with the "he is looking at me funny" garbage. I have broken up actual fist throwing fights that erupt inside airplanes and have had to explain to adults that they could get arrested because they won't comply with the flight attendants requests. When people get into airplanes they turn into spoiled children.

I understand that flying costs a lot of money and you are entitled to a certain level of service when you pay that much money for a flight. That said you are not allowed to ignore and belittle the folks that work for the airline and who are there for your safety.

What Steven Slater did was beyond the reaction that should have occurred and for that he paid the price. He got arrested, will lose his job (not good these days). But Steven Slater did something that most of us airline folks cannot do, he spoke up and in doing so he became an instant working class hero.

The next time you are flying watch what the public does. The cell phones stay on, people won't sit down, they don't fasten their seat belts, put their seat backs up, or their tray tables up when told, but they pay our bills. Our society is built on being able to take liberties and have freedom. The problem comes when rules are imposed on us that go against those liberties. People have to learn to chillax as my kids say. Stop being so uptight and remember those people serving you drinks, making your beds in the hotels, taking your orders at the fast food joint, keeping you safe in the sky, are all trying to make a living. We in the airlines know that the front line employees, the flight attendants, customer service folks, the people working the ticket counters, have the hardest jobs. We mechanics, pilots, rampers, etc do not have to deal with people who may be having bad days themselves. I appreciate the flight attendants and all the airline folks who keep us going day in and day out. With out them putting up with all the daily crap the airlines would grind to a halt.

2010-08-01T20:29:00.000-07:00

This is a beautiful old bird! The Lockheed Constellation was designed in an era when not all planes looked the same. She looks like she is going 200mph just sitting on the ground. These mechanics are lucky to have worked on such a graceful beast. I'm sure they were not thinking that at the time but it is true.

Check out this picture! Look at the stand the mechanic is using to access the top of the Connie's engine. No safety railings. Check out the shoe that guy is wearing and his helper up on top is not wearing any fall arrest equipment. How did they ever do it?

A little background: The Constellation first went into service in 1945 with TWA. The design began back in the thirties and a few were finished in time to see some service at the end of WWII. Howard Hughes is rumored to have been heavily involved in the design of the plane. The elegant shape of the fuselage is due to the fact that no two frames are the same from the front of the plane to the back. While this resulted in an eye pleasing shape it was very expensive to manufacture that way and maintenance of the fuselage was also cost prohibitive. After the Connie all planes were made with uniform tube shaped fuselages.

There were 856 Constellation built and they were operated by quite a few big airlines. The Connie was the last of the big four engine piston airliners and was a victim of the quickly growing jet-age.

Early on in its life the Connie was plagued by engine fires. The Wright R-3350, an 18 cylinder radial, was a developmental nightmare, but eventually they got all the kinks worked out.

The Connie broke several records during it's time and still holds the record for the longest-duration non-stop passenger flight a 23 hour and 19 minute event during TWA's inaugural London to San Francisco flight on Oct 1-2, 1957.

A Connie also gave Orville Wright his last flight more than 40 years after his historic flight.

There will never be another like it and that is okay with me since it will stay unique.

Back In The Day...

2010-07-30T10:45:00.000-07:00

Check this guy out! Landing on the snow and ice with a big old heavy metal jet! Back in the day when A&P mechanics were MECHANICS, no TECHNICIANS. When a guy could use a belt loader to check a dent on a horizontal stab with out the fear of incurring a fine from OSHA.When kids feared their parents and a band aid would fix all injuries. In other words: THE GOOD OLD DAYS.

Funny, I don't see any safety vests on these guys. I'm sure these guys could sign off their work with out having "mechanic b" verify that it was done correctly!

I'm pretty sure that I could trust these guys to do their job completely. It looks like a gear swing on the old DC-3. No safety tape, cones, warning lights, etc. If you were too stupid to realize that a gear swing was dangerous and you wandered into the path of the gear, you got hurt and it was your fault.

Look at these guys...they are paying attention to what the instructor is telling them. Look at the instructor...he looks like he would belt any of these guys across the face if they smart mouth him or check their text messages during the class. When did we turn into a bunch of wimps who let the few feeble minded idiots ruin our proud profession?

I love working on planes, I do not love working with what has increasingly been a bunch of spoiled, unknowledgable (is that a word?) meat heads who only want to do the least and think they are owed the most. I advise my kids not to become mechanics not because of the hard work or hours or working conditions, it is simply because I see the direction our profession is headed and it scares me for the next generation of mechanics or as they want to be called-Technicians

Good News There is One Manufacturer Who Stand by Their Product!!!

2010-07-28T14:54:00.000-07:00

A couple of posts ago I wrote about some work gloves that I bought made by Big Time Products. The gloves in question got pretty beat up the first day I used them and they developed a hole in one of the fingers. Well, the folks at Big Time Products sent me a new pair of the gloves for free!

I still use the older pair and I have even washed them twice to see if they were really washable as the company claims, and they are. I know a lot of you think that buying these things is extravagant since the company supplies us with a pretty good work glove. What I have found is that the Big Time Products gloves, unlike the ones SWA supplies us, have a padded knuckle area. A while ago when working on a lower anti-collision light I cut my right knuckle very deeply. Of course being a big tough guy mechanic I just wrapped it up and let it heal on its own. I'm thinking that I probably should have gone to the doctor for stitches or something because after two months that thing still hurts but I'm sure all of you have done something similar. Anyway, the Big Time Products glove cushion that area on my hand so I feel that they are a good addition to my tool bag. Check em out when you get the chance.

Big Time Products 20103 Grease Monkey Large General Purpose Work Glove

That One Key Piece Of Info

2010-07-14T18:20:00.000-07:00

The other day while at work I got to go on a road trip with Maybe-Maybe down to San Jose. The information given to us was that the HDG flag was showing on both the Capt and FO HSI. We gassed up the truck, J-Bird (one of our stores guys) loaded up the parts, we got our tools and were off. For this problem we brought with us an IRU (inertial reference unit), a DAA (digital analog adapter), and both of the overhead panels that talk to the IRU.

This is an IRU from Northrop Grumman. We use a Honeywell system but no pics avail.

The plane had been taxiing out for departure when the instruments flagged. The flight crew returned to the gate, then contract MX came out, performed a re-align of the IRUs. The flags went away and they signed it off. On push back, this time, the instruments flagged again so they returned to the gate again and called us to go check it out.

Road trips are a perk of being a Line Mechanic. There is a certain amount of pride in knowing that the company trusts us enough to go out and fix planes away from station. There is also satisfaction in the figuring out of what is wrong and using knowledge, and available tools to get a plane that is stuck at an away station back into service. Most guys enjoy road trips and I have written about them before.

Maybe-Maybe and I are of the same mind in that we like to go, fix the plane and come back as quickly as possible. We figured that this would be a quick fix and back to OAK.

Once we got to SJC and read the logbook we found out that the problem only existed on the FOs side instruments. All the instruments: ADI, HSI, RMI, and even the PWS INOP light came on. We began by aligning the plane and checking for any faults in the system. Of course we found no faults and everything worked as it was supposed to. We decide to put the new IRU and DAA in as we were sure the #2 IRU was acting up. When we put the new IRU in we found out that it was "Bad From Stock". There was a fault code that would not reset or go away. So much for a quick trip! We called MX CTRL and they got one headed our way through LAX MX. We could expect it in a little over an hour.

While we waited we kept busy by cleaning the plane (the flight crew left in a hurry and had no time to do it). We also changed some seat belts on another plane that had an issue.

When our IRU arrived we threw it in and got everything working correctly. I called MX CTRL to tell them I was signing off the plane and let them know that it had in fact been working when we arrived hours ago. We did the deed and soon enough a new crew arrived. Maybe-Maybe and I decided that since the plane had returned to the gate twice before, we would wait until it took off to make sure everything was ok. (I think you all know where this is going) The plane boards, pushes back and sits there for like 6-7 minutes. Maybe-Maybe and I are saying "That's it he's broke.....he'll be coming back". We went to OPS and asked the OPS guy to call them. Sure enough he said he was working on the same problem the plane had before.

DAMN! The freaking plane is POSSESSED!!!

They came back to the gate and said that the instruments on the FO side flagged out, but as soon as he put the APU bus back on line the flags went away!! That was it!! that was our piece of info that we were missing!! When the pilots put the plane on the #2 generator the FOs instruments flagged. The #2 generator was not powering the #2 IRU bus!!!

We called MX CTRL and I suggested we MEL the #2 engine driven generator. That was all we had to do all those hours ago when we got there and we could have been done!!

It's amazing how one little piece of info can throw off a whole troubleshooting plan. We had been chasing the wrong problem the whole time! In hind sight we figured the #2 generator must have stopped powering that bus when they first were taxiing out the first time the problem manifested itself. Of course the re-align worked because they were most likely on GRD power or APU power at the time.

We did wait until the plane pushed out to ensure they left. We got to SJC at 12:30pm and finally left at 7pm. A long day of waiting and chasing phantom problems. Oh well, we did figure out what was happening. The plane did finally go make some money.

The COAX Connector From Hell

2010-07-07T20:13:00.000-07:00

Today at work I got to do a few "firsts" for me. I worked on a plane that had a VHF problem which was traced down to a VHF COAX connector attached to the #1 VHF antenna. I have changed the VHF antennas before and I have monkeyed around with the connectors before. My prior experience with these fun little connectors has been realizing that one was bad and MELing the system since we do not carry the right parts or equipment to fix the thing in OAK.

Since this was a #1 VHF problem it was not MELable, and since the previous shift had traced the problem and ordered the parts I had the relative easy task of putting the thing back together. A first for me, although I did do some COAX crimping at my house for TV cabling.

A little description. COAX (Coaxial Cable) is a shielded electrical wire. The wire has an inner conductor surrounded by a flexible insulator surrounded by the tubular shielding.

The theory is that the electromagnetic field produced by radios etc. is contained within the space between the insulator and the shielding allowing COAX to be run along other wire bundles without fear of much interference. The thing about COAX on aircraft is that the length of the wire is pretty critical and you are not allowed much slack as far as simply cutting it shorter to allow crimping, stripping, etc.

The connector crimps onto the wire but you have to strip the shielded part of the wire back some so that the wire fits into the end of the connector. Looking at the picture on the right the wire feeds into the narrow hole on the left of the connector. First the barrel is placed over the wire, you push the wire into the connector, making sure it contacts the pin inside, push the shielding down over the narrow thing on the left, slide the barrel down over the whole thing and crimp it. The shielding must contact the connector to ground it out.

Not only was it my first aircraft COAX crimp but they also sent a complete Daniels Strip and Crimp set. Most of you know that Daniels makes all kinds of crimpers that we use on airplanes. They also make pin pushers and pin pullers, hex crimpers, strippers, etc. For this fix the company sent me two Daniels sets! It was pretty cool seeing just one complete set but they sent two. I tried to find out how much they cost but could only find one set on Ebay for $3000.

Any way, we used the hex crimper for COAX, we found the right die block to put into the crimper and squeezed away. When we were done we had a perfect crimp and what do you know the #1 VHF was transmitting again!

One of the things that threw me off for a little was that the wire we were working on had a wire tag on it that said #2 VHF. Apparently Boeing changed the locations of the #1 and #2 VHF antennas on the 737-700s somewhere mid production so the wire tags are all jacked up. Watch out for this one as I can see it really messing people up. I'm not sure why they did not change the tag but, whatever. That was the final first, incorrectly marked wires from the factory.

I have to wonder, this is the second COAX that I have been involved in and I know there have been others, why in such a relatively young aircraft series (the -700s) are we having so many COAX issues? Mines is not to reason why, mines is just to push tin!

Work Gloves

2010-06-28T14:46:00.000-07:00

Big Time Products 20103 Grease Monkey Large General Purpose Work Glove
So a while back I said I was going to try out some of those mechanic style work gloves. I was at Home Depot the other day and found a pair from a company called Big Time Products. These are called Grease Monkey general purpose gloves "made especially for mechanics." I really liked that tag line since I'm a mechanic and I figured these things would work for me.

The gloves are pretty comfortable and have a velcro shaft on the back of the wrist to tighten the glove. They are made out of a synthetic suede material on the fingers and palm and a spandex type of stretchable material on the back of the hand. There are padded areas on the palm and knuckle and they seemed reasonably breathable. They cost me $10 at the store.

I was working a triple the next day so I was excited to give the gloves a try. That night I was working midnight shift first so I got my assignment and went to it. The gloves worked really well and were very comfortable. I changed some tires and did some engine work and hydraulics, etc. The next shift was days and I used the gloves for nearly every call I went on. Day shift is primarily oil and hydraulics with a little engine work.

Around the end of day shift I noticed a problem with the left hand glove. The index finger on that side was developing a hole in it. Try as I might to "favor" that hand or finger I could not and soon enough the hole got bigger and bigger. The material that makes up the fingers of the glove is getting very thin on all the finger tips. I'm not sure if its the oil or hydraulic fluid, or just maybe the type of work we do as Aircraft mechanics but these "general purpose" gloves just won't hold up. In 24 hours the glove failed (in my opinion).

The gloves are comfortable enough but not durable enough for airplane work. To be fair I went to the Big Time Products website and they do say specifically "for auto mechanics". There are other gloves with reinforced finger tips but I bought these for the tactile touch I though they would provide.

I still like the gloves and I still and going to use them. As a matter of fact I cut the finger tip off the left glove and continue to use them.

Plus I'm a broke, cheap aircraft mechanic and as you guys know we always adapt. The next time I'll be sure to get some better gloves but I must say that I really like using them.

My New Mag-Lite LED XL100 Dayshift and Swing Shift Friendly

2010-06-17T23:38:00.000-07:00

A long time ago I did a post on my trusty 3D cell LED Mag-Lite. Anyone who remembers that post can recall how much I endorse the Mag-Lite line of tools. Tough as nails, reliable and of course able to be used as a whacker (hammer). I still use my 3D Mag-Lite almost every day I'm at work and certainly every time I work midnight shift. The light works great but recently I have been looking for something smaller to carry when I'm on day shift or swings and certainly when I'm on a road trip. Ideally something that I could place in my pocket but still throw out some good light.

I started looking at all those little LED lights that you can find at the gas station or Wal-mart etc. As a matter of fact my buddy, Maybe-Maybe< carries one of those little lights and it works fine for him. I could not bring myself to using one of those cheapies at work. I own one that I keep in my car and another as a back-up light, but as a primary light I just can't do it. Maybe-Maybe has told me that he is at a point in his career in that he does not wish to buy any new tools. He claims to be about five years from retirement (yeah right). I am no spring chicken but I also have about another twenty years before retirement so I still want to buy some quality tools.

I like most Aircraft Mechanics am broke!!! So when I got a Home Depot gift card a while back I knew I would waste it all on tools and such. Today while picking up a hose for my refrigerator (it was on MEL), I looked around and saw the Mag-Lite LED XL100. Small, compact, water and drop resistant (hey it is a Mag-Lite!) and its an LED.

The XL100 is 4 3/4" long with a diameter of a quarter. Once I got it unpacked and loaded with the batteries (they came with the thing) I tried it out. To say it is bright is an understatement. The XL100 puts out a nice focused beam which is fully adjustable like any larger Mag-Lite. The light is turned on by a thumb switch on the butt end, sealed of course.

One of the kind of gimmicky things that I don't really approve of is the way the light swithces between "modes". Yes Mag-Lite has jumped on the different modes band wagon, which is kind of sad but I know they have to appeal to more folks than just Old School Aircraft Mechanics. There are 5 modes: DIM (normal), STROBE, NITELIGHT, SIGNAL, and SOS. That would be ok but to switch between the modes you don't turn the little knob/button/switchy/red thing in the photo above like I thought. That thing may look like it is movable but it is not. I had to break open the included written directions to figure this thing out. Basically it is a motion sensitive switch, you hold the light so that the mode you want is at the twelve o'clock position, press the on/off switch and hold it down, in the DIM mode you can adjust the brightness by then twisting your wrist in a counter clock wise or clock wise direction. Ridiculous!!

I'm pretty sure I will never use any mode besides the normal one (DIM??). Anyway the thing is pretty bright and for that it is doing it's job. I hope to never have to test it's drop test toughability but I'm sure it will happen sooner or later.

I will let you guys know how well it holds up. I hope to never have to read an instruction manual to figure out how to use what is supposed to be a simple tool but I fear the days of simple tools are over. Ahh another post subject....

Happy fixing!!

Golden Age Pics from SkyWalker

2010-06-11T17:24:00.000-07:00

The plane above is a CV-340. I don't know any thing about the CV-340 yet but I am an airliner nut so I will be looking it up to learn some more. This is an incredible picture, it looks like a Untied Airlines plane that either had a gear down or got stuck in the mud or something. Check out the mechanics and the cranes! This was a day all those guys who worked on the plane would have remembered for their whole career. Thanks for the pic SkyWalker and anyone with info on the CV-340 drop us a line!

**UPDATE**

here is a link to Wikipedia for more info on the Convair 340:

Convair 340

"Did you really ask me that, Mr. Captain?"

2010-06-08T16:17:00.000-07:00

I love working Line Maintenance and one of the things that really keeps me interested is seeing how other guys I work with deal with the situations that come up versus how I would react to them. For the most part we all have about the same reactions to Flight Crews, airplanes, the FAA, etc. There are those guys who have a really negative view toward all of the above and those guys generally hate their jobs/life. These are the types who are always negative. Most of the guys at SWA have positive out looks and really try to help the company by getting the planes back into service.

This week when I was at work something happened that put into words a philosophy that I have come to accept as a reasonable way to deal with Flight Crews who ask stupid questions or complain about systems that work fine.

We had a Captain who had just pushed off the gate and was taxiing to the runway when his APU shutdown on him uncommanded. Instead of calling Dispatch he called MX Control and they could not decipher his mumbo jumbo explanation so they told him to return to the gate. As we know if he had called Dispatch they would have helped him to Crew Deffer the APU and he would have been on his way. They mechanic (let's call him NiceNice) got the low down from the Captain and started to work the problem. Surprise, surprise the APU worked normally, there were on Faults on the thing and it would not break for NiceNice.

I was out working on another plane when the call came in so I was listening to all this on the radio. After a while NiceNice came back into the shop and I asked him what that was all about. NiceNice explained to me why the Captain returned to the Gate (MX Control) and what he was doing to check out the APU. When he was done and said the thing worked great I asked him if he signed it off as "Ops checks good, no faults found". NiceNice said "Nope. The APU was fine but I MEL'd it anyway because the Captain didn't deserve to have an APU". It turns out that when crews call him to fix things that are not broken or things that don't work because of something that the crews did, NiceNice always MELs it. He says that if they can't figure out or don't know how it works-they don't deserve to enjoy the use of it!

I really like that way of operating and until now I was torn when I came upon crews who are the ultimate reason for problems that I was trying to fix. Next time I come across the HUD problem and I look into the Fault History coming across the old ALTITUDE Warn, or INCORRECT NAV faults, I am going to MEL the HUD. Better to take it away from those dummies than to let them use it incorrectly.

I figure this will also work well for the crews that refuse to "take the plane" until their little problems are fixed or who are really demanding or obstinate about the work being done etc. One of my buddies here is MEL King. This is very close to what he does. He is known for MELing items because the Crew got on his nerves or couldn't explain things fully. Maybe if we all did such the Crews would bother to learn more about their systems....

Old Aircraft Spotlight- Lockheed L1011 Tri-Star

2010-06-01T16:30:00.000-07:00

The Lockheed L1011 Tri-Star was the third wide body airliner to enter commercial operations. In the 60's American Airlines approached Lockheed about making a competitor for the Boeing 747. Ultimately American chose the DC-10 and the Lockheed L-1011 was launched by TWA and Eastern Airlines. The L1011 was very similar to the DC-10 in appearance and they both had three engines with the L-1011's number two engine is integrated into the tail by an "S" duct for improved quietness and stability. The plane had a bunch of production delays, mostly due to the selection of the Rolls Royce RB211 as the powerplant. The DC-10 was able to get into service before the L-1011 and consequently only 250 L-1011s were produced by Lockheed versus a production run of 446 for the DC-10.

The L1011 entered revenue service in 1972. Delta Airlines eventually became the largest customer for the L-1011 and that is where I first met her. We all remember the first real airliner that we work on and mine was a Delta Airline L1011 tail number 789.

Being pretty much straight out of school I was amazed by the sheer size of the plane. The largest plane I had been around before that was an Aero Commander. I did overhaul work at Delta and the L-1011 was not exactly an easy plane to do that sort of work on. The plane was built like a tank, everything was heavy, and none of it really wanted to be taken apart. We would strip everything out of one, fix the discrepancies and put it back together again. My time spent there gave me a huge appreciation for the airplane. I did not get to do a lot of different jobs on her but I tried to learn as much as I could about her while I was there.

I do recall that the flight deck on the L-1011 was huge! The picture above does not even show the observer seat and that was as big as a business class seat. Those of you who have squeezed into the observer seat in a 737 can appreciate that. I also recall that the windshields were very heavy. I had the chance to change one and we used an overhead crane in order to lift it. The doors, the Galleys, the elevator they were all very heavy and required four guys to lift them. The largest repairs I was involved in were gigantic door doublers for the entry doors and Beam Caps in the cabin floor area. This beast was all metal and way ahead of it's time. I know she had RCCBs (remotely controlled circuit breakers) and that she was the first wide body aircraft to achieve a CATIIIc rating. Apparently the autopilot system was way ahead of its time as well and one of the reasons pilots really liked to fly her. I wish I had the chance to do some Line Maintenance on the L-1011 but like I mentioned earlier they went into service in 1972 (when I was two years old) and I got to Delta in 1991, the L-1011 was pulled from service by it's last US operator (Delta Airlines) in 2001 so unless I move to Africa or South America I'm not likely to see one.

I know that I will never forget the BOOM and following cloud of dark exhaust that followed the starting of those RB211s or the BANG and shaking following a test deploy of the RAT (ram air turbine). I will also never forget the amount of work involved in overhauling the Eastern Airlines L-1011s we got from out of the desert. "S" ducts, Lower Galleys, RCCBs, CATIIIc, RB211s, corrosion all a major part of me and those of us lucky enough to work one of the true Queens of the Air.

Ahh Yes The Old Relay Quandry!!!!

2010-05-27T17:14:00.000-07:00

Those of you who work the Line know what the picture to the right is. For the rest of you, it is a picture of a bunch of relays that live behind the First Officers seat up in the Flight Deck on the 737. Out working the Line you may get calls like "the so and so light is on and it won't shut off" or "I switched power and the Master caution light won't turn on". All of these are real problems to our end users (Pilots) but often not "real" problems in a sense.

I will explain it like this, the 737 must have hundreds if not thousands of relays in it. For any one who does not know what a relay is an electrically operated switch. In other words electricity is supplied to the relay and a switch or contact is made to initiate the flow of electricity to operate a system. Relays are wonderful little and big things that allow the plane to turn on an or off systems very quickly and often times without Pilot or Mechanic actions. Relays must make or break systems thousands of times a flight.

As with any mechanical thing relays some times "hang up" as we say. When a relay hangs up it stays on or off when the power to the coil (the coil opens and or closes the switch) is off. As you can imagine when a relay hangs up it causes erroneous indications or effects on the Flight Deck.

More often than not you can reset a hung relay by simply switching power sources. In other words switch from Ground Power to APU Power and back again. The interruption of power can relax the relay and the system goes back to normal, you look like a hero! There are times, however when that will not work. The next step is not in the Maintenance Manual but it is a time proven technique. Take your flip-flop screwdriver and give the relay a little love tap. This is probably the most used technique out there. If the system or light goes back to normal you have figured it out! There are of course times when nothing but changing the relay will work but, take a look at the picture above and try to figure out which relay is giving you the problem. A look at a wiring diagram will tell you the relay to look for if you are lucky but often there are two, three, four or more relays in a system. Now is the time to take off your High Tech Mechanix Gloves and feel for the HOT relay. Relays that get stuck get hot, quickly!

Changing out the relay is easy enough when you are at the home base with Stores available. But my question is: What to do when you are down line on a road trip and have no relay, no stores, and the next part can not get to you for four or five hours? If the old love tap worked and there are no other problems how do you sign it off? Sure arrangements can be made to have the relay changed downline or at the RON if it is in a maintenance station but, how far should you take it? My personal feeling is if there are no other problems, if you can not get the issue to repeat again, if the plane is going one or at the most two legs and then to maintenance, if the Flight Crew is comfortable with it, than it can be signed off as "Reset system" or "System operates as normal".

What do you think? It's kind of a sticky one, huh?

High Tech Work Gloves

2010-05-24T21:10:00.000-07:00

I was thinking about buying a pair of these Mechanix Gloves. I have been using the Tsunami Gloves that SWA supplies us at work and they are ok. I like that they are a lot more flexible than the older leather gloves that we have and they breathe a lot better. I have read some blogs, etc about these types of gloves and most people like them alot. Being oil resistant and better at protecting your hands than the surgical gloves are what attracts me to them. I have never bought a pair, however, and was wondering if any of you out there have used or use them. Let me know.

Another Reader Pic!!! Thanks Cerberus

2010-05-19T13:35:00.000-07:00

The View from the top!

To Drill Or Not To Drill

2010-05-17T20:19:00.000-07:00

I like my drill I use at work. I have a Hitachi cordless drill and it has worked for me very well. I am an advocate for using cordless drills, they speed up panel removal, etc. I do, however, get into these moods where I do not want to use my drill to remove panels. Occasionally I like to remove screws by hand, it helps me keep touch with the tactile, hands on nature of our profession. I also notice that there are guys at my job who use the drill to remove and install all sorts of screws into all sorts of things. I have seen guys use a drill to remove and install the little screws that safety the nose wheel retainer ring on. Then they wonder why the thing gets stripped out! I have seen a guy use a drill to put 1/4 turn fasteners in! I mean they only require a 1/4 turn of the wrist for goodness sake!

I think the cordless drill is a blessing to our jobs but people should also be able to use a speed handle or ever a screw driver and I'm convinced that some guys do not know how! We all know that even if you have a panel that has 100 fasteners it is easier, and I think smarter, to loosen each one with a speed handle before trying a drill. We all know this and yet time and time again I see guys blasting away with their drill, cussing when they strip out a screw head, and loathing having to go back and try easy outing the screw.

I know that I am an old fashioned type of guy and that there are cool new easy-outs now that almost always work, but I still reach for the old speed handle. Of course I am also finishing up before most because I do not have to drill out screws because of stripped heads.

This thought was not really about speed handles but rather simply using hand tools now and then. Once a long time ago I was changing a forward position light on a 737-300. I had my speed handle going and my ratcheting screwdriver and I was happy as a clam. One of the other RON mechanics was driving by and asked if I wanted to use his drill motor. I told him no thanks and explained that I wanted to do it by hand. He drove off with a confused look on his face and returned later with a drill motor that he left on my belt loader (that should tell you how long ago it was). Apparently by the time he reached the shop he had convinced himself that I was kidding around!

Call me a glutton for punishment but there are times when using a screwdriver makes me feel like I have accomplished something.

Old Aircraft Spotlight- The Vickers VC-10

2010-05-13T19:23:00.000-07:00

This is a new section I will be adding to the blog. I really like old airliners, so I figured every once in a while I would introduce a new-old airliner.

The first one is going to be the Vickers VC-10. I chose this one only because one of the guys in the shop (BigPart) was looking at it on line.

I don't know much about the VC-10, but it is pretty cool looking. I know it was ordered by BOAC (British Overseas Airways Corporation) and entered service about 1960ish. The plane was very well received by passengers and was the first plane to be certified for "Hands off landing" (CATIIIc). There are several web pages dedicated to the VC-10 and one on the better ones is http://www.vc10.net/

Our Personal Integrity

2010-05-11T15:55:00.000-07:00

In these times of massive oil spills, planes being flown into buildings, wars that start for reasons unknown, the word integrity seems to have fallen clear out of the dictionary. Where did it go and will it be back?

Well, I can't answer that for anybody but me.

I have always maintained my integrity when it comes to my aircraft since my first logbook sign-off. I know there are people out there who have seen me run around acting like a chicken, wearing a HUD cover over my head, or confusing Flight Crews by telling them that I was born without a last name, but I have always kept it serious when it comes to aircraft maintenance.

Maybe its because I have an older brother that is an A&P (no Technician here, thank you), a father who was a WWII fighting Marine, a bit of OCD, I don't know. Maybe all of them put together. I just know when it comes down to it, down to the last screw, I find it necessary to complete the job, whatever it may be, to the best of my ability. If I don't think that's good enough, then I call in someone I trust to look it over and maybe even correct it. I'm not above having my work corrected. In fact, I invite it. My personal integrity is driven by my want of a job well done. When I can do my job safely and it allows the aircraft to leave safely is what I strive for. My integrity knows nothing of making an on-time flight, saving money, or getting back to the break room to catch the end of that great movie. It knows only safety and hard work to make it that way.

I know the A&P's reading this know what I'm talking about and I'm only preaching to the choir here. What I hope is that people either connected with our job or maybe even someone who wonders about us sees this and knows that we care.

We care a lot about personal integrity.

You Want It When???

2010-05-11T15:31:00.000-07:00

While I was at work the other day a call came from Maintenance Control. There was a plane headed our way with a #1 engine bleed air issue. We get calls like this all the time and so it was not all that uncommon to have them request that we check it out. The problem came about when they said we HAD to have it fixed in two hours to make a flight to Midway.

A quick check of the history on the #1 engine bleed air system revealed that it had a 45 day history of problems! In other words this bleed air system has been acting up for over a month now and they wanted it fixed in two hours. I thought it was pretty ballsy of them to say we had to get it done, and I let the lead know how I felt about it. Luckily that day we had a guy on shift who is really good with engines and engine systems. He was able to figure out what was wrong and kick the plane out in about an hour and a half. Anyone who has worked on engine bleed air faults knows that often times multiple high power runs are required to narrow down and fix a problem.

Part of the issue is that the 737-700 is using the same bleed air valves and regulators as the 737-300 series. These valves seem to work well on the -300 engines (CFM-56-3) and are pretty reliable. These same components are not very reliable on the -700 engines (CFM-56-7). Boeing has not figured out why this is so, or at least they are not saying publicly why this is so. Through the grapevine we have heard that the -700 engines put out a different harmonic vibration than the older engines and this small vib is playing havoc with the components. Whatever it is they are still working on a fix!

More troubling is the "you have to get it fixed" statement. There is no way that I have to fix anything in an allotted time period. Make sure that you as a mechanic do not fall into this trap. Pressure is part of the job as I have mentioned before, however, when a component has a bunch of history, going back a lot of days, with a lot of different mechanics and parts thrown at it, proceed with caution. Do not let Maint. Ctrl or any one tell you how quickly you should work. In my example it all worked out fine but it could have easily gone the other way with the plane grounded and not leaving until the next morning. Thank God we had Dark Cloud there to work it (yes that is what we call him).

Remember When Airplanes Were Made Out Of Metal?

2010-05-06T19:02:00.000-07:00

I always say "remember when airplanes were made out of metal?" More and more planes are composite these days and soon all the old metal birds will be put out to pasture. In the not too distant future coming across an old metal airliner will be like coming across an old Schwinn Bike, or metal Tonka Toy. Sad really they are beautiful airplanes, this Braniff 727 is gorgeous, sleek, fast, but guzzles gas!! The mechanics who worked on 727s really seemed to enjoy the work, personally I only ever worked 727s in Overhaul (HMV) at Delta and those were beat up old birds! The old metal airliners ruled the skies for what will turn out to be a short era in aviation: the era when fuel was cheap and profits were high. The Glory Days. Thanks Skywalker for the pic.

Good Book!

2010-05-04T08:51:00.000-07:00

I read this a long time ago and remember enjoying it!

DOWNTIME!! It's Part Of The Game *Guest Post Suggestion!

2010-05-04T07:34:00.000-07:00

It happens all the time. I know that at least once a week we mechanics will be sitting in the break room and a ramper or OPS agent will come in for any number of reasons. Inevitably they will say some thing like "you guys have it made" or "you guys don't work too hard". I can't really blame them, they have jobs that require them to constantly be in action. The more they do the more money the company makes in a sense. Since those other work groups are involved with the normal everyday type jobs at an airline they can not wrap their minds around the fact that Airline "Line" Maintenance operates in a totally different way.

We on the Line are paid hourly like everyone else at the airline, that however, is where the similarities end. Every time we leave the office to work a plane we spend money. The more we work, the more money we spend. I'm not talking spending little dollars either, we spend big bucks. At any given gate call we could spend up to and at times over $100,000. Everything we change on the plane is pricey. Of course the other work groups will never be able to understand the concept of staying in the office to save money but that is exactly what a maintenance department should do.

Any time people see us relaxing in the break room they should be excited that we are not out working on a plane and spending thousands of dollars. It's all part of the Airline game, and it's one of the reasons that working the Line is typically more desirable than working in a hangar. Hangar work is more like a regular type of job-the more you work the faster the plane can get back into service and make some money. Sure the same thing applies to a grounded plane out on the Line, but for everyday operations downtime for the Line is money saved for the company.

GOOD NEWS MY SPELL CHECKER IS FIXED!!

2010-04-29T18:08:00.001-07:00

One Of Those Days

2010-04-26T14:29:00.000-07:00

As an aircraft mechanic we all know that it is coming. The it can be several different things. For some guys the it is having to work with a certain mechanic or foreman. For others the it maybe a road trip, still others may have their it in the form of a check plane with an MEL on it. The list goes on and on. For me that it changes from time to time and situation to situation.

Also as a profesional aircraft mechanic I realize that the it is going to come and I like to think that I am mature enough to accept it when it happens. We all know guys who whine about the work that they get assigned and know how frustrating it is to deal with those guys. As a person who has moonlighted in the foreman slot I know all too well that dealing with those people is not a pleasant experience. That said we as profesional mechanics have to realize that guys have good days and bad days, and some of us are not good at leaving all that home stuff at home. I personally try not to complain about the hand that is dealt me (although I know that I have before) and I can understand that if a guy has to change an HMU one night he may complain if he comes in on OT and gets assigned another HMU.

Unlike other jobs where if things are not going well we often cannot simply put something down or aside and work on another thing. There is not going to be any closing of the spreadsheet or going down the hall to visit a co-worker. Our job is a results based job and like it or not a time based one as well. So my main it, the thing that drives me the most crazy is working on a plane all day and leaving it broke, having made very little headway. So here is what happened:

Day shift, about 10am I head out to a gate call for Leading Edge Slats not retracting upon landing. As I roll up on the plane, sure enough the slats are out. When I talk to the crew they are in a good mood (which always helps) they inform me that this is a repeat write-up from yesterday and sure enough the leading edge B system pressure hydraulic fuse was replaced for the same problem just the night before. I tell the OPS guy not to board and go check out this fuse. I'm looking around, as you guys know there are a few hyd fuses in the wheel well and I have no idea which does what. Up on the ceiling there is one fuse that is clean (this is an old work dog 300) so I figure thats the one. The lead calls MX Control and gets no help from them really so I checked the Auto-Slat box on her advice to make sure the problem was not in that system, no joy.

As I start up the jetway the Captain stops me to ask if the plane is good to go-"nope". As I get into the jetway the FO asks me if the plane is good to go-"nope". As I turn into the cockpit the Flight Attendants ask me if the plane is good to go-"nope". As I leave the cockpit the OPS Sup asks me if the plane is good to go and thats when I had had enough and asked them all if they thought I would keep the status of the plane a secret from them. I mean why not let me work and get back to them when I was ready? I know, I know-thats a subject for another post.

Turns out I had the right fuse so I back off the B nut drain the one side of the thing, back off the B nut on the other side and get a face full of Hyd fluid. Luckily just moments before the Lead asked me why I was not wearing safety glasses so I threw them on. The glasses deflected the majority of the fluid but could not stop the stuff dripping off my forehead and right into my eye. I got a good bit in mouth as well and as it turned out that was only the first time of many that day in which the taste of hyd fluid would be in my mouth.

Once the fuse was reattached the slats worked fine except (you knew that was coming) one end of the fuse now had a leak. I tried to tighten the B nut but it did not help, I took it off again and cleaned the B nut out but that did not help so we ordered a new fuse. Well as it is a fuse does not typically shut unless there is a leak so I put everything back together, hung my bucket on the dripping line and we ran the Flaps/Slats a bunch of times to find the leak. Not too long into this I found #2 Slat actuator leaking. Cool, I'm thinking, at least now I'm getting some where. The Lead checks it out and of course we have neither the Actuator or the Fuse! Since the actuator had to come out I started to take off all the panels and such to gain access. Anyone who has done this before knows that there are about two hundred screws, four or five access panels a bunch of bolts and a few nuts to deal with. After that it was wit til 4pm for the parts.

Fast forward to 4pm I grabbed the fuse and installed it first. I figured it was the quickest. Another couple of drops of hyd fluid in the mouth/hair/eyes and it was time for a leak check. Guess what? That SOB was still leaking! I took off the line that the fuse connected to and the flair was cracked! Now I need a line! I can't use a temp line because this line snakes in between the Aileron mixer, two cables, and two rods. When I called AOG they told me that the line was NIS (Not In Stock) system wide and that they would have to call Boeing! Well now it's about 5 or 5:30. It's Saturday we only had four guys on shift and Terminators were in range so I had to stop and help with that. Actually I was not even supposed to be working that plane since we only had four guys covering the line but the guys were cool and let me break off here and there to work it.

When I left the plane to a guy working RON I had accomplished zero. As a matter of fact we were worse off than when we started since we needed a line that nobody had! Before I gave up completely I did put the old line back in, and hung my bucket from it again so the RON guy could change and leak check the #2 actuator. Kind of sucks but hey he was on OT.....

Week End Crews

2010-04-23T15:53:00.000-07:00

So we have had this on going joke about weekend pilots. I have worked here for a while now and it always seems that when I am working the weekend the calls we get from the crews are, how should I say it, INFANTILE. I'm not sure if it is just the imaginaion of the mechanics but when we get calls about things like nose shimmy or flap lever hard to pull up, they are almost always on the weekend.

I am positive that the junior crews are working on the weekend and holidays. My wife will tell me that it's just my imagination but I'm not so sure. All the "icing" issues that I have run into involve junior crews and they all were on weekends.

There is no question that the current group of pilots won't put up with as much stuff as the older guys. The older guys seemed to know the plane a lot more and although we would never think of it now a days the older crews used to carry an issuse or two in order to get the planes out on time.

Maybe the fact is that I'm getting older and as I do I notice that some of the complaints we get in maint. sre just that-complaints. If that is the case it's not going to get better any time soon. We are often just having to hold the pilots hands and let them know that it will all be ok. "Yeah Capt'n, I checked it out and it seems like that _______ is OK". How many times have you heard yourself saying that?

A good part of our job is in reassurance for the flight crews but now a days it seems like the crews are afraid to fly or is it that they are trying to throw their perceived Captain seniority around. I hate to break it to them but your 50,000 employee number amounts to nothing much.

Keep em flying-Push that tin!

Take That Extra Step (It's Harder To Do Than It Sounds)

2010-04-18T15:10:00.000-07:00

Well I'm back from vacation. Back to work time. Time to push tin, it's what we do.

I had the opportunity to go on a road trip to Boise to fix a 300 with one of the other Oakland mechs, let's call him TwoTurns. So we get to Boise and it's raining and cold. The ONLY plane there besides the one we flew in was an old work horse of a -300. Before we left Oakland we got the low down on the issue with the plane. The number two engine "START VALVE OPEN" light came on after engine start and remained on. So with us we brought: Rain gear, rain boots, tools, a start valve, an N2 indicator, starter, a korry light, a bunch of other stuff that was already in the downline box. I also brought my MagLite, and an extra bag of open end wrenches where I keep my trusty Ford Wrench.

We let OPS know we were there and went over to the plane. Once up in the flight deck we turned the plane on and what do ya know? The number two "START VALVE OPEN" light is on. TwoTurns checks the log book and we hit our first snag of the trip. Not only is the start valve written up but on the next log page the crew wrote up "Over weight langing at 155k". Great! we had no idea that the plane actually took off and landed again, heavy. We called Oakland and got the Foreman to look up the Over Weight Inspection for us so that we could concentrate on the start valve issue.

I suggested to TwoTurns that we start up the APU, put the bleed air on and see if the engine starts to spin. I figured that if the valve was really open, once the bleed air was turned on the engine would spin up. The APU comes up we turn on the bleed and nothing happens, but the "START VALVE OPEN" light remains on. We motor the engine to see if the light would go out but that did nothing. TwoTurns goes down and manually opens the valve but that did not help either. When he took the canon plug off the valve the "START VALVE OPEN" light went out! TwoTurns put the canon plug back on and the light remained extinguished. Cool, looks like the valve was messed up or at least we knew we could change the valve and that would most likely fix the problem.

I went downstairs to the engine and told TwoTurns that I was going to get the valve and my tools so that we could get this pig back in the air and making money. When I got back TwoTurns says one of the things that no mechanic wants to hear-"we have bigger problems than the valve". Second snag of the trip! While aiting for me TwoTurns took the extra step to look at the wire bundle which fed the canon plug for the start valve and he found that the N2 Alternator wires had chaffed against the start valve wires causing the indication in the cockpit. There were seven wires in the bundle and five of them would have to be repaired. The question came up about splicing wires under the fan cowl and what type of splice to use if we could do it. A quick call to MX Control confirmed that the wires could be spliced with environmental splices but then a Planning Item would have to placed on the engine to have the engine wiring harness replaced within 500 flight hours.

The third snag.TwoTurns searched his line bag, I searched my line bag, we both searched the downline box that goes on all road trips-no environmental splices anywhere. We figured that someone on the field must have them so we asked OPS and they had the number to Horizon Air MX. After describing what I needed they said they would drive it over for us. After a short wait the Horizon Air guys brought us the correct splices and sleeves and told us to keep the extras! (thats how we roll in the Line Maint. world, one company generally is willing to help the other!) With the wires spliced we ran the engine to make sure all was good, did the paper work and closed her up. Of coure being SWA they were boarding the plane while this was going on but hey it worked so I figured that if the pax wanted to wait while I was sure that my paper work was correct than they would just have to wait.

The main thing is that if TwoTurns had not taken the extra step of checking those wires, we would have changed the valve, which may have had the false effect of working for us while potentially failing on the next revenue flight! Taking that extra step is not the haredest thing to do and I think that most mechanics know that it should be done. The problem is that outside pressure (OPS, Mx Control, Foremen) often creates the byproduct of skipping that extra step. Once we find something that we believe has fixed our problem, we go with it and often times omit that extra step. As with any real skill, troubleshooting takes time to develope into an artform. If we practise taking that extra step, looking over our paperwork, ignoring those outside pressures (OPS, Mx Control, Foremen, etc) we become better mechanics and that should be the main goal in our professional lives.

Reader Submitted pics!!

2010-04-16T19:12:00.000-07:00

The glory days!!

Thanks Skywalker for the pics!

2010-04-16T18:09:00.001-07:00

Hey guys. I've written a new blog but I'm having technical difficulties with the upload. Stand by. Thx Goat

What's It Gonna Take?

2010-04-09T18:29:00.000-07:00

I may be opening up a can of worms here but my wife and I were talking about this today and I was wondering what all you guys thought of this. We had a conversation about what it is going to take to fix the airline industry. We all know that the airlines are not really a great places to work and some of us remember when the airlines were a great place to work. I started my airline career with a carrier that had an 80 year track record of never laying people off and still got the axe. I think that I started my airline career right at the time when the pluses of working for airlines started to decline. I love my job and really can't see doing anything else but working for one of these once great companies is not what it used to be.

I know that the price of oil has decemated the slim profit margins that the airlines rely on. I also know that next to oil, personel is the next highest cost. The first thing that an airline in trouble seeks out now a days is concessions from the work groups. The problem is that over the years the airline employees have given back so much that, come contract time, the company can tout a smalll pay increase even though in reallity you are just getting back what you gave up and most times just a percent of what you gave up.

The cost of living has out paced all airline jobs. Making 60-70k a year sounds great but just is not what it used to be 10-15 years ago. When I see people like Geologists with 1-2 years experience and a BS degree making 107,000 bucks a year and I have to struggle to make ends meet while working to keep a 110 million dollar plane up in the sky, it seems un fair to me. My wife is a furloughed pilot and the pilot group is fairing no better. I know they make more money than we do but not the kind of money they made 15 years ago while of course working more hours.

The only thing that I can think of to fix the situation is to increase fairs. The fair structure at the airlines has been the same for the last 20 years. It pretty much costs the same to fly from Oakland to Denver today as it did in 1990, it may even be cheaper! I think that if the cost of a Big-Mac can go up in 20 years than the price of an airline ticket should go up also. That's not to say we should double or triple our fairs but a modest increase of $5-10 is not too much to ask for.

The big rumor in the pilot world is that airlines are looking into hiring pilots from overseas to fly domestic routes because they can get them cheaper. I do not think it's too much of a leap to see airline shutting down and outsourcing their maintenance departments as a whole. Remember what Alaska Airline did to the hangar in Oakland or how Northwest Airlines treated their mechanics a few years ago? If something does not change we are in a slow death spiral of and industry and there is no way out.

Is That Reading Light Out? Great What Else Is Wrong?

2010-03-30T20:33:00.000-07:00

So I am going on vacation. I have all the Vacation days in at work and have told my trade partner what is going on so he can adjust his days if need be. I am packed, the travel arrangements are made, rental car, hotel, etc. Everyone has wished me a happy, relaxing vacation which I plan on having. There is only one part of the vacation that I know I will have trouble relaxing on: the flight.

I don't know if it's me or if other mechanics have trouble flying. I'm not afraid to fly or have any concerns about the plane breaking down or turbulence or anything like that. The thing that gets me about flying is that I find myself looking for broken items in the cabin or out the window on the wings, etc. It's crazy I know but I can't help myself. When I see some lady try to use a reading light and the damn thing doesn't work it ticks me off. Back in the day when we could carry a Leatherman on board I could help out and fix a few things when we landed. Now that TSA has classified everyone as "guilty until proven innocent" I can't even fix the little stupid things I find that bother me. Now I have to sit and stew about the broken tray table latch or galley drawer that is broken.

I will once again try to sleep or read instead of letting my mind wander about the interior of the plane but I'm sure I will have little success. Even when I fly in the cockpit I can't help but look around and there have been times that I've found things that are not right but that the crew didn't notice. In any event I will let you guys know if I notice anything.

Veteran Tool Spotlight: Safety Wire Pliers

2010-03-25T20:23:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since I did a tool spotlight so I think I am going to discuss safety wire pliers. Like most mechanics I have a couple of pairs of safety wire pliers and have "gone through" a couple more. When I first started out in the industry I had a large pair of Mac safety wire pliers that were "liberated" from me by someone who thought he could take better care of them. I pretty much used those pliers for the first three years that I worked on airplanes.

A good pair of safety wire pliers is pretty much an essential to a good mechanic. Like the Ford Wrench I wrote about in an earlier post the safety wire plier can be a multi-use tool. Of course there is the obvious use for twisting wire, but I have known guys who use their safety wire pliers for cutting wire, zip ties, etc. pretty much replacing their diagonal cutters (dykes) with their safety wire pliers. By the way before I get too far along there are two sizes of safety wire pliers typically found: a 6" and a 9-12". The larger version is what guys in the hangar use. If you are reading this blog and just getting into aircraft maintenance than I suggest buying both. I personally only used a large pair until I got laid off and then started working line maintenance. In the line maintenance world just about everybody uses the smaller 6" version. Working the line you are safetying items that use .032 or smaller wire and not much .040 wire so we can get away with the smaller plier.

The larger pair of safety wire pliers I own were given to me by and old guy at Hayward Airport. They are Milbar Wire Twisters and are all silver (kind of unique). They are also unique in that the bar that you pull out to create the twisting action ratchets back into the plier instead of wisting back in. The smaller pair that I used for years is a no-name plier I bought new off of a truck. They worked very good for a long time and I only retired them because I got a better replacement. The safety wire pliers I carry in my line bag now are Bluepoint reversable safety wire pliers. The Bluepoints are very good and I like the fact that they can be reversed although I have to admit I rarley use that feature. The other thing I like about the Bluepoints is that the head of the plier is very small compared to an el-cheapo brand.

There is a funny thing that happens to line mechanics when they get used to using their own safety wire pliers. It is very awkward to use someone elses. When a buddy hands you his pliers to safety something they just do not feel right. I have also noticed that guys will use those pliers long past their useful life. I've seem some pretty messed up safety wire pliers being used after the lock or return spring thing is busted up. That just goes to show you how attached mechanics become to their tools (or are we a cheap bunch?) and how important useing a tool that one is familar with is to mechanics.

As in most Tool Spotlight posts I have to admit that I have used my safety wire pliers as a hammer before, but is that really that unusual? For all you guys with busted up safety wire pliers I even included a link to Amazon.com so you can pick up a new set!

Slow It Down-Be Cool-What's The Rush?

2010-03-24T14:46:00.000-07:00

I know I am guilty of it. As a matter of fact we at SWA are all guilty of it. We Rush. We pride ourselves in getting the planes turned in 30 minutes or less and it is a way we differentiate our company from others. Typically we mechs have about 20 minutes to troubleshoot and fix our problems. We hurry to finish the planes at night time to get our precious "down time". We want to remote the planes as quickly as possible to get back to the shop for the next one or for clean up time. Of course there is a danger lurking in the rushing around. Things can be forgotten, planes damaged, and people injured.

Last week at work we had a grounded plane. The mechanic working the issue ended up having to remote the aircraft to our remote parking spot in order to clear the gate. The ramper driving the tug was going too fast, could not stop the plane with the tug and nearly ended up in the grass with the plane on top of him. Luckily for that guy the mechanic had his wits about him and was able to apply the aircraft brakes in a way as not to throw the ramper off the tug. The ramper is a guy I know and is one of the better ramp guys we have but he got in a hurry and nearly got hurt for no reason.

I have damaged airplanes by rushing and there is nothing worse than the feeling afterwards that just a few seconds longer and it could all have been avoided. The culture at SWA is such that we are encouraged to get our jobs done quickly but we as mechanics have to know that that does not mean to rush our work or even our paperwork. SWA never intended that the company culture affect the quality of our work. I am sure you have all had OPS agents swirling around you because it is close to push time or captains breathing down your neck because they will miss their commuter flight if the don't push right away. These things are important, and to OPS, the Ramp, and Flight Crews the push time of the airplanes are very important. The SWA culture of hurry, hurry applies to them in one degree or another for different reasons. My point is that this particular part of the SWA culture should have very little effect on we as mechs.

If at all possible I get the work done in a way as not to delay a flight but I will not rush my work to ensure a flight is not delayed. This is not to be confused with working quickly. There are mechs who work quickly but they do the same 10 steps to trouble shoot and fix an ILS (for example) as the next guy they can just get the job done faster.

The picture at the top of this post is an MD-80 nose landing gear that was ripped off by the tug that was trying to remote the plane to the gate. These guys were rushing, they got a tug that was HUGE! I mean that tug could have probably pulled the terminal over to the plane if they tried it. Then they got ahead of themselves and forgot to release the brakes on the plane. The guy on the tug gunned it and off came the nose gear!

When I first hired on at SWA we had what we called "QUICK TURNS". These quick turns were done in 15 minutes! That's pax off, bags off, pax on, bags on, fuel, and push in 15 minutes. Of course if there were and maint. issues you could pretty much kiss that 15 minutes good-bye but it was still an impressive thing to watch. We all got patches saying we were part of the "Quick Turn Team" it was pretty cool. With paperwork the way it is now and the planes getting more and more complex I do not think we will ever see the return of 15 minute turns but I'm glad I was around to see them.

Remember it's the little things that will get you in trouble and the little things are what get forgotten during a rush. The FAA is checking our paperwork with a fine tooth comb so cross all your T's and dot all your i's. Oh and don't be afraid to tell OPS or the flight crew that you will be done when you are done. There is not one person in the company who will fault you for wanting to fix the plane correctly.

It's All About The Little Things

2010-03-17T16:55:00.000-07:00

When most people think about aircraft maintenance they think of a guy or gal changing a tire or working on an engine. Indeed I will bet that when all you mechanics out there explain your job to others you tell them about tires, engines, checks, etc. The envision you standing there with grease on your hands and clothing, big wrench in hand working on "The Big Part". Of course a good deal of our job does in fact fit that description.

Last night I was changing a brake on a 737-300. For all of you in the know it is time consuming with something like 10 bolts and nuts holding the stupid thing on. I think we can all agree that a break is a "Big Part". The thing about changing brakes and tires is that I am convinced that most pilots do not even notice that there are new tires and brakes on the plane when they do their walk around. They do, however, notice that the windscreen is dirty or that their map light is inop. This is simply a truth of human nature, we usually only notice the things that directly affect us. It is up to us mechanics to save the pilots from this way of thinking. Our job is to continue to change the big and small parts, even the parts that no one will ever notice in order to keep the plane in an airworthy condition.

That covers one aspect of the importance of all the little things. The next thing is the "Pet Peeve". The pet peeve is the one thing that a mechanic checks on every airplane. Each mech has his own thing that he checks, for me it's the floor mounted CB light in the flight deck and the screws that always come loose on the Classic Series Flap Track Canoe Fairings. Now, I always checked these things and never really thought about it until one night when I was working with Just Jim and noticed that he was cleaning the inside of the landing light lens for the fixed/turnoff lights. When I asked him about it he told me that every mechanic here has that one thing that he does to every plane that they work on. The one thing may seem small but when taken as a group of 1200 mechanics those one things add up. That he explained to me is the reason why our planes are in such good shape everyone does their one thing and in the end the plane is fully covered.

I believe that most guys here in our station do that same thing. As a matter of fact for all those who keep asking me why I continuously write up bad floor mounted CB lights I say go find your own pet peeve and leave me alone. We all know guys who change seat back pocket springs or clean and re-stripe the landing gear down lock indicators so my CB light is not too big of a deal.

Also in closing; a while back I worked a whole lot of midnight shift OT with one of the more senior guys here, lets call him Maybe-Maybe. Maybe-Maybe and I would always try to work together because we had similar working styles and got jobs done fairly quickly. Well Maybe-Maybe had a theory he called "keep 'um happy". What this meant was after all the tire and engine crap was done we would go upstairs and do the windscreens, clean the cockpit, do the reading lights and any little stupid cabin items that the crew would be sure to notice. His theory being that if all those little things were done we would get no gate calls in the morning (remember when you used to have to go to gate calls on the planes you actually worked on?). The funny thing is that it worked, we hardly got any gate calls on our planes. There is a lesson in there somewhere...

S-W-A-G

2010-03-09T19:40:00.000-08:00

So I was watching TV the other day. There was a show on about snipers. The show detailed all the things that a sniper must go through to figure out how he was going to make his shot. There are mathematical formulas that they go through, they use tools such as scopes and wind finders, laser rangers, etc. A lot of things have to be done, quickly, for a sniper to be successful. The thing that struck me however, was one sniper who said that after all the formulas and tools are used it can come down to something they call SWAG (Scientific Wild A$$ Guess). That got me thinking.

We who work line maintenance rely on BITE tests, tools, and the maintenance manuals to tell us what is wrong with aircraft. On days and swings these things have to be done quickly to avoid delays. The thing about it is that it often does come down to SWAG. We use our tools and computers to point us in the right direction, to eliminate the majority of suspects, but it often is SWAG or and educated guess that fixes most problems.

People often discount the human factor in our job. The maintenance manual can point you in the right direction but a good mechanic can meld all his previous experiences to arrive at the proper fix. The Scientific part of SWAG is really the part that you add your two cents into the situation to arrive at a proper fix. I can't tell you how many times pilots have asked me "How did you know to look there?" The answer is SWAG. I know that this thing works this way or that so I can eliminate systems to come up with the fix.

I notice that guys that worked for Non-Scheds have a lot of common sense. They are also very good at SWAG. Ask those guys how they knew to change a particular part and they will most likely not be able to tell you how they did it. Those guys had to work "out side of the box" when they worked at Non-Scheds. Often times they are on their own and away from support of any kind. The planes they worked on were grounded until they came up with a fix. SWAG is a huge tool in the old line mechanics tool bag and should not be under-estimated!!

"Maintenance Copy!!"

2010-03-02T11:34:00.000-08:00

"Maintenance, copy!" That is the dreaded call that starts almost every gate we have on Day and Swing shift. This particular cal happened on Day shift last weekend. "Maintenance, copy! The plane pulling into Gate 25 would like to talk to you about a Bleed Trip." Damn, did she say "Bleed Trip"? "Is it my turn to go?"

"Hey Goat, can you go to Gate 25, Bleed Trip".

Is it me or do these bleed problems seem to follow me around? Well it had been raining so the prospects for an MEL are not very high.

When I got to the gate I went up to the cockpit and the Captain was already standing up. He says, as he passes me, "The Bleed Tripped on descent and again when we were taxiing to the gate. Oh and also (this is where they always get you) the number one TR is also inop."

So I figure I will pop the cowls, look at the TR paddles, try resetting the EAU, and call MX Control on the bleed trip. Tuna came out to give me a hand and we tried but could not get the TR to work right. Tuna went up to call MX Control and I started to lock out the TR. While I was doing that a miracle happened! Tuna calls down that MX Control says we can MEL BOTH PROBLEMS. They got Dispatch on the line and got the green light to MEL the bleed air since they were going to Las Vegas next and they planned on taking it out of service there. Feeling better than ever I opened up the C Duct to lock the PRSOV closed while Tuna started with the MEL paperwork. Everything was locked out and all SPs complied with etc. I went upstairs to help Tuna and here comes the Captain back down the jetway.

As a side note, we had the ramp hold off on loading bags until we knew what was going on with the flight. Since I found out we were going to MEL and fly the plane to Vegas I told the Ramp Sup to load her up. Tuna gave the ok to OPS to board the passengers while he was busy MELing both problems.

Well by the time I got upstairs the pax were loaded and the ramp was busy loading the bags. I wired the TR handle and flipped the CAT placard. When I was in the jetway with Tuna and saw the Captain strolling down the jetway with his Andela Burritto bag in his hand I was feeling real good. As he was passing he asked what we had come up with and we told him that Dispatch gave us the green light to MEL both problems. The look on his face said it all-he was not happy. He disappeared around the corner into the plane and Tuna continued with the paperwork.

A few minutes later the Captain comes out to us and tells us that Dispatch had switched planes and that this one was staying here! Obviously he had made a call and decided that he did not want to take the plane to Vegas with an inop bleed and TR, cried enough about it to them to make them change the plan on us.

This type of thing happens more often than you would think. Several times flight crews have called Dispatch or Chief Pilots to complain about a plane that was perfectly legal to fly. I fail to understand how or why these crew get almighty Dispatch to cow down and change maintenance plans. It's not that we are trying to get out of work or be lazy, Tuna and I did end up fixing the plane, BOTH issues. The problem is that these whining crews think that they are the most important part of the SWA equation. I once had a guy refuse to take a flight until "someone cleans my windows"!

I wonder what would happen if I came to work a graveyard shift and saw that I was working an HMU with a couple of other problems and turned around and said "I refuse to take this jet". Can I call Tator Tot (our manager) and get another plane to work on. WAIT that has already happened hasn't it! The problem with that thinking is that even if you do argue your way out of something you do not want to do, or give up and simply go home, someone else is going to have to do the job. It seems to be the "Why Me?" company now-a-days. "Why do I have to?" "Why does Goat get an MV-1 and I have an MV-3?""Why,why,why...........?"

Why don't we all just do the job presented to us? Why don't we see that there is a bigger picture at stake?" Why ask why?-Very little will change any time soon.

It Was A Bad Day - a guest post by Franco A

2010-02-24T19:28:00.000-08:00

It was bad, very bad.

We found ourselves in San Diego on a rainy night in a post 9/11 world at a pre-9/11 airport.

We had to deal with Army guards with weapons just to get our visitor badges. The Ops agent who was escorting us had to talk about surfing on his cell phone instead of watching us like he was supposed to. We had the minimal amount of parts to fix the maximum amount of airplane. Add to that we were both on our 5th shifts (obviously this was a long time ago-Goat) and it should be enough to write a horror novel, but this was the good part.

We managed to fix the airplane without being shot by the Army and in reward, the Ops surfer dude called his boss and told him that we refused to spend the night in their Ops office and that we insisted that they get us some hotel rooms. They got us some rooms all right. Rooms at Motel Hell!

The Ops Surfer Dude gave us a Taxi Voucher and the address to the hotel to the taxi driver. We drove, and it started to rain, and we drove, and it rained very hard, and we drove some more. After about 25 minutes I began to think we were either being given a room out of state or we had been kidnapped and we were going to be shipped to Somalia to be pirates.

Well, we got there and the cab driver dumped us off in the rain in the front of a place that was straight out of a Quentin Tarantino movie. There was even a strip club across the street and a tow yard next door. We had to walk a block in the rain just to find a 7-11, No decent restaurant could possibly be in this part of town.

The rooms they provided us had a fantastic view of the tow trucks next door and mine had the crisp freshness of nicotine in the air! The company did us right this trip. Right as in right up the %@&%*@! I thought that I could blow the smell away by turning on the air conditioner mounted in the window, but when I turned it on it spat particles of who knows what into my face and the air from it smelled like it smoked 4 packs a day too.

I went to the bathroom to wash off the nicotine that coated my face. I was scared to use the soap as I didn't know if someone had done "The Toothbrush" trick on it and it was dirtier than I could imagine. I dared the "it" and washed 4 pounds of nicotine off of myself and dried my face with the towel provided by the friendly people of Housekeeping.

Imagine that! It smelled like nicotine too!

I thought I had walked in to a hotel room, but I was actually in a box of Camel non-filtered cigarettes with plumbing! Wow! I thought this was only something that could happen in a John Candy/Steve Martin film. I knew one thing right then and there; DO NOT go barefoot in this room.

Well, we left the hotel the next morning to catch out flight back to OAK and as we were passing through Ops I really wanted to show my appreciation to Ops Surfer Dude and his boss by giving them a big kick in the a$$ for the great room and lung cancer that I probably acquired from sleeping there that night.

We were boarded and pushing back from the gate when it suddenly struck me that we never got our Rubio's Fish Tacos from the terminal restaurant. It was a mechanic's mission whenever he went to SAN to hit up Rubio's. All that I endured on this trip and now I would have to admit defeat to my fellow mechanics when I returned to the OAK-Town that Rubio's had not been visited.

Franco A.

On The Road Again

2010-02-16T14:54:00.001-08:00

The Other day I had the opportunity to go on a road trip up to Sacramento to work on a broken plane. Me and the mechanic I went with got all the stuff together: parts for an engine bleed problem, tools, flashlights and batteries, and a full tank of gas for the Chevy pickup we use for our road trips. We got some cash for the toll on the bridge we have to cross and hurried to hit the road. Everything was going well for about 2 miles. Once we got on the highway we were in bumper to bumper traffic.

It takes about 2 hours to drive from Oakland to Sacramento on a normal day, however, we took about 3 hours and a few minutes to get there. There are mechanics in Sacramento but usually only one mechanic is there at a time and as such they require assistance when airplanes get grounded there. Sure one guy can handle the normal gate calls of the day and maybe an occasional tire change, maybe even a hydraulic pump change, but items like engine work or window changes require more than one mechanic.

Once we arrived we called the on shift mechanic and he escorted us to their shop. Coming from Oakland with all our space I was taken aback by the size of the maintenance office in Sacramento. I had been to Sacramento to work planes before but not since the company stationed four mechanics there. They have a small office but it has all the necessary equipment: refrigerator, computer, desk, phone, small TV, lockers, and a place to sit down. I would say it is about perfect for one guy at a time as is the norm there. The mechanic on duty was an old Oakland co-worker so we sat down and caught up on things, he explained the engine problem to us and we headed out to check out the plane. Before we could get to the door a call came over and he had to go check something out on another plane. We waited for him to come back and then got to the grounded airplane. While we were working on the plane something like four or five more calls came in that the on duty mechanic had to check out.

We tinkered and checked some stuff and eventually decided that one of the bleed air lines must be leaking. When we finally got around to removing the suspect line we closed up the cowls and got ready to take her out and high power run her. Well, gone are the days of simply hopping in the plane and taxiing to the run up hole to see if we had once more done our magic. First we had to go to the shop and fill out our taxi paperwork, printout the airport maps, fax the paperwork to maintenance control and do the hoky-poky. Of course this whole ordeal which should take about 20 minutes tops is made even longer by the incoming gate calls which our host had to attend to. It was crazy, it seemed like every time we were ready to go, another call would come over. This had to take almost an hour and to be fair it was right around terminating time and the crews wanted to discuss their issues with a mechanic.

We get to the plane and call the ramp over to pull the chocks and belt loader away so that we could taxi out. Amazing the rampers there are very polite and willing to work, a huge contrast to our rampers in Oakland. Our host was taxiing and I was on the radio. We went to the run-up hole and set our N1 tachs, ran her up to take off on the suspected engine and about 77-80% on the other. We did our checks, checked our checks, and rechecked that the checks we checked were checked (you mechanics out there know what I mean). Everything was fine. We taxi back to the remote spot and button her up, head back to the maintenance office.

As we are enjoying a refreshing drink the radio and phone start up again requiring the on duty mechanic to head out and get things handled. I tell you it was exhausting to watch him go out over and over again. We decided to bail while we had the chance or risk being sucked into the gravitational pull of the needy pilots in Sacramento that particular day. Small stations are cool but it seemed to me, at least that day, they keep you humping. Maybe it was a junior pilot day, but that's a subject for another time.

The Olympics Are Here

2010-02-10T14:00:00.000-08:00

Well the Olympics are something like a week away and the whole world is gearing up for the various events. The hoopla and excitement is building as the attention of the world is focused on Canada. You may think that this has little to do with aircraft maintenance but we too have an Olympic history (at least we do at Southwest Airlines).

Years ago we had what we called the Maintenance Olympics. The Maintenance Olympics were held in Dallas (I believe). Each maintenance station could send a team of four or five mechanics, one stock clerk, and one inspector. There were different events: Tire change, Coalesor bag replacement, passenger seat cover change, and maybe one I am forgetting. The winning team would have the best time in each event. For example the tire change would start with a stock clerk bringing a tire to the mechanics, the mechanics jacking and changing the tire, the inspector making sure that all is legal and no short cuts are taken. All the events are timed and all the work has to be complete.

Now, people from other airlines may not understand all this, and I will admit the culture at SWA is different than most companies. The Maintenance Olympics may seem like a complete waste of time and money to outsiders. I will also admit that SWA has cancelled the Maintenance Olympics indefinitely for exactly those reasons. What is amazing is how the competition helped with team cohesion. After the team was selected others were encouraged to go and root their fellow mechanics on to victory. The Maintenance Olympics encouraged a healthy competitive spirit among the maintenance stations and was a boost in team work within the different maintenance stations.

When the economy comes back around I hope that the Maintenance Olympics can be re-instated. The opportunities for team work building within a company a few and far between. Sure we mechanics work well as a team within our separate stations but this event helped build COMPANY WIDE teamwork and teamwork is the only thing that's going to bring us through this crappy economy.

To Troubleshoot Or Load The Shotgun!!

2010-02-04T18:54:00.000-08:00

There are times when working Line Maintenance that problems with airplanes are real apparent. These tomes do not require much troubleshooting. Actually a great deal of what we do as Line Mechanics is troubleshoot. We at SWA run things differently than most places in that we utilize most of our airplanes and have very few spares. In fact not too long ago we had no spare aircraft which required us as mechanics to fix grounded planes quickly. Unlike the picture above the majority of issues that airplanes have need to be rooted out via troubleshooting. As such a good troubleshooter is usually a good mechanic and vise-versa.

Now all that said there are also times when you "Load the shells into the shotgun". When we say this we mean that we take all the parts that could be causing a problem with us out to the plane and start changing them until the problem is fixed. A good example of this for us are Engine Bleed Air issues. We at SWA have a test box that is supposed too tell us which valve or regulator is at fault. The problem is that our test box is not very reliable and often leads us astray. I know that the "Shotgun Method" is a more costly method but for issues like Bleed Air it is the method I prefer. When the boss and OPS are breathing down your throat for a time that the plane will be fixed you simply do not have time to fiddle around with a busted test box.

Last night I worked another problem that called for just changing the part and seeing what happened. This time it was for a totally different reason. My plane had a Fuel Boost Pump inop and on MEL. This particular boost pump was a center pump and on the 737-700 series aircraft to correctly change and ops check the center boost pump you have to put at least 10 thousand pounds of fuel into the center tank. In a situation like this I figured I could fill up the tank, troubleshoot, and try to fix, or I could change the pump and low pressure switch and then fill the tank and do the ops check. Since the pump and switch are really the only things in the system excepting a wire problem its safe to change them as they are most likely to break. Saves time, saves me energy. By the way it fixed the problem.

As most Line Mechanics I see the value of good troubleshooting. We spend a lot of energy with BITE books and in the Maintenance Manual to fine tune and hone these skills but there are times when you have to go old school and pull out the shells for the shotgun.

"That Guy"

2010-02-02T16:01:00.000-08:00

This post is mainly for those of you who are thinking of getting into this profession. I'm going to call them "That Guy" posts. This particular post is going to be about that guy you should try to avoid being.

At every stop in my maintenance career there has been "That Guy". That guy who feels the need to stand over you while you work and tell you how what you are doing is wrong. That guy who always has a better or quicker way to do the job and can't figure out why you won't do it his way.

The thing about "That Guy" is that he usually only comes around after you have begun or after you have finished the job at hand. "That Guy" usually is spouting his knowledge when a roomful of people can hear it to attest to his greatness. "That Guy" is often the last to help and the first to have problems doing even the simplest tasks. In fact "That Guy" is a legend in his own mind.

"That Guy" is in reality a guy who when you think about all his stories you figure out that you have never seen him do any of this stuff. "That Guy" a needs constant spotlight shone on him when in fact he does nothing noteworthy.

My own "That Guy" experience happened when I first started at SWA. I got hired in with another guy who had a lot of Line Maintenance experience, worked on several types of planes, at several different companies, doing things that sounded amazing to me. "That Guy" even knew two thirds of the mechanics at Oakland from previous employment. Me, on the other hand, having come out of hangar work and knowing nobody put "That Guy" on somewhat of a pedestal in my estimation. As it turned out "That Guy" is a big wind bag who does more talking and complaining than work. The thing is it took me about three years to realize this and by the time I did we at SWA had hired and in most cases fired a bunch of other "That Guys".

So when you start your career don't be "That Guy" who is boastful, pushy, and a know it all. Believe me things go a lot easier for you if you are open to advice, modest, and ask a lot of questions.

Forlorn Warrior

2010-02-01T03:30:00.001-08:00

Picture copyright Radek Oneksiak Courtesy of Airliners.net

The Way Of The Whine

2010-01-28T06:12:00.000-08:00

I know that I have already blogged about this before. I hate that our industry has come to this. I feel like an old man when I bring it up. Maybe it has always been like this and I was too green to have noticed it back in the day. I'm talking about whining. In the last five or so years it seems to me that the whining in our maintenance shop has gotten out of control. Some of the guys who work there do not seem to do any thing but whine. I can recall one night when everything seemed to be going well, one of the chief whiners walked by me, on the heels of his co-whiner, no mention of how good the night was, no mention of how clean their aircraft was, no mention of how well they were getting paid. This guy was actually complaining about how the paperwork package was different from the last time he did whatever job it was he did. I have heard the same set of guys complain about everything from shift start time to actually having to work or terminate the plane they are supposed to work on to how the work is assigned to how the roller chairs in the break room suck. I have even heard complaining during down time.

I'm not saying that some of the complaints are not legit. I'm not saying that there are not things that need to be fixed (even at SWA). What happens as far as I am concerned is that because I hear all complaining all the time from some of these guys, when they have a legit complaint, I lump it in with all the rest of the whining and chalk it up as a problem with the mechanic.

Having been around for a while I also understand that there is a far bit of whining that is coming from management on down to the work force. My main beef is the whining about delays. Sure I realize the importance of understanding what happened to cause a delay. To hammer a mechanic for taking a delay is kind of crazy in my book. I am paid to fix planes, to provide an airworthy plane for the flight crew as well as for the flying public. If I take a delay fixing a plane then I am okay with that. When you get back in the office and a delay report comes in they come running up to you with "why did we take a hit on ac XXX", or "how did you get a (whatever) minute delay for fixing a coffee maker?" It goes on and on... When the flight crew calls, and they call often not when they get on the ground but when they remember a problem or even when they are fully boarded, we go. Doing this often creates a delay. Additionally if the plane is already 20 minutes late and I go out to fix a reading light at push time that for whatever reason takes me 5 minutes to change, do the book, etc. I get a 25 minute delay. Crazy!

There are flight crews that whine, Operations Agents that whine, Ramp Crew that whine. All this whining reminds me of the Little Boy Who Cries Wolf. I hear so much of it that I no longer hear any of it.

It seems more and more that the whiners get their way while the workers are ignored. That said I will continue to work as I always have and as I was taught. Happy to have a job in these hard times and happy to start work when I'm told and get paid.

Aircraft Damage

2010-01-24T19:39:00.000-08:00

My guest blogger suggested that a post on aircraft damage may be good. Being a line mechanic we see our fair share of damaged aircraft, additionally, being a line mechanic we also cause our fair share of damage to airplanes.

The picture on the left was caused by a provisioning truck (they bring sodas and snacks up to the airplanes) running into the wingtip of one of our planes. It may look like my golf cart hit the wing to some of you but that was just poor photography by me.

As a line mechanic we are usually on the front line and act as first responders for incidents involving damage to aircraft. The picture I put up is more the exception than the rule. Most damage incidents involve dents or small punctures that can be patched up quickly and sent on the way. Antennas seem to be magnets for belt loaders. I have seen 4 or 5 antennas broken off aircraft by careless rampers driving belt loaders. Engine inlet cowls have this same fate especially the number 2 engine cowl being on the side of the plane that the rampers are working on.

Damage inflicted by mechanics seems to run the gambit from breaking an end bay off a row of seats to destroying a thrust reverser half by jacking a plane and lowering it back down with a main tire resting against the TR half. My own personal experience involved a TR half also. I was rushing, not paying attention, when the TR half's were open and I lowered the flaps which put a hole in the TR half. We were able to simply speed tape it and Mx Note it for a repair a few cycles down the road.

Sometimes aircraft design puts certain components in danger. For example on the MD-80 the number 2 engine cowl rests right against the APU exhaust when it is open. I watched an Alaska airline mechanic leave the cowl open on his MD-80 and turn on the APU which burned a hole in the cowl.

Since the winglets have been installed several have been hit by provo trucks or by being pushed back into other planes.

The point is that damage happens. Unfortunately most companies treat aircraft damage like you have committed man slaughter. A few years ago Southwest adapted a zero tolerance for aircraft damage and threatened to fire those responsible. Planes are expensive and the economy being as it is you might understand why they do this. This and policies like this are problems for mechanics because it makes you think that the company does not have your back if a situation occurs involving you. it also is a problem because there is a reluctance by other employees to tell mechanics about how a plane was damaged. For example, if a pilot spills a coke and ruins a radio head it is considered aircraft damage. Prior to the new policy we would get a call for a radio head and the pilot would say "hey look I messed up and spilled my coffee on the thing". No big deal in my book, I R&R the radio head and go about my day. Now we go up to the flight deck and the crew says "I don't know, the radio head just stopped working". At times like this I have to trouble shoot the whole system which wastes my time when I could be done already.

We at SWA have over 500 aircraft. What the bean counters at headquarters do not seem to understand is that with 500 aircraft you are bound to have some damage incidents. It is statistically impossible to have that many airplanes flying hundreds of flights a day and not have any damage incidents. I think it would be better to have a set standard of what to do when a plane is damaged then to say there is a zero tolerance for damage, but, I'm just a wrench turner.

I do know this: the zero tolerance rule does not effect how I work in any way. You can not do this job if you are worrying about damaging an airplane. I'm not a big time Union guy but I figure that's what they are for. If I am doing my job and something goes wrong, an airplane gets damaged, I know that I am secure in the knowledge that I do not intentionally damage planes. If the company wants to go after me for doing my job, so be it.

Guest Blog!! Thanks Franco A.

2010-01-22T16:57:00.000-08:00

Oh Captain, My Captain......

I am just a guest blogger here and it's only because I've known Goat since he was just a kid. I'm no authority on aviation, but I thought I'd recount an incident that happened to me not long ago in a far off 737.

Here's the preliminary;

Southwest is good with watching over the usage of parts and how to tweak things to make it more cost effective for the company when it comes to repairs.

Somebody, I don't know who exactly, looks at the time it takes to change certain problematic parts and decides whether it would be more time conscience to change some other part while the mechanic is in that area. Let's take for instance the -700 Flight Attendant Handset.

A mechanic gets a call for an inoperative forward handset. They change out only the handset and it works ok. Two legs later its inop again. If the mechanic looks and sees the handset was just changed, he'll go for changing the cord. More than likely this fixes the problem and everybody is happy happy joy joy.

Well, the powers that be decided that a mechanic should now change out the handset and cord as one unit. It doesn't cost that much more to send the cord in along with the handset for repair. It does take a bit longer to change out the cord along with the handset, but it is still easier than a second gate call down the line.

So, Southwest's policy calls for changing both handset and cord at the same time and this is where the title comes in to play: Oh Captain, My Captain...MYOB!

The Story:

A few weeks ago I got a call for a handset being intermittent. Not the PA, but the handset itself. I go up to the gate and the Captain informs me that the forward handset is inop and he has put it into the book as such. Right away my hands are tied. If the entire handset is inop then I have to change it out.

I had brought one out with me along with the cord and proceeded to inform Operations to hold off on boarding as I would be in the way of the passengers. I informed the Captain it would be about 15 to 20 minutes for me to complete the job.

As this was a "through" flight, there were still passengers on board waiting to continue to their final destination. There were 3 sitting in the first row who could not only see me working, but were within earshot. This is when the Captain came up to me and asked, in front of these passengers, why was I taking apart the Flight Attendant seat, I explained that it was necessary to gain access to the end of the cord for change-out.

He asked why change the cord if the handset was bad? Good question...if I had time! I told him it was company policy to do so. Did he stop there? No. He then asked me, in front of the passengers, "Hey, who's gonna know what part you changed?"

My mouth simply said again that it was company policy. He gave me a funny look and said let me help you and started to try and hold the seat belts for me. I let him know I was just fine and needed no help. My brain wanted me to "escort" him to the empty jetway by the scruff of the neck and tell him how stupid he had just been and add a nuggie in for good measure.

How could he have made such a statement? Especially in front of passengers! Who is going to know what parts I change? Well, I would. So would he. And so would those passengers who heard him. Would he want me to make that statement to a fellow mechanic as we did an engine change? "You know Harv. forget taking those engine mounts off and putting on new ones. Who is gonna know?"

Oh Captain, My Captain, please do your job and let me do mine. I appreciate you wanting to have an on-time departure, so would not it be best if you do your pre-flight, sort your charts, or whatever you guys do up there before flying the machine that you entrust to me to make airworthy?

You do your job, I'll do mine. Thank you very much.

Truly,

Franco A.

Old School Airline

2010-01-20T19:51:00.000-08:00

FAILURE!

2010-01-19T18:57:00.001-08:00

"Can you hear it?"

"Yeah it's still clicking!"

"OK what should we try now?"

Last night I worked graveyard shift. My airplane was making a clicking noise in the aft cargo bin. I met the plane and talked to the Captain. The Captain tells me that the noise is coming from the area of the Flight Data Recorder in the Aft Bin.

At this point I bite my tongue and inform him that the box in the aft bin is the Voice Recorder and not the Flight Data Recorder. Of course he doesn't believe me and starts to ask me all kind of nomenclature questions which I expertly redirect back to the matter at hand. Something back there is clicking, that's the bottom line.

Once I get the plane out to Tango (remote parking area) I quickly finish up the MV-1 check, fix the few things I found broken, and get into the aft cargo bin. Sure enough you can hear a clicking noise, as a matter of fact you can hear it by just standing with your head in the door opening. "Click, click, click, click.....".

My first thought is the CVR is messed up so I open the access door and give it a tap, no help. I tap the APU temp. box next to the CVR, no help. On the side of the CVR enclosure is the J-11 Junction box and I can see a few relays in there through the holes cut in the side of the box. Pop that sucker open and sure enough it looks like the R353(?) relay is clicking. I call on the radio for someone to look up the relay part number and they tell me that Maintenance Control has already ordered it and it is on the way-be here at 10pm.

Now I'm thinking: If MX Control called and wanted to know which relay was making the noise (they were the ones who called about the plane originally), how could they have already ordered the relay that was busted? Even better why not let me know so I would not go beating up two other boxes, and possibly saving me some time. Whatever.

By the way all this time the worse storm of the year is roaring outside. Rain, wind, flooding at the airport, it's crazy outside. So I get my part and go back to the plane, put the new relay in, go up stairs to turn on power, go back down to the aft pit and CLICK, CLICK, CLICK...

Strike one.

I had doubts as to if that relay was the one clicking so with the power on I decided to disconnect the cannon plugs that go to the relay rack. The plugs are labeled 1 and 2, and the only other relay that could have been making that noise was labeled 2 while the relay I just changed was labeled 1. Sure as heck the noise stops when I pull of plug 2!

"Hey someone check to see if we have an R625 relay" I call on the radio.
A few moments later they tell me "We do not stock that relay". Before I can say for sure that the relay is the trouble I wanted to rob one from another plane and "slave" it in.

Now the wind is blowing at about 25mph, but the rain has stopped.

I get my "volunteer" relay and put it in, reconnect the cannon plug and CLICK, CLICK, CLICK...
The problem is not the relay.

Strike 2.

I drive my golf cart back to the shop which takes a while since it is old and the wind is blowing right at me. My normally slow cart is having to push through the wind and it going about 5 mph. At the shop I discuss the problem with the foreman and check out the wiring diagram. The relay gets a signal from two switches both of which are in the flap drum. For those of you who know the 737 the flap drum switches are one of the most loathed jobs in all of Line Maintenance. All the work is over head on the wheel well ceiling and the wires to the switches cannot be spliced they must be unclamped from the switch all the way up to the cannon plug, a run of about five feet or so with about 7-8 clamps to deal with.

I decide to see if I can adjust or clean the switches. While I am doing this I notice that one of the switches is loose in the drum and that the wires leading to the switch are spliced. I lower the flaps and check, no clicking. I raise the flaps up one setting, no clicking. I raise it one more setting, no clicking. I do this again and again, running up the stairs and down to see if the clicking is back. I figure if I can get these flaps all the way up and there is no clicking I'm going to sign this bad boy off. Sure enough at the last setting I go down stairs and CLICK, CLICK, CLICK...

Strike 3.

Now it's about 1am. I have a 50/50 chance on which switch to change but I have a pretty good idea that it is the loose and spliced switch that needs to go. Start digging! Off comes the switch, off come the clamps, I de-pin the cannon plug. I take the old switch to the shop and lay it out on the work table so I can put new pins on where they belong and new ground lugs and terminate the unused wires. It is now 2:45am. Since its not raining anymore I figure I'll take off my rain boots (they are killing my feet) and put my regular work boots back on.

Back at the plane I re-pin the plug. String the wire. Re-do the clamps. Put the switch in. It is now 4am. the moment of truth! By now the foreman and one other mechanic has come out to give me some moral support. We turn on power go to the cargo door and....

CLICK, CLICK, CLICK....

Damn! Strike 4!

We go through the adjustment on the switch to see if that is the problem but it is no help. Now it is raining again, the wind is blowing so hard that the plane is dancing around while I'm trying to adjust the switch and tie up all the loose wires. The final part of that adjustment calls for me to listen for the switch to click and then back it off and tighten it there. The wind is so loud that I cannot hear the tiny clicking of the switch. Time for the alternate method (I love this job). Any way it is starting to look like my 50/50 guess was incorrect and that the other switch is going to have to come out! Now it is 5:50am. I have been standing on my ladder the whole night. My back is killing me. My shoulders are burning from the overhead work. Remember when I took off my rain boots? Bad move, for the last 2 hours my feet have been soaking wet. My hands are black from the grease and muck in the wheel well and I cannot feel my fingers they are so cold.

I have the awkward experience of recounting my tale of woe to the day shift lead mechanic and informing him that one of his guys will have to change that second switch. I leave soaked, pissed off, dejected, and filthy. Part of being a Line Mechanic is that feeling of failing to fix the problem. Some people handle it better than others and some people just don't care. Not fixing a problem is a fact of life in our industry almost as much as fixing a problem is. The really talented mechanics will always learn something from each of their failures like - leave the rain boots on!

Another Day In The Trenches

2010-01-16T08:13:00.001-08:00

Well it's Saturday so that means back to work for me. Once again the ability to work on the weekend is paramount in that my boss called and asked me to be the bump-up supervisor for the morning shift. The pay is good the work is sometimes tedious but not very hard. All in all I like being the sup. and if the permanent position paid well enough and some other things were set in my personal life I would put in for the permanent position.

It's crazy that a position like Foreman at a major airline pays so poorly. People with FedEx delivery routes make more than our foremen do. It is just like many of the jobs at airlines these days-the pay is very low and in some geographical locations-laffable. Legal Secretaries make more money than most airline pilots, mechanics have to live often many states away and commute into work because they can not afford to live at their work base location.

All this is a result, not of airlines like Southwest as a lot of employees of the traditional "legacy" carriers claim. The reason the airlines are cash strapped is that they refuse to raise the ticket prices despite the fact that fuel has gone through the roof. When one airline raises rates all the others tend to do the same, however, at some time one of those airlines get greedy and lower their rates. This in turn makes everyone else lower fares and so goes the cycle, over and over again.

I'm not talking about raising fares from $50.00 to $200.00. I'm talking about raising fares from $50.00 to $60.00. A couple of years ago we raised fares an average of $2.00 and that allowed the company to realize a profit that year! It's amazing how a short term gain in filled seats can sabotage a companies thinking into believing that lowering fares is any type of advantage to their bottom line. This industry is in major trouble if the CEO's and CFO's do not start to realize that with the fares they are charging you can not make any money. If they can not make any money they cannot compensate the employees appropriately.

I'm sure that raising fares is not going to go over well with the public but I also do not believe that an extra $10.00 or so is going to be a deal breaker. I have seen a lot in this industry and I love working on airliners. The most troubling trend in this industry is the quality of the persons that are being attracted by low pay and hard hours. This used to be a proud industry where people were paid well and the people coming on board were willing to go the extra mile because they knew the reward was with in reach. I know from experience that pilots at regional and commuter organizations make about $800-$2000 a month! When my wife was working at a commuter I had to keep her fed and housed (away from home) and I also had to keep one or two of her colleagues fed as well. If you think that quality top of the line people are going to get into that line of work for $400.00 a pay check you better think again. Enrollment is down in maintenance training schools across the country, the caliber of folks that are enrolling can not be the top of the top as it was in years past. This is a problem for the future of our industry that is more immediate than any other.

The next time you fly on an airliner think about the fact that the multi-million dollar plane you are in is being piloted by a person who, on average, makes less than a manager at McDonalds, was "fixed" by a guy who could get a pay raise by going to sort mail at the Post Office, and these nice folks will likely get pay cuts in the coming years. It is really too bad when you find a job that you like, such as the Foreman position for me, and you can not "afford" to take the job but instead have to stay in the position you are in. maybe one day things will change...I need TEN more years baby, just TEN more years.

Another Typical Night thanks 666 for the pic

2010-01-15T11:29:00.000-08:00