Control column of a KC-135 tanker from the WI ANG

[u/redfiretrucks]

[u/CptSandbag73]

All the center caps are gone from AD birds. I guess people keep stealing them.

…probably guardsmen.

[u/slyskyflyby → u/CptSandbag73]

Oh contraire.

As a former guard KC-135 crew chief, we had these special made for a few jets in my wing, but as part of our pre-deployment checklist we would remove these because if we didn't, active duty would steal them. We would also swap out our nice engine covers with our wing mascot with the crappy red engine covers with straps that hook to the back of the engine instead of pin to the front. We would also remove our specially modified tail stands that we rigged up to have wheels so we didn't have to lift them to carry them everywhere. We stopped sending those on deployments after we lost them and started finding them with our wheels and our tail numbers, hidden away inside active duty jets.

We don't steal things in the guard, we just take care of our stuff because we have pride of ownership. In my old tanker unit we had crew chiefs that had been in that specific unit, working on nearly all the same tail numbers for 30+ years. Active duty steals the nice things we have and the nice modifications we make to show our pride because active duty doesn't give a shit. They have a jet for a year and then move on to another one or another airframe completely after their first tour. Or they just get out.

I'm now a guard C-17 guy and not in maintenance so I'm not sure what all they do to protect from sticky fingers but I will say my squadron has nice hot cups that work and we keep them in good shape. We also engraved all of them with our squadron mascot. Active duty is notorious for breaking their hot cups so they often try to steal them from the guard. It's actually standard practice for us to bring a lock to lock up our hot cups when we go in to crew rest at other bases. I had a hot cup stolen in Dover during a fuel stop earlier this year. We ended up rerouting our mission to go back through Dover to hunt our hot cup down again. We told the flight managers we were going to Dover to retrieve our cup and if they wanted to complain they could talk to our DO, Sq Commander and Wing Commander who was also a C-17 guy and a one star. The Dover maintenance group commander got involved and found the cup for us, he said they claimed fleet service took it inside to clean it, which is not standard procedure, ever, especially on a quick turn fuel stop.

Active duty are the ones with sticky fingers and the guard folks have to stay quite vigilant to protect our nice things that we made and procured for ourselves.

[u/YaBoiCrispoHernandez → u/slyskyflyby]

Telling you the fleet guys took the hot cup to clean it during a quick turn fuel stop is almost worse than just saying "ya fuck you guys we stole it, here have it back"

[u/CptSandbag73 → u/slyskyflyby]

Keeping the jets shiny is about all the guard can do whilst they have the luxury of only having the gucci taskings that they bid for months ago, and very predictable deployments scheduled years out. /s

I kid of course. I admire the shape you keep your jets in and make sure my crews aren’t part of the problem. Can’t control what our maintainers do when we’re not looking, but if I see it happening I try to squash it.

Even our “nice” jets with the one set of fancy engine covers on base and nose art, that we theoretically use for static displays and local outreach, are beat to shit and usually hangar queens.

[u/slyskyflyby → u/CptSandbag73]

I've been on active orders ever since I came back from PIQ almost three years ago now and I have yet to experience a nice MRA. They won't let me go on those missions because I'm on the wrong type of orders haha, that's one downside to the guard. And I won't deny I do miss the tanker lifestyle, one leg days to a location where you stay for a week... all we do in the moose is 3 leg days bumping up on 24 hours with min crew rest. I've traveled all around the world but really have only seen the inside of hotel rooms haha. Guard tankers is where it's at for the lifestyle for sure.

Regarding active vs guard quality of aircraft:

I'll never forget the day I was launching a jet as a young SSgt with a new Airman and I was training her how to brief the forms to the pilots. We were launching a MacDill jet in Guam and when the crew showed up the pilot asks "hows the jet look?" To which my young Airman responded "it looks like an abandoned warehouse." 😵‍💫😂

To my surprise mx briefing forms does not appear to be a thing in the C-17 community. Maybe it was just another guard nicety haha.

[u/Space_Brains_123]

I'm more of a KC-30A kind of guy. But I am biased because I work on them.

[u/redfiretrucks → u/Space_Brains_123]

I don't know, there is something very cool about a 68 year old airframe still in active service.

[u/Space_Brains_123 → u/redfiretrucks]

Absolutely. Immortal life of type.

[u/VelociRaptorDriver → u/Space_Brains_123]

I think everyone would prefer the KC-30 lol

[u/redfiretrucks → u/[deleted]]

seriously threatening a pilots life on an aviation forum? Are you sick?