BUFDRVR - about new squadron structure

I didn't want to hijack the "Joining the USAF" thread with somthing
unrelated, so I'll start a new thread to respond to something you wrote
over there.

As of 1 OCT 2002 you are correct, kind of.. There are now Ops Squadrons
and Maintenance Squadrons. I'll pleade ignorance on how they've got the
maintenance squadrons broken up (crew chiefs in one, hydraulics in
another, etc.), however, from 1 OCT 1993 till 1 OCT 2002 we were all
(except the back shop guys) in one squadron. This current "break up" is
considered a mistake Air Force wide.

It might be wise to keep in mind that the different MAJCOMs still tend to
have their own ways of going about things. I work in an AMC/AFRC unit.
Prior to the "split ops and maintenance back up" decision, all mechanics
at the base I work at were already part of their own squadrons. The
"backline" shops (e.g., ELIN or E&E, Hydraulics, Propulsion, AFIN or
Avionics or GAC, CNAD or Com/Nav, Aero Repair, etc.) all belonged to an
"MXS" (Maintenance) squadron, falling under the Logistics Group. The
flightline workers (crew chiefs and all the specialists who also have
flightline positions) belonged to an "AGS" unit (Aircraft Generation).

After 1 Oct 2002, the MXS unit stayed just the way it was all along, with
a few exceptions that don't even matter - it now falls under the
Maintenance Group rather than Logistics. The internal structure of the
MXS unit was also reorganized very slightly (e.g., one shop switching to
a different branch - flight - within the squadron). From a worker bee
perspective, it really had no impact at all on us. It only changed from
the perspective of who actually oversees (manages) each unit and flight.
LG still exists, but I believe its limited to SUPS (Supply) and perhaps
Contracting and TRANS.

The flightline side, from what I can best determine, didn't do much of
anything more than getting renamed from AGS to "AMXS" (Aircraft
Maintenance) and also moving from the LG to the MG. They were a separate
unit from the flying squadrons all along (btw, we have 2 flying squadrons
that fly a single fleet of aircraft maintained by a single AMXS unit).
There was one other change internally, AFAIK. They were previously setup
into 4 or so different flights (2 day shift + 2 night shift flights
splitting the responsibility for assigned aircraft in half). These
flights were not selective based on AFSC's. 1 flight had crew chiefs,
electricians, pointy heads, hydraulics, etc. into a single group. The
flights, I believe, are now split up based on specialty (crew chiefs =
one flight, specialists = another flight, etc.). Basically, it went back
to what it was when I was still active duty and under ACC.

When I was active duty, yes we were part of the flying squadron as well.
I'll have to ask my friends who are still stationed there how the
maintenance units are setup. Like you, I'll have to plead ignorance for
now, but I suspect they also went to the AMXS (flightline) and MXS
(backshops) structure.

Personally, the only thing that changing "AGS" to "AMXS" seemed to have
accomplished is to really confuse the heck out of those of us who are
assigned to "MXS". We were never briefed about the AGS units changing
names. The first time I ever saw "AMXS" mentioned, I thought they were
talking about us in MXS.

I didn't want to hijack the "Joining the USAF" thread with somthing
unrelated, so I'll start a new thread to respond to something you wrote
over there.

So other than different names, how does the new structure differ from what it
was in the 70s when Ops and MX were almost mortal enemies?

(Smartace11) wrote in
:


I didn't want to hijack the "Joining the USAF" thread with somthing
unrelated, so I'll start a new thread to respond to something you
wrote over there.

So other than different names, how does the new structure differ from
what it was in the 70s when Ops and MX were almost mortal enemies?

hehe I'm too young to know anything about that. I was born in '73. But
honestly, I don't notice any major "ops vs. maintenance" problems in my
neck of the woods. Maintainers seem to have a good general idea who the
good pilots, FE's, and load toads are as well as who the not-so-good ones
are (and vice versa). As long as there is some mutual level of respect
between individuals from both sides, the "ops vs. maintenance" mentality,
for the most part, doesn't really exist.

Tac fighter aquadrons were pretty well self contained in the late 60s with both
maintenance and ops in the same unit. Then the AF mandated a SAC type
organizational structure with separate squadrons for ops and the various
maintenance types, Avionics (AMS), Munitions (MMS), Field or backshop (FMS) and
Organizational or flightline OMS. Apparently worked for big airplanes but well
at all for fighters, but then those were still the days when SAC ran the AF and
looked at all planes as potential nuke delivery platforms.

The Wing King's scorecard was heavily based on "scheduling effectiveness". For
ops that meant that if the actual tailnumber you were scheduled to fly was not
ready, you didn't fly or at least didn't fly on time, missed your range period
or sortie with the other planes you were scheduled with. It was like night and
dayu for the ops guys who were used to flying when the schedule said they would
fly and created a great deal of animosity between Ops and Mx, and morale was
terrible.

Mx officer promotion rates, by boards staffed heavily with Ops guys, dropped to
40% or less for 0-3. Then Jimmah Cawtah was elected and immediately cut the
military. Many Mx officers saw the writing on the wall and got out. A few
years later, the AF had a critical shortage of Mx officers - duh!

Things improved a lot under COMO and POMO in TAC. Now the pendulum is headed
the other way again for some strange reason, apparently.

Steve







Subject: BUFDRVR - about new squadron structure
From: Jughead
Date: 11/15/2003 10:02 PM Eastern Standard Time
Message-id: 2

(Smartace11) wrote in
:


I didn't want to hijack the "Joining the USAF" thread with somthing
unrelated, so I'll start a new thread to respond to something you
wrote over there.

So other than different names, how does the new structure differ from
what it was in the 70s when Ops and MX were almost mortal enemies?

hehe I'm too young to know anything about that. I was born in '73. But
honestly, I don't notice any major "ops vs. maintenance" problems in my
neck of the woods. Maintainers seem to have a good general idea who the
good pilots, FE's, and load toads are as well as who the not-so-good ones
are (and vice versa). As long as there is some mutual level of respect
between individuals from both sides, the "ops vs. maintenance" mentality,
for the most part, doesn't really exist.

(SteveM8597) wrote in
:

The Wing King's scorecard was heavily based on "scheduling
effectiveness". For ops that meant that if the actual tailnumber you
were scheduled to fly was not ready, you didn't fly or at least didn't
fly on time, missed your range period or sortie with the other planes
you were scheduled with. It was like night and dayu for the ops guys
who were used to flying when the schedule said they would fly and
created a great deal of animosity between Ops and Mx, and morale was
terrible.

Thanks for the snipped history lesson. In response to the above, that's
something I can somewhat relate to. There always seems to be some degree of
finger pointing with regard to the causes of delayed and/or canceled
flights. I never noticed any difference regardless of where exactly
maintenance falls in the chain of command. I'm guessing the finger pointing
is sort of what you had in mind when you mentioned ops and mx with respect
to delays and/or cancellations.

SteveM8597 wrote:

Tac fighter aquadrons were pretty well self contained in the late 60s with both
maintenance and ops in the same unit.

I remember the "fighter squadron concept"; my first real
assignment was to the 43rd TFS (MacDill). It worked okay,
but required massive duplication of manpower (specialties)
in every squadron - and some of those skills were in very
short supply.

Of course, it was tried only in TAC - while the combat
wings in PACAF and USAFE stayed with the older AMS/MMS/FMS/OMS
mold.

The earlier "Armament & Electronics" squadrons (along with
FMS for the mechanical trades) and OMS for crew cheifs was
pretty good, too.

Then the AF mandated a SAC type organizational structure with separate
squadrons for ops and the various maintenance types, Avionics (AMS),
Munitions (MMS), Field or backshop (FMS) and Organizational or
flightline OMS.

This was the norm; it was efficient of manpower, and
gave good training to the specialties.

Apparently worked for big airplanes but well at all for fighters

Your dreaming. It worked oustandingly for fighters.

Things improved a lot under COMO and POMO in TAC.

Let me correct that: you're ****in' delusional.

POMC (it's first name), COMO, and POMO (all the same thing)
were a disaster of major proportions for the fighter forces,
particularly when it came to maintenance training.
We had 7-level specialists in AGS who didn't have a clue
about how their systems worked. Not surprising: they never
got a chance to fix them. They spent most of their time
kicking chocks, hanging tanks, and manhandling refuels.
Under POMO, the only time a lot of jets were actually fixed
(instead of patched PMC) - was when they were handed over to
EMS or CRS for phase, radar cal, etc. Otherwise, "tires and
fires" were all that mattered.

- John T., F-4 WCS toad and memeber of the 1st, 4th, 15th,
36th, 50th, 56th, 86th, and 388th (Korat) TFWs...

I was in the USAF from 1951 to 1980. I started out as a 30150 airborne
radio mechanic and went to aviation cadets and spent the rest of my
career flying fighters (except when a desk caught me for 4 years.) AFM
66-1 (Socialized maintenance) came in to my view about 1959. Prior to
that I'd been in outfits with their own maintenance. It was workig
pretty well at RG AFB but we only had one squadron there a big one
with about 34 F/TF102As. From there I went to teh 332 FIS/F102 at
Thule and here it bit us in the butt. Our flying schedule was by tail
number and printed out a month in advance. Any deviation was a gig. We
had half a squadron - 10 F102s. If one went down for extended
maintenance and you were scheduled to fly it - too bad. You sat on the
ground. My next assigment was the 319FIS/F104A at Homestead. We had a
600 man outfit with 30 F104A/Bs. No 66-1 - we all worked for the same
man. The 319th had the best maintenance bar none I ever saw in the
USAF. Our in-commission rate was always over 94%. The only problems we
experienced were tired engines and AOCP. Then I went down the road to
the 31TFW, same base, and F4s and 66-1 'Sacumcised' maintenance. The
concept originated in SAC where they scheduled B52s about once a week
and had 168 hours to get the thing ready to go. the control process
was far too slow and unwieldy to generate fighters and fly them twice
a day. (In the 319th we once flew 65 sorties in about four hours -
supersonic to and from the target! and 15 minute turnarounds. 15
minute missions were common.) Morale was low because the DM and the DO
were at each other's throats. This was also at a time when
'management' was prime - and sonmeone forgot about leadership.
Apparently the Harvard Business School hadn't incorporated it into the
syllabus.
Yes, 66-1 was very efficient as to manning; unfortunately the gain in
manpower resources was a loss on the flightline maintenance response
because we lost a lot of time waiting for specialists to arrive at the
airplane. (And the F4 was a maintenance hog - at DaNang we were
running about 53 M/Hr per flying hour!)
One of the big problems was unquantifiable - the 'gung-ho' spirit that
in 66-1 was almost ignored, except by perceptive senior officers - of
which there was a dearth. I took that to heart when I got a squadron -
(68TFS/Homestead and later 390TFS/DaNang). I used the 'walking around'
theory and it really paid off. You got to get all the guys reading off
the same page and singing the same tune. Back in the States at
Homestead 76-80 we were under TAC 'whateveritwas' that put the AGS
'units' with the fighter squadrons (same color hats and badges) and
disolved 31MMS (I commanded it for about 6 months) and gave the
bombloaders something to do besides load planes - they became deputy
assistant whatevers to the crewchiefs. The flightline guys also
learned how to help the specialists, like open and close the bird as
nee3ded before the 'specs' got there. A lot of cross-training was
involved and it really helped maintain the birds and - ta-da! sparked
morale. I was Chief of QC then because of a request from an old
colleague who was the DM. (I also got to fly test hops besides subbing
as a 307th IP.) Anyway he was getting worn down; so was I; in 1980 we
both thought Cawtah was going to be reelected and we were out of parts
for our 120 F4s and about 2/3 manned in skills and 4/3 manned in FNGs
so we both bailed out in April of 80. It had stopped being fun when I
saw an Estimated Delivery Date 21 months in the future for one of our
AOCP F4Es. (We had 4 real hangar queens - they were missing about 250
items apiece we'd canned for other birds and awaiting parts for them.
'Consolidated Cannery' ships, I called them. And that was what was
documented! It was/is not unknown for gung-ho crewchiefs to make
midnight requisitions to get their own bird airborne. Swap parts -
don't leave the hole vacant! And if you want to be really 'honest'
write it up as inop and sign a fake name. Not that I ever did that . .
..) FWIW once I put my papers in my blood pressure went down 20 points.
One thing - with the parts and manning problems I knew we were going
to lose airplanes but there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it.
Well, we did, but the crews got out okay. Thank God. One of them was
me.
Walt BJ

We-e-e-e-ell yes we've all heard from several ops guys who related anecdotal
stories about how much "better" things were "back in the day" when Ops owned
the on-equipment maintenance and the "tough jobs got done in spite of
undermanning, underfunding, etc."

And I'm sure that everything happened exactly the way you remember it, and
"perception is reality."

However

while it is true that bad leadership can screw up a good situation- and vice
versa- some actual "scientific studies" have been done on this topic.

Generalizable results are as follows:

1) R&M varies considerably between MDS
2) Low R&M = high workload, irrespective of parts funding
3) Low parts funding=higher workload, irrespective of R&M
4) Maintenance will ALWAYS get the job done, irrespective of manning
5) Low manning makes it harder to get the job done
6) There will always be more sorties required than available (OPS has
unlimited wants and needs)

and, as a very low priority (1-6 above drives the train)

7) Specialists in backshops fill the shelves
8) Specialists on the flightline wait for redballs
9) Consolidating specialists into shops is more efficient (fewer troops,
more work done)

Therefore?

If you have high R&M, lots of spares, and high manning, by all means- put
specialists onto the flightline. It's more fun. If you don't- then you
really ought to consolidate into backshops (and dispatch them from there),
or you will work them unecessarily. And that ceases to be fun fairly
quickly. However, see 4) above. By the time Ops sees the troops burning
out, it'll be too late.

By the way, it might *seem* like a good idea to have a bunch of 7-levels
sitting around playing cards in the breadtrucks waiting for redballs;
however, preflight ain't where the workload is for specialists. Write-ups
need to be worked on postflight.

Steve

"WaltBJ" wrote in message
om...
I was in the USAF from 1951 to 1980. I started out as a 30150 airborne
radio mechanic and went to aviation cadets and spent the rest of my
career flying fighters (except when a desk caught me for 4 years.) AFM
66-1 (Socialized maintenance) came in to my view about 1959. Prior to
that I'd been in outfits with their own maintenance. It was workig
pretty well at RG AFB but we only had one squadron there a big one
with about 34 F/TF102As. From there I went to teh 332 FIS/F102 at
Thule and here it bit us in the butt. Our flying schedule was by tail
number and printed out a month in advance. Any deviation was a gig. We
had half a squadron - 10 F102s. If one went down for extended
maintenance and you were scheduled to fly it - too bad. You sat on the
ground. My next assigment was the 319FIS/F104A at Homestead. We had a
600 man outfit with 30 F104A/Bs. No 66-1 - we all worked for the same
man. The 319th had the best maintenance bar none I ever saw in the
USAF. Our in-commission rate was always over 94%. The only problems we
experienced were tired engines and AOCP. Then I went down the road to
the 31TFW, same base, and F4s and 66-1 'Sacumcised' maintenance. The
concept originated in SAC where they scheduled B52s about once a week
and had 168 hours to get the thing ready to go. the control process
was far too slow and unwieldy to generate fighters and fly them twice
a day. (In the 319th we once flew 65 sorties in about four hours -
supersonic to and from the target! and 15 minute turnarounds. 15
minute missions were common.) Morale was low because the DM and the DO
were at each other's throats. This was also at a time when
'management' was prime - and sonmeone forgot about leadership.
Apparently the Harvard Business School hadn't incorporated it into the
syllabus.
Yes, 66-1 was very efficient as to manning; unfortunately the gain in
manpower resources was a loss on the flightline maintenance response
because we lost a lot of time waiting for specialists to arrive at the
airplane. (And the F4 was a maintenance hog - at DaNang we were
running about 53 M/Hr per flying hour!)
One of the big problems was unquantifiable - the 'gung-ho' spirit that
in 66-1 was almost ignored, except by perceptive senior officers - of
which there was a dearth. I took that to heart when I got a squadron -
(68TFS/Homestead and later 390TFS/DaNang). I used the 'walking around'
theory and it really paid off. You got to get all the guys reading off
the same page and singing the same tune. Back in the States at
Homestead 76-80 we were under TAC 'whateveritwas' that put the AGS
'units' with the fighter squadrons (same color hats and badges) and
disolved 31MMS (I commanded it for about 6 months) and gave the
bombloaders something to do besides load planes - they became deputy
assistant whatevers to the crewchiefs. The flightline guys also
learned how to help the specialists, like open and close the bird as
nee3ded before the 'specs' got there. A lot of cross-training was
involved and it really helped maintain the birds and - ta-da! sparked
morale. I was Chief of QC then because of a request from an old
colleague who was the DM. (I also got to fly test hops besides subbing
as a 307th IP.) Anyway he was getting worn down; so was I; in 1980 we
both thought Cawtah was going to be reelected and we were out of parts
for our 120 F4s and about 2/3 manned in skills and 4/3 manned in FNGs
so we both bailed out in April of 80. It had stopped being fun when I
saw an Estimated Delivery Date 21 months in the future for one of our
AOCP F4Es. (We had 4 real hangar queens - they were missing about 250
items apiece we'd canned for other birds and awaiting parts for them.
'Consolidated Cannery' ships, I called them. And that was what was
documented! It was/is not unknown for gung-ho crewchiefs to make
midnight requisitions to get their own bird airborne. Swap parts -
don't leave the hole vacant! And if you want to be really 'honest'
write it up as inop and sign a fake name. Not that I ever did that . .
.) FWIW once I put my papers in my blood pressure went down 20 points.
One thing - with the parts and manning problems I knew we were going
to lose airplanes but there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it.
Well, we did, but the crews got out okay. Thank God. One of them was
me.
Walt BJ

I'm guessing the finger pointing
is sort of what you had in mind when you mentioned ops and mx with respect
to delays and/or cancellations.


Some of the time. Often it was just because mx cold take credit for scheduling
effectiveness on a late sortie when the ops guys, having missed range slots,
basically just had to bore holes in the air. Upset a lot of guys because it
seemed the priority was to fly planes not train crews.

I remember the "fighter squadron concept"; my first real
assignment was to the 43rd TFS (MacDill). It worked okay,
but required massive duplication of manpower (specialties)
in every squadron - and some of those skills were in very
short supply.

Worked fine for maintenance but not for ops as it meant a lot of lost range
times and crews sitting around waiting for planes to come OR so maint could
take credit for a flight. I was in a PACAF squadron, 391st TFS, Misawa later
34th, Kunsan when they went to the AFM 66-1 maint structure and the difference
in training effectiveness for crews was like night and day. I was also ops and
maint in the 48th TFW, and coold see the problems it caused for crews.

It did help maintenance in that it made scheduling easier and kept flying time
on birds pretty well balanced out.

Of course, it was tried only in TAC - while the combat
wings in PACAF and USAFE stayed with the older AMS/MMS/FMS/OMS
mold.

Not really it was used worldwide. I was in fighter wings in TAC, PACAF, and
USAFE under both concepts.



The earlier "Armament & Electronics" squadrons (along with
FMS for the mechanical trades) and OMS for crew cheifs was
pretty good, too.

Then the AF mandated a SAC type organizational structure with separate
squadrons for ops and the various maintenance types, Avionics (AMS),
Munitions (MMS), Field or backshop (FMS) and Organizational or
flightline OMS.

This was the norm; it was efficient of manpower, and
gave good training to the specialties.

Also madeif very difficult at times to work on planes like the F-4 because
suddenly everyone was carrying union guys.Each specialty could only touch their
part of the plane and lot of time was lost "waiting for specialists" when
formerly in the past, crew chiefs did many of the same tasks, so planes got
fixed quicker.




Apparently worked for big airplanes but well at all for fighters

Your dreaming. It worked oustandingly for fighters.

Not the F-4 from 69 - 79. I lived the problems. It made life far easier for
the specialist shops but aircraft availability suffered. Ask anyone who flew
jets under both concepts and see which they liked best.

The 388th at Korat in md 73 was a good example.
WE almost quit flying after the war ended because maintenance could hardly
generate airplanes going to a strict 66-1 concept.

Prior to that I hardly remember a sortie lost because maintenance couldn't get
a bird ready. A lot of it had to do with what was allowable for tail number
substitution. If your plane wasn't ready for its takeoff time you probably
wouldn't go even though there may be plenty of others ready but not on the
schedule that day.


Things improved a lot under COMO and POMO in TAC.

Let me correct that: you're ****in' delusional.

POMC (it's first name), COMO, and POMO (all the same thing)
were a disaster of major proportions for the fighter forces,
particularly when it came to maintenance training.
We had 7-level specialists in AGS who didn't have a clue
about how their systems worked. Not surprising: they never
got a chance to fix them. They spent most of their time
kicking chocks, hanging tanks, and manhandling refuels.
Under POMO, the only time a lot of jets were actually fixed
(instead of patched PMC) - was when they were handed over to
EMS or CRS for phase, radar cal, etc. Otherwise, "tires and
fires" were all that mattered.

- John T., F-4 WCS toad and memeber of the 1st, 4th, 15th,
36th, 50th, 56th, 86th, and 388th (Korat) TFWs...