WESTOVER AIR RESERVE BASE, Mass. --
Nowhere in the 439th Airlift Wing’s mission statement does it say anything about Yankee ingenuity, but it should, because when the Westover maintainers need a part for a C-5, they made it themselves.
The “knuckle busters” of the 439th Maintenance Squadron found out they needed an elevator support bracket as soon as possible for the C-5 aircraft 69-0020, the oldest C-5A in the Air Force fleet that’s still flying. To make it mission capable, they made the large bracket from an even larger block of aluminum, saving the Air Force time and tens of thousands of dollars.
During a routine inspection, TSgt. Konrad Hundley was installing a panel on a C-5 wing when he noticed a broken elevator bracket. The piece was coded as depot-repair only, according to maintenance squadron officials. But there were no elevator brackets in the system.
“It looked like something we could do,” said Steve Holloway, accessories supervisor, 439th MXS. So the team submitted two unique engineering requests: one to manufacture the part locally, and another to deviate from the specified material – i.e., make the part and install it locally.
“General shop practice is when a part is not procurable through the system, we submit a 107 engineering disposition to locally manufacture the part,” said Lt. Col. Jordan Murphy, commander of the 439th Maintenance Squadron.
Gary Surozenski, a metal technician at the Regional Isochronal Inspection hangar, served as the lead machinist on the project, with assistance from machinists Tech. Sgt. Richard Towlson and Master Sgt. John Vescovi who helped input the design and information into the computer-assisted drawing program.
“This type of repair, in the tech data, is listed as ‘depot repairable only,’ so we had to lobby depot at Warner-Robins AFB, Georgia for approval,” said Murphy. “The whole project had to be created from scratch, and it shows our ability for unique manufacturing like this.”
On Sept. 26, they received depot approval to manufacture the part. It took five days to complete, with a material cost of $1,500, compared to what would have been a month turnaround and cost of $50,000 if ordered through an outside source.
The part started as a 100-pound aluminum slab in the machine shop. Using Surozenksi’s CAD data, a milling machine, and the skills of Towlson, the process began.
“Most of the hands-on-work was done here in the machine shop,” Towlson said. “With the setup of the milling machine and the hand-operated machining, there’s a lot of back and forth between the blue-print, machining, and measuring to make sure the tolerances are correct.”
The meticulous machining work done by Vescovi’s shop was exacting, and before being installed on the aircraft, the six pound part needed to undergo a non-destructive inspection.
“We want to make sure there are no defects or cracks in the metal,” said Master Sgt. Thomas Pitts, NCO in charge of NDI. “It takes about an hour for the inspection using a chemical process to expose any problems.”
Once the part cleared NDI it was given to the Sheet Metal Shop, where they drilled holes and installed the elevator bracket on the aircraft, making it the oldest C-5 with the newest Westover-made part.