Just when you though you had it figured out...

I am so embarrassed.  Last derby season one of our bench top delta bandsaws started running so slow it wouldn't cut a board.  Sr. Commander said he thought the motor was going out on it. Just had another machine act the same way and it was the brushes.  

Took the blade off the saw and everything seemed to be rolling smoothly.  Hum.  Looks like the motor is going bad.  Price to replace it 250.00 more than a new bench top saw costs new.

Yesterday. I had lunch at the Ranger Annex and pull that bandsaw out and took of the motor blew out the saw dust and just happened to get by the tool repair place.  They determined the motor was ok.   Hum I thought.

Later that evening I check the band saw out.  Booht wheels are running smoothly.  checked the bearings. Hum one bearing was needing some grease.  Put the blade back on it to find out that bearing was out of adjustment and had frozen up the whole saw.  Greased it again realingned it made some new bade guides out of this blade guide stuff and put it all back together and viola a brand new saw!!!!

Now I have to tell my Sr. Commander.  We were all fooled.  Ha. Merry Christmas and no, were not taking back the 17" grizzly bandsaw be bought to replace this one with...Ha!

Mark Jones
p.s. aint God good!

Just when you thought you had it figured out...

This one might be a bit tough for you land lubbers to follow. I had received accelerated orders to a ship on its way to Desert Shield. Just past Hawaii, I turned in my department head acceptance letter. 15 minutes later, someone burst into my office and shouted, "Sir, we're going to lose the motor whaleboat!"

A little background at this point. It's a slow 24' boat on the side of the helo flight deck. It hangs from two massive steel arms, and it is cranked outboard whenever we're conducting flight operations. It's main purpose is to be the ready lifeboat in case a helo goes down. In that case, with a crew onboard, an electric winch pays out the cable and it's lowered into the water. The crew then removes the two hooks, the after one first, and gets underway. Got it?

So I run out onto the flight deck and find the boat hanging from the aft hook only. It's davit arm is twisted, but holding. The forward davit arm is broken and laying on the deck. Thirty-year old steel had failed. The department head that I just replaced looked at it and walked away, not to be seen again.

My plan was to lower the boat to the water by the single hook, and then use a rope to walk it around the stern of the ship to the other side, where we could pick it up with a crane. We wouldn't be able to use it, but at least it would be back onboard and safe. But I needed to get a guy into the boat to release the hook. Someone volunteered and he wanted to stay in the boat the whole time. No, I said. After you release the hook, I'm bringing you back up.

So all of that went well. We started to pull the boat back to the stern, where the high seas took charge. The boat was swamped, we couldn't hold the line, and we watched it drift away. The ship continued on. My volunteer thanked me for getting him out of the boat. The captain said, "Well, we tried. Now find me a new boat and fix the davit." Did that in Subic Bay.

So was that, like kind-of, the new "Lend-Lease" Program for the Philippine Navy?

Nah. We borrowed a flat-top's extra whaleboat for the rest of the deployment, and the naval shipyard at Subic Bay did all the davit repairs. My 4 days in port were spent overseeing the work and biting my nails during the weight testing certification.

On our way back from Desert Storm, we returned the boat and picked up a new replacement. Of course, the Air Force dropped it while pulling it out of a cargo jet.

At one point some Air Force guys dropped our ROD(reverse osmosis desalinator) unit and then tried to pass it off as normal when they got it to the ship. I didn't think one man could swear as much as our Engineering officer did when he saw it. Couldn't even use it. We had to stay in port in Guam for an extra week until they got a new unit sent out cause we couldn't produce fresh water with out it. We had sailed with only one ROD unit serviceable for some reason.

3 weeks after that we had to completely remove and replace our Primary Diesel Engine. 2 weeks stuck in singapore. Someone dropped something else.... I thought I heard him swearing while I was in Australia on leave.

My son was a "Zoomie"...Crew Chief on a KC-135.


You know what the Air Force considers us, paratroopers??????????



............................................................




.................................................................................CARGO.

Paratroopers or cargo...... either one just gets thrown out the door, At least the cargo is a little bit closer to the ground when they let it go.

"I get no respect."

(Rodney Dangerfield)