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Tinker reaches milestone in acquiring C-17 workload

  • Published
  • By Brandice J. O'Brien
  • Tinker Public Affairs
TINKER AIR FORCE BASE, Okla. --  The 550th Commodities Maintenance Squadron recently reached a milestone in securing the C-17 Globemaster III hydraulic actuator overhaul workload.

From Oct. 21-24, Air Force Sustainment Center and Oklahoma City Air Logistics Complex support personnel met with industry partners Parker Aerospace and Boeing to review manuals, develop technical data and leak-check test stands.

"The 550th Commodities Maintenance Squadron produced close to 26,000 units for fiscal 2013 and has the capacity and skilled workforce to absorb additional workload across our technical repair centers," said Joe Lopez, 550th CMMXS director. "As the TRC, this creates an opportunity to work with another major weapon system, producing a quality product on time and on cost while sustaining over the long haul.

The squadron first entertained the idea of the new workload in 2008. Since then, personnel have gone through the acquisition phase, purchased tooling equipment and renovated the space. Original equipment manager Parker, headquartered in Ohio, is training squadron personnel to become a certified repair center. Boeing will own the workload and share repair work with Tinker.

While the squadron is roughly a year out from acquiring the workload, excitement is building among the multiple stakeholders who have dedicated their time and efforts.
"Some people really don't realize how long it takes to get new workload at the base. It takes years and years. It just doesn't show up at the base one day," said Robert Young, 550th CMMXS Industrial Engineering technician.

But, Mr. Young said it's worth it.

"The business office is continually looking for work -- it's the bread and butter of Midwest City. As long as we can keep the doors open here at Tinker, we want all the work," he said. "We repair aircraft, it's what we do. These workloads make for job security."
Erik Stengel, Boeing project manager, agreed and said he is looking forward to Tinker being awarded the workload.

"It's a great shared workload," he said. "It's a new capability with all this support equipment we have installed here. It's a good workload for the OC-ALC and we'll have two sources of repair, because right now they're currently being repaired at Parker, which has sites in California and Michigan."