After the Power Plant Bay, I was posted to Aircraft Maintainence Squadron [AMS] where all the second line servicing was carried out.
This was where the inspections that took more than a day, some took months, depending on the hours the aircraft had flown, happened.
We serviced Canberras, Vampires, C47s [DC3] Devons, Harvards.
All the Vampires were approaching the time when all the hoses that connected the five fuel tanks in each wing were replaced.
There were small holes in the bottom of the wing that with care you could put your hand in and undo the hose clips holding the hoses in position.
Then donate a bit of skin, and get the old piece of hose out. Get a new piece of hose, cut to the same size, and try and refit it.
The original hose had one ply of supporting braid in the middle of the hose wall. The new hose had two layers. This made the new hose so much stiffer.
We reckoned they had assembled the tanks then built the wings around them.
This was also a good job for the ‘morning after the night before’. Get a piece of string, tie it around one wrist, pass the string through the hole, over the tank pipe, back to the other wrist, and have a sleep.
To the people walking past it looked like you were struggling with a hose and they left you in peace, as long as you didn’t snore.
Another least favorite job for the engine fitters on Canberas was changing the fuel booster pump in the main fuel tanks in the fuselage.
The only access was through the bomb bay. This had a peaked roof, needing a pump on both sides of the tank.
The bomb bay doors had to be half closed so you could reach up to the 24 small nuts that held the pump in place.
No matter how hard you tried to get all the fuel out of the tank first, there was always five or six gallons sloshing around in the bottom of the tank.
Usually, after about the sixth nut, the Avtur[aviation kerosene] would start running down your arm, across the chest, and into lower regions.
Because of this we would strip off to our undies, wrap a couple of bangles of rags around the arm, and play ‘Heroes’. There were all sorts of muttering going on as well.
Being a mainly masculine work force it didn’t matter much. It was noticeable how long a bloke had worn his undies by the number of ‘blow holes’ in the rear.
Then the local school thought it would be good to take the little kids through the Base and show them all that was there.
Some of the young lady teachers go to see more than they had planned on. There was a giggle or two, then the sounds of the teachers trying to hurry the little kids away.
All the servicing was done by the card system. You got a card at the start of the day, checked/repaired/ replaced whatever was on the card, sign that you had carried out the work, hand it in and get another card.
The sergeant would then check to make sure you had done the job properly. The RNZAF was extremely safety conscious. Our safety record was one of the best in the world.
This also allowed for anybody to be dragged off a job with least interruption.
As a way to prevent aircraft accidents caused by lost tools, we had a shadow board where each tool was outlined in red.
Each man was issued ten tokens, when you took a tool off the board, you would replace it with your token, replace the tool and get your token back when you were finished with it.
Nobody left the hanger until each tool was back on the board. Sometimes it would be half past five before the tool was found and replaced.
It didn’t pay to be the cause of late knock offs too often. The rest of the guys had ways to teach you the foolishness of forgetting things.
In the fortnight leading up to Christmas 1967 two Canberras had been on exercise at Amberley, near Brisbane. The control tower had directed them through a hail storm, normally no great sweat.
These hail stones were bigger than cricket balls. They smashed the Navigator/Bomb Aimers front window [two layers of three-quarter inch thick perspex], Dented the leading edge of the wings, it took about thirty pounds of ‘bog’ to fill in the dents and damaged three of the engines so they required replacement.
A team was sent over to repair and recover the aircraft. To go from our 18 to 20 degrees temperature to Amberley’s 30 to 35 degrees was a bit of a shock at first but, we got used to it. We just rolled the shorts up a bit further.
Their airman’s club had their annual ball while we were there and we were invited, free. At the door the organizers had set up four suppers, one for each quarter of the room. The main item on the supper was prawns.
When the Kiwi’s got to the door we all given four supper tickets, so we could get four lots of prawns. Then we cleaned up any left overs on any of the plates around us as well.
One of their Squadrons was flying Sabres, with a British Avon engine, [similar to the Canberras] fitted to it.
We watched them do an engine change on a Sabre. The engine slid in on two rails that were bent a couple of times so the engine would clear some obstruction in the fuselage.
Later we would do similar with the Skyhawks.
We managed to repair the two Canberras and get home in time for Christmas.
While I was working in AMS, concern was expressed for the men who were working in the drafty hanger, so they replaced the concrete floor, in six sections, then put steam heating pipes in the roof.
Even when the steam had been on in the locked hanger all weekend there was very little difference in the temperature inside the hanger at floor level. The birds in the roof were very happy about the heating though.
With the increase of birds most weeks someone was given a .303” with a Mauser Tube fitted to bring it back to .22” and a hand full of ‘bird shot’ cartridges.[ a baby shot gun]
By the time the pellets reached the top of the hanger they had run out of steam and just politely tapped the birds on the shoulder requesting they move along a bit.
After a couple of years, my next posting was to the Technical Control Section.