Osan maintainer awarded for discovering a better way to troubleshoot a fuel-flow problem with the A-10

Released by 51st Fighter Wing Public Affairs on their public website's photo section, titled: What could you do with 10,000 dollars



Tech. Sgt. Tremaine Smith, 51st Maintenance Group, was recently awarded $10,000 through the IDEA program for discovering a better way to troubleshoot a fuel-flow problem with the A-10 Thunderbolt II close air support aircraft. He fought for almost two years to make the change, which was finally approved and saved the Air Force almost $90,000. (U.S. Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Chad Thompson)



The fuel-flow transmitter regulates the fuel that goes to the engine and sends a signal back to the pilot that tells how much fuel is being sent to the engines. "It's a critical system component that gets the engines going and keeps the aircraft in the air," Tech. Sgt. Tremaine Smith said. "Without it the pilots would never get off the ground." Hundreds of feet of wire connect the fuel-flow gauge in the cockpit to the fuel-flow transmitter in the engine. Smith found two wires that were swapped in this harness that was causing a problem in an A-10 Thunderbolt II when he was stationed at Davis Monthan Air Force Base, Ariz. (U.S. Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Chad Thompson)



Tech. Sgt. Tremaine Smith holds the seven-pin cannon plug that connects the A-10 Thunderbolt II close air support aircraft engine to the fuel-flow transmitter. Smith found two wires that were swapped that was causing a fuel-flow problem. (U.S. Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Chad Thompson)



A view of the 39-pin cannon plug (top right) that connects the A-10 Thunderbolt II close air support aircraft engine to the fuel-flow gauge in the cockpit. Smith found two wires that were swapped in the wiring harness that was causing a fuel-flow problem. Hundreds of feet of wire connect the fuel-flow gauge in the cockpit to the fuel-flow transmitter in the engine. Had Smith not found the issue with the swapped wires the next step in the technical orders would have been replacing the wiring harness, which would have taken hundreds of man hours and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to replace. (U.S. Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Chad Thompson)