Greasing the wheels

  • Published
  • By Master Sgt. Collen McGee
  • 433rd Airlift Wing Public Affairs
LACKLAND AIR FORCE BASE, Texas --  His two jobs are worlds apart. One evokes mental images of an almost sterile work center, but his Reserve job is full of wheel grease and runway grime. Staff Sgt. George Meza is also a wheel and tire specialist. He's a traditional Reservist and has a civilian job in San Antonio with a print shop that prints packaging materials for surgical needles and suture supplies.

It's that divergence Sergeant Meza says he loves about his work with the 433rd AW.
"It's not an everyday job," said Sergeant Meza.

In fact, the two careers are so different that Sergeant Meza's civilian coworkers often ask him about his Reserve weekends.

"They always ask what it was like," said Sergeant Meza as he rolls a 150-pound tire onto a stand for disassembly. "Every weekend I come, I learn different things."

Always having something fresh to do and learn, has kept Sergeant Meza coming back to the Reserve for nine years.

Staff Sgt. Charlie Morales is an Air Reserve Technician with the 433rd Airlift Wing's Wheel and Tire Shop. As an ART, Sergeant Morales works full time for the Alamo Wing. Sergeant Morales, even though he's a full-time member, also said the daily tasks in the wheel and tire shop are anything but monotonous.

"If I'm not in the shop, I'm out on the flight line," said Sergeant Morales about the variety of his work. "It's landing gear today, maybe tomorrow it's wings or slats. There's always a challenge."

It was wheel and tire day. The two Airmen were dismantling nine C-5 main landing gear wheels. Each wheel has a split rim that, under pressure, can separate with explosive force if proper safety precautions aren't followed. The two check the technical order and set up a pattern to take each step in order, ensuring the tire comes apart without a violent reaction. Sergeant Morales said the tires are deflated when removed from the aircraft and the valve stems are removed. Then it has to be separated from the rim, the bearing are removed for cleaning and repacking with wheel and axle grease, the rim halves are separated and steam cleaned before a new or re-tread tire can be mounted.

With the challenge of new tasks and of making sure each task is completed well, with quality results, both Airmen get to see their aircraft maintenance efforts pay off in the sky above San Antonio.

"I can look up and see an aircraft flying and say, 'I was working on that aircraft today,'" said Sergeant Morales. "It's a good feeling when I see a C-5 flying."