FT. EUSTIS, Va. –
The 7th Sustainment Brigade sent five Soldiers from Fort Eustis and Joint Expeditionary Base-Fort Story to AM General's Research and Development Plant in Livonia, Mich., a suburb of Detroit. Their mission was to assist AM General in their rewrite of the M1097R1 High Mobility Multi Wheeled Vehicle Interactive Electronic Technical Manual for a total of 51 days.
Sgt. Robert Schwark, Spc. Joel Elizondo, Spc. Eric Papineau, Spc. Vince Driver and Spc. Kurtis Gilley, all holding the Military Occupational Specialty of either 91B-wheeled vehicle mechanic, or 91L-construction equipment repairer, participated in the successful completion of the verification and validation portion of this project.
These Soldiers attended this training because the United States Army is transitioning away from a four-level maintenance system, which is comprised of unit level, direct support, general support and depot maintenance. The new, two-level maintenance system will combine the echelons of unit level and direct support to what is now known as Field Maintenance, and combine general support and depot to make Sustainment Maintenance.
Field Maintenance will be characterized by "on-system maintenance," and Sustainment Maintenance will be "off-system maintenance." Field Maintenance will be repair and return to user; Sustainment Maintenance will be repair and return to supply. Some of the advantages of the two-level maintenance system are a reduced logistics footprint in the battlefield, faster returns of equipment to the fight, decreased equipment evacuation requirements, increased productivity of maintainers, and therefore increased combat power, and possible force structure savings.
The four-level maintenance system was adopted just before the beginning of World War II and has served the Army well over the past 70 years. However, because the Army is constantly changing, the methods of operation must change along with it to stay ahead of the fight. The Army's four-level system works by the simplest task being performed at the lowest echelon above operator or crew level, when a maintenance procedure is beyond the resources of a given echelon the procedure is evacuated to a higher echelon.
"To have full vehicle maintenance in area operations, levels through General Support must all be deployed since maintenance capabilities only exist in certain levels of this system," according to Maj. Gen. Mitchell Stevenson, who authored "Army Maintenance Transformation."
During the 51 days the soldiers were in Michigan, they had the opportunity to remove just about every part attached to the HMMWV, and reinstall as per instructions from the IETM. Along the way, they checked for any errors or wording issues within the text of the manual. Along with completion of the maintenance tasks, the Soldiers performed various diagnostic, troubleshooting procedures.
Additionally, the technicians of AM General would bug the vehicle by placing intentional faults in the HMMWV's primary systems, and have the soldiers use the IETM to assist them in correcting the faults.
The Soldiers of the 7th Sustainment Brigade were able to participate in not only a much needed technical manual rewrite, helping to ensure the these manuals are correct for Soldiers, but also excellent training, giving them all additional hands on experience on the HMMWV. These Soldiers gave their best efforts to ensure proper information and procedures will be published for their comrades and future Soldiers.