Some things really irk me! Morale must be at an all time low in the USMC
(no, I'm not intending to start another political discussion here...).
So far on my 1985 M998 HMMWV I have found the following amazing acts of
ignorance, stupidity, carelessness, and laziness:
1. I just removed the oil filter from my 1996 USMC overhauled 6.2 liter
diesel only to discover a USMC issue green earplug lodged between the block
and the filter. The ONLY way this could have gotten in there is if it was
placed there intentionally! Luckily Gomer Pyle placed it on the filter inlet
side where it couldn't really plug anything up.
2. A missing washer on a tie rod causing the cotter pin to not engage the
castellated nut. This allowed the nut to back off a few turns causing the
front suspension toe-in to be random and variable. This, combined with a
worn drag link and steering arm (probably never lubed since new) added up to
about 3 inches of toe-in/toe-out slop between the two front wheels.
3. No lubricant packs for the runflats in two of the tires....
4. A missing cotter pin on another steering component.
5. One out of three bolts missing on each and every exhaust joint.
6. Disabled neutral start switch...I discovered that one accidentally!
Although I can't run very fast, a HMMWV doesn't idle away from you very
quickly...luckily nobody got run over. Of course they cut and spliced the
body harness wires instead of the neutral start switch wires to bypass the
unit, so you can't just replace the neutral start switch, now you have to
fix the harness too.
7. A metric bolt forced into place to hold on the transmission oil pan.
Naturally the head snapped off as I removed it. Some cuss words and an
easy-out later I was able to successfully chase the threads and complete the
job.
8. One of the wheels had the O-Ring cut into two pieces, yet the excessive
grease slopped around the O-Ring area kept it from leaking. About a 2-inch
long piece of the O-Ring was floating around loose inside the tire.
Thankfully some ground pounder wan't forced to drive this crate into combat
in some foreign land (at the direction of some misguided politician trying
to make a legacy for himself), only to be further at risk when his HMMWV
craps out due to malicious pranks and negligence by his own "comrades."
I'm not sorry I bought the HMMWV (yet), but frankly I am quite surprised
that the military takes such poor care of their (our) vehicles. I realize
that these vehicles are used in an extreme environment, but there is no
excuse for a lack of preventative maintenance. When I was inspecting
vehicles at the time I purchased mine, I was shocked at how many trucks had
blown engines (and other serious maladies) with under 15,000 miles on them!
With all the manuals that the military publishes, you would think that they
would require people to read them! Your (at least the US list members) tax
dollars at work! Semper Fi????
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Tue Jan 02 2001 - 23:13:20 PST