My (over) 6,000 hrs was all loged as a C-130 FE. I have 2,200 hrs Combat time in SEA,A DFC and 11 Air Medals,10 stars on My VM campaign Ribbon.
I was an instructor,FCF,Awads,Halo, Lapes, Plads,Grads Etc.
before going to "Flight Mechanic"yes that was the name of the course at
Sewart AFB in July 1964 I was a crew chief on C-130A 55-0013 at Tachi.
Pope 779th 64-66 (3 deployments to SEA)
Mactan 66
Sewart(61st)67-68
CCK 345th 68 -73
LRAFB(61st)73-ret-77
Utapao, Easter Bunny(air drops in Cambodia) 6 months(179 days)
2 rotes to Howard AB canal Zone
so many rotes to Mildenhall,and Rhein Main I can't even count them.
Most SEFE that asked crap questions were just tryin to show how smart they were. Some of them would fly"in country" toward the end of the month.give a few "no notice" check rides,get credit for 2 months combat pay then fly back to home base,set around the office thinking up chicken shit questions trying to impress people with there useless knowledge.
I declined becoming a SEFE as I prefered Flying Missions instead of setting around bragging about how much systen knowledge they had.Learn your Emergengy Procedures,and study the "G"file but that is why we carried the TOs.If you know where to find the info you need,a lot of that "Minutae" is just useless crap. Learn about things you can do something about in flight and how to get your ass back on the ground.When you go to debriefing then you can explain the problem to the proper Maint Troop.
My 3 cents worth