Best Crew Chiefs...

[Double T]

Much is spoken of leading-edge aircraft design and high-levels of pilot-training.
Little or nothing is spoken of the crew-chiefs and ground maint. crews that made these aircraft mission-ready. In their minds, the pilots were only loaned these aircraft to take them for a drive.
When they were on the ground, they were the crew-chief's airplane.
Who had the best crew-chiefs?
Nationality?
Branch of Service?

PS: Hat's off to all the crew chiefs and maint. personnel that kept them running and ready to answer the call.

Tim

[Double T]

I'll wager this will be a difficult question to answer without nationalism becoming involved.
I'll bet the Germans had "master-mechanics." (Master-race. Get it?)
I'll bet the Russians could change spark-plugs in minus 40 below temps without gloves.
I'll bet the US Marines could build a Wildcat out of parts and still whip some nipponese-butt.
I'll bet the Japanese had trouble keeping crew-chiefs. If the engine miss-fired, they all committed seppukku.
I'll bet the British could swap an engine before the next "tea-time" rolled-around.

C'mon. Jump-in. Who'd I miss?

Tim

[Red Admiral]

Nah, the US just threw the planes away after they ran out of fuel :)

[andyo2000]

Hmm, Italian mechanics could go very slowly - the pilots took hours to go home and kiss their mothers goodbye before flights.

[simon]

As much as the national stereotypes and terms here are intended to be light hearted, please be careful with the words you use. "Nip" for example does have racist overtones in English when referring to the Japanese, yes I am aware that it is an abbreviate of Nippon which is the Japanese word for Japan and historically 1940s USMC members may have referred to the Japanese using that word, but nevertheless I would rather not see it used here.

Not wishing to sound oversensitive and overly PC here, but let's remember we are an international grouping.

[Double T]

That better Simon?
Sincerely,
Insensitive Tim

[Mark J]

My Uncle served with the New Zealand fighter wing in the Solomons, as a radio man servicing P-40's.
99% of the time they were on US bases so a certain amount of national pride kept the kiwi ground crew a little more 'effective' under the watchful gaze of their American counterparts. It was ussual for a US fighter to be scrapped if repairs or sometimes even just a major service seemed a little too time consuming. Not so for our boys who had to account for every piece of hardware lost or broken with mountains of paperwork, lend-lease or not, it was just the way of our services. So, parts were repaired, remade, scrounged ( sometimes stolen ) and borrowed. The servicability of the NZ P-40's was considered better than any other wartime aircraft in the Solomon campaign and they even worked on US aircraft. There is a story of a New Zealand ground crewman who saw a USAAF P-40 being pushed into a junk pile. He asked the guys if he could have the engine. Thinking this was another NZ request of spare parts, they asked him what he wanted the engine for and he said he wanted it for a speedboat project back in NZ. The US guys helped him take it out with promises of meeting up after the war, for a ride! I believe it actually worked.

cheers