Members of Moody’s Air Force Repair and Enhancement Program have been repairing seven gull fuel testers since October of last year.

A gull fuel tester is a fuel systems appliance that analyzes the wiring within an aircraft for the fuel capacity and resistance, which mainly affects the indication portion of a fuel management system on the A-10C Thunderbolt II aircraft. The AFREP team has currently restored two of seven fuel testers and continues to work toward fixing more — leading the way in Air Combat Command.

“Throughout the Air Force and all the different AFREP’s in ACC, we’ve done the most comprehensive repairs on gull testers,” said Staff Sgt. Favian Sanchez, 23rd Maintenance Group AFREP technician. “So, (ACC) felt comfortable giving us the seven in hopes that we would get some of them fixed up.”

Due to outdated information and age of the testers, the process to complete them can be challenging because the A-10C aircraft is no longer produced.

“A lot of the gull tester’s information is old and the manufacturers of these specific testers no longer exist,” explained Staff Sgt. Robert Kinlin, 23rd Maintenance Group AFREP technician. “There’s only a handful left serviceable in the Air Force, so getting even one fixed is a big deal.”

In the case that a base doesn’t have a fuel tester it lessens their capacity to generate airpower due to the inability to accurately indicate an aircraft’s fuel level. By repairing more gull fuel testers, it allows for more combat capable fighter squadrons throughout ACC.

With each tester having diverse issues, the effort and tasks to fix them can vary.

“It can take a couple days or a couple months to fix a gull tester depending on its issues,” Sanchez said. “On top of that, some of the parts are no longer acquirable.”

Because some parts are unavailable, AFREP has to acquire them through other means. A cannibalizing, or cann, gull fuel tester is used only for its parts in the case that parts are difficult to obtain.

“In most cases, we take a part from a (cann) gull tester,” said Sanchez. “The tester is usually so far gone that we would rather use the good parts from it instead of repairing the unit.”

As the AFREP team continues to restore gull fuel testers, the testers will be sent to bases in need.

“Nellis AFB will be first on the list to receive a newly restored gull tester,” said Tech. Sgt. Gregory Martin, 23rd Maintenance Group AFREP manager, “and the other completed tester will be shipped to the Warner Robins (Air Logistics Complex) for distribution.”

The AFREP team plans on completing all seven gull testers in the near future. All incomplete gull fuel testers will be returned to Warner Robins to become cann testers.

As the team continues working to fix more gull fuel testers, leadership expresses their support, maintaining faith that if anyone can repair the testers it’s the AFREP team here at Moody, said Martin.