2nd Cav. Regt. Soldiers attend 'Stryker University'

By Lt. Col. Steven Schultz, commander, ASFBn-GermanyJune 23, 2015

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ROSE BARRACKS, VILSECK, Germany -- Soldiers from the 2nd Cavalry Regiment are attending the Army's only Stryker Common Chassis Sustainment Maintenance course, which began this week at Vilseck, Germany. This is the first iteration of the course which will occur quarterly.

The two-week course, known simply as "Stryker University," is a collaboration of a number of key agencies and was developed to address new maintenance challenges.

In early February, the 2nd Cav. Regt.'s Stryker fleet reached an operational readiness rate of less than 60 percent.

The sharp decline in Stryker readiness was largely a result of challenges in the transition from contracted maintenance support to relying primarily on Soldier mechanics for repairs. The 2nd Cav. Regt. had to develop a way to retrain its maintenance sections on some of the basic trouble-shooting skills that were lost due to heavy reliance on contracted maintenance support.

The 405th Army Field Support Brigade, working with its TACOM and Combined Arms Training Center partners, spearheaded an effort to sharpen the skills of the cavalry's Soldier mechanics. The result is a class designed to provide Stryker system maintainers the fundamental skills beyond Advanced

Individual Training to perform common chassis/drive train and automotive diagnostic troubleshooting, malfunction isolation and corrective actions on the common automotive chassis systems of all Stryker platforms.

TACOM automotive logistics assistance representatives are serving as the course instructors with Gary Cameron fulfilling the role of instructor and Jeff Amos as the assistant instructor.

"It is an honor to be in the forefront of teaching this important Stryker sustainment and readiness focused course to our customers," said Amos.

The class consists of 12 mechanics. Classroom and hands-on training for each of the topics covered in the sustainment course will lend experience to the students -- MOS 91S and 91B -- working on the very systems they maintain back at their unit.

The Soldiers will receive training on system functionality and how different systems affect each other. They will also train on maintenance support devices and numerous software programs that maintain modern Army equipment.

The course is utilizing three Infantry Carrier Vehicles furnished by 2nd Cav. Regt. for the common chassis portion of the training, along with a Full Up Power Pack and special tools, all of which are stored at the CATC at Rose Barracks.

The TACOM and CATC team now offer the only Stryker sustainment maintenance course in the Army. The team is currently working to develop additional courses to support the needs and maintenance issues of Stryker specific variants like the Mobile Gun System, Mortar Carrier and Anti-Tank Guided Missile.