Editor’s Note: An earlier version incorrectly spelled Ian Campbell’s name wrong in the story. The story has been updated to correct these errors.

Detail Dawgs, SIU’s own aviation maintenance team, has been a life-changing experience for many people involved.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the RSO, as many things did, came to a screeching halt. However, they’re back and they’re busy.

James Barker, the faculty manager, remembers a time when they excelled. 

“When I was a student in the program, the Detail Dawgs were around… It was a really cool program,” Barker said.

“We’re a competitive maintenance team. We’re meeting twice a week, but we train for the maintenance competition that happens once a year.” Liam Dunn, a member and officer of Detail Dawgs, said,

“What that looks like for us can be really different depending on what we’re training for.”

Barker was not the only one who thought highly of the group, and certainly not the only one who dreamed of bringing it back.

“I noticed some students that were going above and beyond and I thought this might be a good chance to get that program back up and running,” Barker said. “Sure enough, they had the motivation to see it through.”

Ian Campbell, the president of the RSO, sought to create a maintenance team that could keep up with an already successful flight team. 

 “My brother is on the flight team… so, seeing how they can make these amazing connections through their alumni and through the companies that they work with, that was a really, really cool thing,” he said.

The SIU School of Aviation is well known for its flight team.

“If we can make the Detail Dawgs into something as outstanding and credible, that would be an amazing opportunity for all of the people involved,” Campbell said.

Dunn said he knew he wanted to be a pilot by the time he was in fourth or fifth grade. 

“I loved airplanes,” Dunn said. “I remember playing on the playground and looking up at them and being like, ‘Wow, I wanna be the person that flies those.’” 

“While I was in the maintenance training here, early on, I had heard about a club that used to exist called the Detail Dawgs,” he said. “Hearing that there was a competitive maintenance team at one time, I’m like ‘Wow, that’s super cool. I wish we still had it,’ … And there were a lot of other people that shared my same feelings … and we were like ‘Well, let’s bring it back.’” 

Bruce Brown, a member of the SIU advisory board for Aviation, an SIU graduate and developmental test engineer for GE Aerospace, decided to sponsor the Detail Dawgs after speaking with the students when he was a guest lecturer at the Veterans Airport.

“I could just see the passion in their eyes when they were talking about a maintenance competition,” Brown said. 

With the help of Brown, his family and GE Aerospace, the Detail Dawgs were able to attend their first competitive event in Atlanta last spring. 

As a member of the SIU advisory board for the School of Aviation, Brown says, “We have our charter which is to support the university maybe once or twice a year. But, my passion for aviation spills over into wanting to help the kids directly.”

Dunn described this annual event, hosted by the Aerospace Maintenance Council, as the “Olympics for aircraft mechanics.”

Before this competition, Brown welcomed the team into his home and took them to the Customer Technical Education Center for GE Aerospace based in Cincinnati and their test facility in Peebles, Ohio.

Brown said he values the time spent with these students. He set up a text chat with all of the students he welcomed into his home, and still keeps contact with them.

“Like I said, ‘Hello from Peebles.’ today, showing them a picture of an engine that they would recognize or a test site that they got to visit and talk about where we are and what we’re doing.” Brown said.

He also said he urges his fellow board members to find an RSO to support like he has. 

“There’s more than 20 aviation groups. I always say, ‘Open up your wallet, work with them to help them financially,’ but in my case, it’s more of a one-on-one personal relationship,” Brown said.

They’ve learned a lot from last year, but they’re working hard to progress.

“Flight gets all the glory but, the mechanics are the ones that keep the plane in the air and safe for the pilot and the passengers.” Barker said, “I like to try to make the connection that mechanics are kind of like doctors in the sense that what we do is really precise down to torquing something correctly, making sure everything is put where it should be, that we don’t miss any cracks or details like that because if we do mess up, it is people’s lives on the line.”

Practice is so important for the mechanics to maintain their skills, and know what they have to do to perform at their best, both in competition and in the field.

 “We are trying to build as many training aids as we can based off of last year’s competition so that we can show up as prepared as possible.” Dunn said.

These training aids cannot always be built for practice, unfortunately. 

“Some events are impossible to replicate, you have to have hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of equipment,” Campbell said.“We have to mime out how we’d do each procedure: what we’re going to say, how we’re going to act.” 

The Detail Dawgs will be in Orlando from April 20 to 23 for their next competition, showing their skills to their peers, their mentors, and potential future employers.

Networking, side by side with experience, is the most important part of this competition, Barker said.

“It’s given them an edge above other students in the program because they get to add this to their resume,” he said.“They get to better their mechanical skills and they get to meet people and make contacts that they wouldn’t normally.”

Brown’s own experience with GE Aerospace only came about on the recommendation of Richard Cannon, a former instructor at SIU. 

“I, admittedly, didn’t know that much about it,” Brown said. “That’s what drove me to submit a resume and interview in 1978 with GE and I was offered a job. So, as I said, almost 47 years later, I still have that passion.”

As the Detail Dawgs continue to hone their craft, the competition gets closer and closer. While it may be a source of anxiety, it’s also a source of pride for Brown.

“They’re here as a group of students representing the university in an international competition. I told them, ‘I honestly don’t care what your scores are. I just really just see the passion, the learning, the networking that you guys are doing that I’m really proud of,’” Brown said.

Staff Reporter Orion Wolf can be reached at [email protected] or orionwolf6 on Instagram

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