What not to do - No excuse BMQ tips [Merged]

[danchapps]

As a former Instructor at the Armour School, there is no way that you can have even one 100% perfect inspection.  When I inspected Defaulters, it was manditory to find 20 faults.  If anyone gets a perfect inspection, it is because the Instructors are in an extremely good mood.  Hint: Now don't piss them off or you will find out how many faults they let you get away with.  Smears on windows.  Dust under the Captain's Beds.  Measurements wrong on your bed.  Buttons undone on your pants hanging in your locker.  Bedspaces not being identical.  Dirt/oil/carbon in your rifle.  Lint on your beret. .....................Ah!  Memories.

I was just throwing a number up in the air. I had a few inspections on BMQ that had no faults. I know where the faults were, but they weren't marked down on me. Trust me, I was lucky, but I made sure to keep my nose clean and work my a** off. After each inspection I'd make sure not to make the same mistake again. I agree with the no 100% inspections, it could never happen, even on a super platoon with all members working on al cubes.

 

[Lumber]

Hey, I should give that a try too, but scaled up a bit?  Maybe I'll leave one aircraft back in the hangar serviceable so that I don't break anything, and fly another one, but park it around the corner so people don't know I didn't take the other one.


Notice how stupid that sounds? 

Starting off doing things like this during basic training and potentially getting away with it (having been DS on BOQ, I can tell you we know a large % of the tricks that you think are witty and undetectable...) only reinforces an attitude of "finding a shortcut".  WRONG WAY TO START A CAREER!

2 more ¢

G2G

You misunderstand how I approach this. I didn't use a ghost kit to 'hide' my dirty kit. I used it so I wouldn't have to clean the kit I actually use. My staff actually straight up asked me when he noticed that the toothpaste tube was still full. "Are you brushing your teeth Mr. ********" "Yes, Sgt." "Are you using this toothpaste?" "No, Sgt." "Well what toothpaste are you using?" "The one in my personal box, Sgt." "What about the rest of it? Your razor, soap...?" "Don't use the soap Sgt, just the shampoo. And I use the razor and toothbrush that are in my personal box as well, Sgt."

If your going to cheat, man up to it. I wouldn never lie. Besides I don't see how it's cheating. They didn't say to have "the toothbrush you use out for inspection," and they certainly never said "do not have an extra toothbrush, in your personal box." They only ever said "follow the standard that is posted on the wall," which indicated I needed a clean toothbrush, soap and dish, razor, etc... I don't see how it is cheating, it's just properly reading and understanding the directions and requirements and using whatever tools at your disposal to make course as painless as possible. Grinding through it the hard way isn't "not cheating", its not taking advantage of the resources available to you....IMO...

 

[benny88]

Lumber,

  Respect for manning up, but you must have had SOME Sgt to not have your ass turned inside out.

Besides I don't see how it's cheating. They didn't say to have "the toothbrush you use out for inspection," and they certainly never said "do not have an extra toothbrush, in your personal box." They only ever said "follow the standard that is posted on the wall," which indicated I needed a clean toothbrush, soap and dish, razor, etc...

eeeh, technically, but I wouldn't try to sell that to a member of the platoon staff.

 

[Lumber]

Respect for manning up, but you must have had SOME Sgt to not have your *** turned inside out.

It's weird. We only ever got our ***es turned inside out if we ****ed up h-core. Like when our CPC (Cadet Platoon Commander) marched us to lunch because our staff was late and he assumed they meant for us to meet them after lunch. Even the cadets on the course (both courses, IAP and BOTP) who had done BMQ, SQ and even some DP1s  said they were surprised how much more relaxed the staff was compared to the staff on their NCM courses.

 

[benny88]

  Interesting, I guess every course is different. I had pretty reasonable staff too, but don't think I would have gotten away with admitting to a ghost kit!

 

[Lumber]

Well I didn't get turned out, but later on they said they didn't want to see extra toothbrush and shaving cream in our personal box. They never said we still coudln't have them somewhere else, so we just put them back into our suitcases before inspection in the morning. Again, an all-too literal interpretation of what they said, but technically valid. Besides, they said "be smart, don't put it right where we can see it," or something to that affect, which pretty much tells me they know and expect us to be hiding a ghost kit, just that we should learn not to be dumb about it.

Normally on IAP they had no problems with cellphones, but one morning the sections commanders switched which sections they were inspecting. Our MCpl found a cellphone inside someones personal box (he didn't open it up, the lid was off :O), and everything that cadet owned, I mean EVERYTHING in his entire "cubicle", ended up in the cubicles of those around him.

Interesting story that relates cellphones and getting turned out, I mistakenly carried my cellphone with my in my brest pocket while we did Bayonet Training this summer on BOTP. It fell out while we were doing push-ups and suicides. I forgot it on the ground and a SGT found it. "Whos Cell Phone is this!?!" he screamed in anger and disgust. "Oh, that would be mine, SGT!" I belowed immediately. "Don't carry your cellphone on you," is all he had to say to me.

 

[pmbrunelle]

Bring a cellphone and call your sweetie whenever possible, without regard to the phone bill  :  And keep a picture of your sweetie with you at all times, no matter what.  An actual physical printed on paper photograph, so that when your cellphone battery dies, say in the field, you can still look at their pic.  I have mine in my upper left combat shirt pocket close to the heart lol.  Forget about the standard  >

Anyway, that's how I passed my reserve infantry course.  The rest is details.

Some people's course mentality is to forget about their civilian lives and go into 100% robot soldier mode, but personally, I can't do it.  I have emotions, and I think it's better to learn to do your job with them than to suppress them.  We're human aren't we?

 

[aesop081]

We're human aren't we?

No.

I'm an aerial kill-bot ,devoid of any emotion, from which there is no escape.

I dont understand the point behind the second part of your post.

 

[pmbrunelle]

Lol I don't really know either.  Well what I'm saying is that you can be devoid of emotion (I do it all the time) for a certain amount of time but eventually you're just gonna go nuts if you bottle it in.  Don't try bottling everything indefinately.

 

[DJS]

Thank goodness for websites like this!! You guys are sure takin alot of weight off my shoulders!

 

[benny88]

  Ha, an OCdt on my platoon tried to bring her cell phone to Farnham when we were in the shacks there doing weapons training. Got booted off course.

 

[Nfld Sapper]

  Ha, an OCdt on my platoon tried to bring her cell phone to Farnham when we were in the shacks there doing weapons training. Got booted off course.

I find that very hard to believe.

 

[aesop081]

  Ha, an OCdt on my platoon tried to bring her cell phone to Farnham when we were in the shacks there doing weapons training. Got booted off course.

There were other factors in this incident. I was not there but i am certain of it. I have worked as an instructor in our training system, i know how difficult it is to get rid of someone sometimes.

 

[Lumber]

During BOTP this summer after completing a combat estimate exam,

Capt. ***** "Congradulation ** Plt, you all passed your test."
** Plt "Wooot wooot! yayyy! High-five!"
Capt. ***** "You can thank standards for that, because I wasn't alowed to fail a one of you. Just realise if you see a passing 60% on your test that I personally would have failed half of you,."

We also had an incident where a DS and our Plt Capt got in a shouting match (loud enough that we could hear) because the DS passed the biggest bag in our Plt for her final tasking. Accoding to him she just pulled it out of arse and did a good job, but the Capt. wanted to fail her anyhow. Standards came to her rescue, once again.

 

[Nfld Sapper]

Tell me about it CDN Aviator, took alot of paperwork to get rid of a guy from the course I was working on.

 

[Roy Harding]

Thank goodness for websites like this!! ...

Why the plural reference?  As far as I can tell, there's only ONE "website like this".

Regardless - best of luck to you.

 

[benny88]

There were other factors in this incident.

  Yeah, absolutely. The incident I refer to was the straw that broke the camel's back.

 

[Nfld Sapper]

  Ha, an OCdt on my platoon tried to bring her cell phone to Farnham when we were in the shacks there doing weapons training. Got booted off course.

   Yeah, absolutely. The incident I refer to was the straw that broke the camel's back.

As you see in your original post it appears that the cell phone was the only incident, better be careful how you word items like that.

 

[Danjanou]

Amusing thread. Guys trust me having taught more than a few recruit and other course during a lengthy career, you are not pulling one off on the instructors no mattert how much you may think you are. We/they are smarter than you and know all the dirty tricks.

Its like a teenager trying to fool their parents, you may think you got away with it but said parent was a teenager once too.

Every instructor had to go through BMQ or GMT (R&B) at some time. After that they had to complete many more trade and leadership qualifications to get where they are standing in front of you checking over your kit. Aside for  the skills learned that's a lot of inspections and cleaning, years sometimes decades worth.

We may let you think you got away with some small thing like a spare tooth brush if it’s in the best interests of the CF, your personal growth, the platoon etc. Conversely we may use it as the reason to get rid of you as in the cell phone incident noted.

Like GW said there is no such thing as 100% if we need to find something wrong we will. Often we don’t need to. Concentrate on what you’re there for learning to be part of something important.

 

[Springroll]

"2nd kit to save time", why not just find a way to be proficient and use one kit. How far will you make it in an Army career if you cut corners from the very beginning. 

If you feel like folding your undies 4x6 everyday, scrubbing the soap suds and gunk out of your soap dish, etc, then by all means do it. When you are given 15 minutes between breakfast and inspection, you will see how very valuable a second set of everything is. You can then focus your energy on the stuff that matters, like getting all the sand out of your gas mask, ensuring your uniform is up to snuff, ironing your bed and dusting (those darn dustbunnies are EVERYWHERE!!) etc. 

Not to mention that the instructors at St.Jean no doubt surf this site and are probably member themselves! SO theres no bloody fooling them, they know what's up.

Guaranteed they are, and have probably posted some of the tips in this very section....hehe  >

My best advice to you, silent_steve, is at least read all the tips and tricks and store them up top. When you feel there is a perfect time and place to use them, then do so. Nobody is saying you have to use any of these, but they will definitely make your life alot easier if you do. You will worry less about all the little things because you know they are done right, and can then focus your energy on the bigger things like team building with your platoon.

Now, I can not remember who it was that posted about the hair, but here is my take on it.
I had long hair before I joined. Figuring I didn't want to worry about it, I cut it off before I got sworn in.
I went for one haircut in the time I was at basic(mighty great cut too!). I was in St Jean for 5 months.
Do I regret cutting it, yes and no.
I miss my long hair and will probably grow it out again eventually, but for now I enjoy it only taking me 10 minutes to wash, condition and dry it. Really, the only person that has to live with the cutting is you, and keep in mind that it is only hair and it will grow back.
Also, do NOT go to the barber on the base for any haircuts, ladies. Wait for your free weekend and head to the mall and see a real stylist. You will regret it, unless your going in to shave it all off.

Cheers!