Small Arms/Towed Artillery Repairer

As a 91F, you kept the unit's weapons firing. You ran field and sustainment level maintenance on everything from the M4 and M249 to the M2 .50 cal, the MK19, mortar systems, and the towed howitzers like the M119 and M777. You diagnosed headspace and timing, swapped barrels and bolts, gaged worn parts to spec, and signed off on weapons going back to the line. The work mixes mechanical, hydraulic, and electronic principles, and the standard is zero tolerance for a weapon that does not function.

The training is no joke either. The 91F course runs about 13 weeks at the Ordnance School at Fort Gregg-Adams, Virginia (the post formerly known as Fort Lee). You learn schematics and wiring diagrams, electronic and mechanical test equipment, and the teardown and rebuild of conventional weapons and towed artillery. Some 91Fs also complete the added online coursework that earns a Gunsmith Certificate in Military Conventional Weapons, which is a real credential to put in front of a civilian employer.

Here is why a civilian shop cares. You already work to tight tolerances, you read technical manuals for a living, and you understand that one missed measurement can hurt someone. That precision-under-accountability mindset is exactly what gunsmithing, precision repair, machining, and quality inspection roles are built around. The trick is getting it onto paper in language a hiring manager understands, which is the whole reason this page exists. If you want to see how your skills line up against other repair fields, the military career crosswalk is a good place to start, and the related 91B Wheeled Vehicle Mechanic and 89B Ammunition Specialist pages cover adjacent ordnance paths.

I was a Navy Diver, never a 91F, but I know the silence that follows separation. I sent out applications for 18 months and heard nothing back, and it was not because the work was thin. It was because I could not say it in their words. A 91F has the same problem and worse: "small arms repairer" reads as narrow to someone who has never held a torque wrench, when in reality you are a precision technician who works to thousandths. Fix the translation and the callbacks follow. — Brad Tachi, Navy Diver veteran & BMR founder

The clearest civilian match is gunsmithing and precision firearms repair. Manufacturers, large retailers with service shops, and independent gunsmiths hire technicians who can headspace, fit, and repair to spec. BLS groups detailed precision-shop wages with related production roles, and Tool and Die Makers, a close skill cousin, post a median of $63,180 per year (BLS OEWS, May 2024). Precision Instrument and Equipment Repairers (O*NET 49-9069.00) is the cleanest catch-all O*NET code for armorers moving into civilian precision repair.

Maintenance and machinery roles take the rest of your skill set. Industrial Machinery Mechanics (O*NET 49-9041.00) earn a median of $63,510 (BLS OEWS, May 2024) and the field is growing faster than average as plants fight to keep equipment running. Machinery Maintenance Mechanics and general Maintenance and Repair Workers (O*NET 49-9071.00, median $48,620) hire constantly across manufacturing, utilities, and logistics, and your habit of diagnosing from a technical manual is a direct fit.

If you liked the inspection and gaging side of armorer work, Quality Control Inspectors (O*NET 51-9061.00, median $47,460) and Machinists (O*NET 51-4041.00, median $56,150) are strong landing spots, especially in defense manufacturing where your background is an asset rather than something to explain. Be honest with yourself about geography: gunsmithing and defense manufacturing cluster in specific regions, so the highest-paying precision roles may mean a move. The maintenance and quality roles are everywhere.

Defense primes and federal arsenals value this background directly. For a sense of how weapons-repair experience reads across branches, the Marine 2111 Small Arms Repairer and Navy GM Gunner's Mate pages map the same civilian targets. For the trades side of the house, our guide to military-to-trade careers walks through how mechanical MOSs convert. When you are ready to put it on paper, the military resume builder turns your maintenance record into civilian language, or you can build your resume now and start matching to jobs today.

Federal weapons and equipment repair runs on the Wage Grade (WG) system, not the GS scale, and that is good news for a 91F. The closest match is WG-6606 Small Arms Repairing, the exact federal trade your MOS performs, found at Army depots, Marine Corps logistics bases, and federal law enforcement armories. WG-6605 Artillery Repairing covers the towed-howitzer half of your job at installations like the Rock Island and Anniston arsenals. Both typically post in the WG-8 to WG-10 range depending on installation and your documented experience.

The optics and fire-control side of artillery work maps to WG-3306 Optical Instrument Repair, where your experience with sights, scopes, and laser rangefinders counts. For technicians who moved into machining or parts fabrication, WG-3414 Machining is a direct federal trade. On the salaried side, GS-0802 Engineering Technician and GS-1910 Quality Assurance hire former armorers who can read a spec and document a defect, often at GS-7 through GS-11.

One scoring note that trips up a lot of applicants: WG and GS rate experience differently. A WG announcement scores you on demonstrated trade skill and a job-element questionnaire, while GS scores you on specialized experience written in plain results. Spend your effort matching the announcement's exact language. Veterans' preference still applies on both, and your service connects to documented preference points. Our breakdown of WG vs GS federal pay explains which system fits your goals, and veterans' preference points covers the 5 vs 10 point question. When you draft the application, the federal resume builder formats it to OPM standards, and our full federal resume guide walks the process end to end.

If you are staying in weapons, gunsmithing, or precision repair, your terminology translates directly. Shops in that world know what headspace and timing means and they know a Gunsmith Certificate. This section is for careers OUTSIDE armament work, where a hiring manager has never seen a TM and needs your experience in business language.

The core move is to stop naming the weapon and start naming the skill. "Repaired M2 machine guns" tells a manufacturing recruiter nothing. "Diagnosed and rebuilt precision mechanical assemblies to manufacturer tolerances, returning equipment to full serviceability" tells them you belong on their floor. Lead with the measurement, the standard, and the outcome.

The before-and-after table below shows how to do it. For a deeper list, our 50 military terms translated to civilian language glossary and the military jargon decoder cover the terms armorers use most. If your evals hold the proof, the guide to converting NCOERs into resume bullets shows where to mine your accomplishments. The military resume builder handles the rewrite automatically, or get started here.