Administrative documents are written for readers who were not present, and DA Form 2408-13-3 is no exception. Titled AIRCRAFT TECHNICAL INSPECTION WORKSHEET, it is used to aircraft technical inspection worksheet — a transaction that means little in conversation and a great deal in a file. The published edition here carries the date 11/01/1991 and the status ACTIVE. Its 1 page(s) and roughly 200 fields are sized to what the record must prove years later, which is always more than the moment appears to need.
The form has an author and an occasion, held by different authorities. G-4 owns the content and reshapes it when what is being recorded changes. PAM 738-751 governs the event that calls for the form and the route the finished document takes afterwards. Keeping those two apart is what allows a procedure to be amended without the page being rebuilt each time.
Identification precedes substance for a structural reason. Name, identification number, organisation and date of preparation are how the finished document is located in a file or a database; the body of the form is what someone reads after the search has succeeded. Spell the name as official records spell it, since the search runs against those records and not against habit.
The rules of entry all trace back to the page being fixed in advance. Tabbing follows the order built into the form, which usually matches how the page reads and misses less than clicking. An exclusive group discards the earlier selection because contradictory entries would make the record unusable. One-line fields have no wrap because print positions are predetermined, so an overlong entry displays fully and prints truncated. Longer text goes to the remarks area or a continuation, both provided for exactly that. Where nothing applies, the nil mark is entered — a blank leaves the reader unable to tell a considered answer from a skipped one.
The signature is the point at which entries become an assertion someone stands behind, so it follows everything else and its absence leaves a draft. Countersignatures by reviewing, approving or witnessing officials each carry their own weight and are dated at signing, which is how the file preserves the order of responsibility. Seen that way, the familiar errors are not clerical trivia: an unanswered mandatory field, digits transposed in an identification number, day and month reversed, and residue from a reused file each put something false or unresolved into a document that will be relied upon.
Personal information may not be gathered silently, and the Privacy Act statement is how that obligation is met on paper: it names the collection authority, the purpose, the routine uses and whether disclosure is mandatory. Because it exists to inform a decision, it belongs before the fields it covers rather than after them. A filled copy then holds personal data and is stored and transmitted under the corresponding safeguards.
Download the form
The published formats — PDF — reflect the range of places a form gets filled in. Where there is a computer, the fillable pdf supplies live fields that keep entries positioned and readable. Where there is not, the printable pdf gives the identical page as flat artwork for pen entry. The distinction is one of setting rather than of authority; the page is the same document in both.
The choice of application decides whether your work survives. Browsers render pdfs as documents to be read; where a viewer shows fields without a mechanism to store them, typed text disappears when the tab closes, and nothing announces the loss. A full reader treats the file as a form and preserves entries on save.
There is no charge and no sign-up. Published documents are distributed as published, without modification.
What the form asks for
- AcftHrsA
- AcftHrsB
- AcftHrsC
- AcftHrsD
- AcftHrsE
- AcftHrsF
- AcftHrsG
- AcftHrsH
- ActCodeD
- ActCodeF
- ActCodeG
- ActCodeH
- ActionD
- ActionF
- ActionG
- Action_H
- CATD
- CATDD
- CATDDD
- CATDDD_1
- CATDD_1
- CATD_1
- CAT_F
- CAT_FF
Where the signed form goes is settled by PAM 738-751 rather than by the office holding it — a named recipient, the unit administrative channel, or the individual's own file, depending on why it was raised. Retention likewise belongs to the records schedule for the series, which exists so documents are kept for as long as anyone might need them and no longer. Keep a copy before release; the original serves the file from then on, not you.
Series and number are how the DA series signals which documents belong together, and the grouping follows real process boundaries: a shared proponent or directive usually means a shared purpose. A form cited on the face of another is part of that same transaction, and continuation sheets, covers and transmittals complete it.
Revision follows the process, which is why editions appear without a fixed interval, and the printed date rather than any version number identifies them. Nothing on a stored copy signals that it has aged; the check is manual. Work already completed under a superseded edition stands as filed, because the record was made under those terms and is properly interpreted under them.
It is worth being plain about what this page is within all of the above. The files are reproductions of published Department of the Army documents, offered for download by a site with no official standing and no part in issuing anything. That matters because the machinery described here — proponency, prescribing directives, records schedules — runs entirely elsewhere. Nothing written here is legal advice, and no statement can be made about whether an office will accept a given document. G-4 and the administrative office servicing your unit answer questions of entry, requirement and eligibility, and they are the ones positioned to.
Questions and answers
- What is DA Form 2408-13-3?
- AIRCRAFT TECHNICAL INSPECTION WORKSHEET
- Which edition is current?
- 11/01/1991
- Who is responsible for this form?
- G-4
- In which formats can it be downloaded?
- PDF, PDF
Publisher notes
- 41-ITEM ALSO PRODUCED IN ELECTRONIC MEDIA