Technology and Data in Aircraft Maintenance
Over the last two decades, and especially in the last ten years, I have seen a shift in aviation maintenance practices toward technology driven maintenance plans. Technology has enabled aircraft operators and maintenance technicians to use sensors, failure data, and predictive analytics to determine when systems and components fail.
In the civilian sector as well as the Department of Defense, aircraft and accompanying ground systems will tell the user when they need to be fixed. While the “glossy brochure” may not always equal the reality of what happens on the flight line, it is truly amazing how far we have come in predictive analytics and conditioned based maintenance.
The Government Accountability Office published a report in Dec 2022 titled “Military Readiness: Actions Needed to Further Implement Predictive Maintenance on Weapon System” that included 16 recommendations for the Military Services to implement predictive maintenance and assess performance (Defense Acquisition University, n.d.).
Definitions:
- CBM (Condition Based Maintenance) – the practice of performing maintenance only when a specific condition warrants the action, as opposed to time based or predictive maintenance (Meissner et al., 2021).
- CBM+ (Condition Based Maintenance Plus) – a Department of Defense readiness enabler and strategic approach to life cycle management that is cost effective. It uses hardware, software, communication, processes, and other tools to improve maintenance processes and practices (Crooks & Plawecki, 2021).
- IVHM (Integrated Vehicle Health Management) – Sensors and technology onboard an aircraft that can collect, analyze, record, and transmit performance data to determine future failure conditions (Crooks & Plawecki, 2021).
- PHM (Prognostics and Health Management) – technology used for early fault detection and projection of fault detection (Meissner et al., 2021).
In some platforms it is now possible to:
- Determine failures on engines and transmissions based on sensor data from onboard collection during a normal flight (i.e. non-functional check flight).
- Perform early removal of components ahead of failure based on mean time between failure data.
- Adjust scheduled maintenance intervals based on use IVHM feedback and criticality.
Maintenance professionals that can interpret and understand the outputs of the information age and then convert outputs into more reliable systems and airframes will succeed in the maintenance departments of the future.
References:
Crooks, K., & Plawecki, N. (2021). Novel Approach to CBM+ Implementation on Aviation Systems. 2021 Annual Reliability and Maintainability Symposium, 1–6. https://doi.org/10.1109/RAMS48097.2021.9605703
Defense Acquisition University. (n.d.). Condition Based Maintenance Plus. Retrieved on August 22, 2023 from, https://www.dau.edu/acquipedia/pages/ArticleContent.aspx?itemid=503
Meissner, R., Rahn, A., & Wicke, K. (2021). Developing prescriptive maintenance strategies in the aviation industry based on a discrete-event simulation framework for post-prognostics decision making. Reliability Engineering & System Safety, 214, 107812. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ress.2021.107812
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