Establishing an approach to systematically improve the effectiveness of fleet support

The emergence of technologies that support the implementation of condition based maintenance and autonomic logistics systems motivate the examination of the support systems associated with existing fleets of military and commercial aircraft with the goal of improving fleet performance. This paper describes an approach to answer the question of where one should invest to achieve the greatest return in an iterative continuous improvement process. Key activities or process features that may yield return are the implementation of: diagnostic and prognostic strategies for line replacement units (LRUs) in major platform subsystems. Maintenance, logistics and operations planning and management. Intermediate/depot test and repair strategies, implementation of infrastructure functions to move data off of the platform as well as capture crew and maintenance personnel input. This paper builds on earlier work in applying the theory of constraints as the core of a continuous improvement process to direct investments in legacy support systems. The paper casts fleet support as a process where throughput is fleet readiness; inventory is the platforms, support equipment, spares and maintainers; and work in process is the current or predicted faults/degradations that must be addressed to return the platform to service requirements or opportunistically maintain its serviceability. In comparison to the earlier work, the process model has been improved and is more comprehensive. The fleet simulation tool that is used as the basis for examining potential bottlenecks and in estimating the return of TOC compliant improvement strategies (those that simultaneously increase throughput while reducing inventory and work in process) has been upgraded. Also, the role and use of an analysis/data mining tool to identify process bottlenecks based on fleet data are described. A defined and accepted approach for the systematic improvement of fleet support is made all the more crucial by the active involvement of multiple partners (that may include the customer) in ventures such as performance based logistics. It provides the common reference model to coordinate partner actions as well as estimate partner return on investment across organization (inter and intra) boundaries.