By Vicky Falcón
NAVAIR Public Affairs Office

The effects of age on the Navy’s aircraft and their associated components have led to increased budgets for operations and maintenance. Aviation components (such as gearboxes, engine turbines and radios) are getting old and experiencing accelerated wear as a result of extended operations overseas. These aging and often reworked parts have led to a decline in reliability and an increase in Aviation Depot Level Repairable (AVDLR) component repair costs.

The problem is so expensive that component repair costs are eating up more than 54 percent of the Flying Hour Program budget – with costs increasing annually in the range of six to eight percent.

To address the situation, NAVAIR established a Business Process Reengineering (BPR) team in 1999 to improve component reliability, lower fleet operating costs, standardize and document standardized In-Service Reliability Analysis processes for export to NAVAIR and other DOD support teams.

Les Wetherington is the current Integrated In-Service Reliability Program (IISRP) Program Manager and was on that original BPR team.

The IISRP Program consists of a small headquarters staff and integrated product teams at each NAVAIR depot. “We had a dual focus right from the start,” said Wetherington. “First we had to do the investigation and analysis to determine why the part was not reaching its capability. Secondly, we had to baseline existing NAVAIR Reliability and Maintainability (R&M) tools and capabilities and evaluate state of the art R&M practices used in industry to find those most applicable to our weapon system components.”

According to Wetherington, the team first used the Aviation Maintenance Supply Readiness list to choose components to investigate. The list was a “Top 100” of AVDLR cost-drivers – the parts that the Navy was spending the most money repairing. Today the team uses the Aviation Financial Analysis Tool (AFAST) – a list of the top 500 components with low reliability and high value as compiled by the Chief of Naval Air Forces.

From that list the team chooses a component, coordinates their choice with the Fleet Support Team (FST – the group responsible for the in-service support of specific aircraft/systems) and Integrated Weapons System Team at NAVICP then examines the entire support process for that component from the time it comes off the aircraft to when it goes back on.

“At the beginning of every year we develop a list of components to study during the next fiscal year,” said Wetherington. The team usually examines about 30 parts each year.

“We analyze all that it is subjected to, through all maintenance levels, packaging and preservation, and through the transportation system” he said. “We are looking for factors that contribute to unreliability and for ways to cost effectively improve or fix the problems.”

As part of their integrated team, the IISRP has case managers assigned to specific components that examine every element of support from the squadron all the way through to the depot floor and back into the supply system to observe how the part is handled.

“We don’t do this in a vacuum,” said Wetherington. “This is a collaborative effort that includes all levels of management with a goal to keep components on the airplanes longer while reducing the cost of operations.”

Working closely with the integrated program teams within NAVAIR, the IISRP team works with technicians, artisans and associated support personnel to identify significant support issues and collaborates with all the stakeholders to develop required strategies and actions that will fix the problems identified during the analysis.

According to Wetherington, a three-phased program model has been developed to achieve significant improvements in component “time on wing”; reduce the Beyond Capability of Maintenance (BCM) rates; and advance, mature and standardize the capabilities and processes used by the team. Increasing time on wing while reducing BCM rates are the two basic metrics used by the team.

At the completion of each study a consensus meeting is held with all participants. At that point the metrics are analyzed, IISRP-related data and observations are reviewed, findings and cost projections are validated and ideas and techniques are discussed prior to submitting them to the program office or depot management for implementation. The recommendations for improvement often involve things like technical publication corrections or updates, test equipment improvements or repair and enhanced training for technicians/artisans.

Since the IISRP’s inception there have been significant improvements in reliability and availability for those components studied. These improvements resulted in reduced operating costs and improved fleet readiness. The 269 AVDLR component studies have resulted in a cumulative cost avoidance of more than $231 million (mainly due to reduced component demand and material usage) and savings of $58.1 million.

Other noteworthy improvements include: the development of a standardized set of processes used across NAVAIR to resolve in-service reliability issues; preparation and publication of a management manual, “Guidelines for the Naval Aviation In-Service Reliability Program”; the development and implementation of a standard, statistically valid Cost Avoidance Projection Model; and the development of a comprehensive online reliability database to track and monitor the results of all IISRP studies based on the IISRP Cost Avoidance Projection Model. The team has presented program related papers and briefs at professional conferences such as the NADEP Jacksonville Acquisition Excellence Conference, the Applied Reliability Symposium and RAMS (Reliability and Maintainability Symposium.) The team has received several awards including the 2004 Defense Standardization Program Award, and Honorable Mention in the NAVAIR Commander’s Award program for 2003 and 2004.

“Aging is inevitable,” said Wetherington. “We’re just trying to slow the degradation on these components – and save the Navy some money at the same time.”

For more information about the IISRP program, their headquarters’ phone number is 301-995-7352.