Three Ways High Velocity Maintenance are Changing MRO

The U.S. Air Force is adopting a concept called High Velocity Maintenance (HVM), which has roots in the commercial airline business. HVM speeds up the maintenance process, reduces total operating costs and improves aircraft availability – in both military and civilian applications.

Shorter, more frequent maintenance checks are a linchpin of the HVM approach. For example, instead of taking an aircraft like the C-130 offline for 160 days every five years for major maintenance, the service may send the aircraft to the depot every 18 months for a just week or two at a time. The result is an end-to-end maintenance process that is synchronized, integrated and tied to mission requirements.

Here are some ways adopting HVM are changing maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) operations.

Improving Fleet Availability Metrics

Maintenance has an enormous impact on fleet availability, which has become a primary metric tracked by military operators. Fleet availability is the ultimate measure of mission readiness and, as the front-line fleet ages, presents a major challenge for the services. Current metrics like turn-around time and parts fulfillment, tell only a partial story. Most effective are processes that optimize the supply chain to increase operating hours and fleet availability.

Using Proactive Processes

Significant gains can be made by using processes and technologies that help maintenance teams get ahead of the game. For example, inspecting aircraft in the field before they arrive at the depot give technicians a head’s up on the work that needs to be done, so they can have the right parts, tools and supplies available. New technologies, like Honeywell Forge Connected Maintenance, uses the latest data analytics to predict what parts will fail and when, well in advance, and prescribe the best actions to take.

Improving the Logistics System

The best HVM systems require a single, integrated logistics system that includes transportation, supply, maintenance and repair. The parts network is a critical component of the integrated supply chain and HVM implementers would need to take a holistic view of parts purchasing, shipping, warehousing and distribution. They also need to analyze past parts demand and use available data to forecast what parts will be needed, in what quantity, where and when. Finally, there is value in opening lines of communications across the supply chain and scheduling routine maintenance around the availability of parts and maintenance techs, to reduce aircraft downtime.