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Track Service Bulletins & Airworthiness Directives Effectively

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Aircraft Maintenance by definition is “Overhaul, repair, inspection or modification of an aircraft or aircraft component”. It doesn’t include activities like Servicing, works done before issue of Airworthiness Certificate or Elementary works, but includes compliance of Airworthiness Directives (AD) or Service Bulletins (SB).

Regulatory authority releases AD when finds an unsafe condition in aircraft/parts. It notifies owners/operators about the potential unsafe condition and remedies (special inspections, repairs, or alterations) to overcome it. SBs are notices to aircraft operators from a manufacturer notifying them of a product improvement. However Alert SBs, which covers about safety related items, will result in Regulatory Authority issuing AD.

On-time compliance of AD/SB is very important. AD Compliance is mandatory. Thus if an operator does not comply with an AD, then the datum aircraft is not considered airworthy.

Hundreds of airplanes in the US were grounded during March and April 2008, due to two cases of potential non-compliance of ADs. Thousands of passengers were inconvenienced and the operators resulted in million dollar loss. This incident gave birth to Independent Review Team (IRT) to examine the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) safety culture and its implementation of safety management. FAA also established AD Compliance Review Team (CRT). These teams played a key role in making AD/SB process easier for industry processing.

Though implementation of SB/AD made easier, it’s the responsibility of Owners/Operators to make sure that all ADs are tracked and complied on time. Running through a big list of ADs from regulatory website, filtering applicable ADs and tracking till its compliance... I’m telling you, it’s not an easy job.

Problem of tracking an AD/SB till compliance can be overcome with MRO IT Solutions, that are built ground up to meet the related requirements and the Solution should be robust enough. Few of the mentioned below capabilities are a must for tracking an AD/ SB in system.

  1. Ability to interact with Manufactures/Regulatory authority websites to extract applicable SB/ADs automatically is preferred as manual efforts to run through the SB/AD list in websites is time consuming.
  2. Robust capability to capture remedies for unsafe conditions in AD, product improvements in SB and references for alert SB is essential. Remedies can be special inspections, repairs, or a configuration change. These can be schedule tracked or non-schedule tracked.
  3. Capability to quickly induct SB/ADs that comes for wide range of fleet/Parts is a must. SB/AD can come for a wide range of fleet. Let's say, an AD "Pneumatic - Overheat Detection System - Inspection" applicable for entire fleet of A380. Induction of AD/SBs to system irrespective of fleet size should not be a time consuming issue.
  4. Capability to induct AD/SBs that are applicable for Parts attached to particular models is key. For example AD - 2014-0172,"Ice and Rain Protection – Full Icing Protection System / Cable Inspection" is applicable for model A380.
  5. Capability to evaluate and decide on execution of SB/Ads is a must. Compliance of all inducted SB/AD may not be required. Execution can be on hold due to pending feed-back from regulatory authority/manufacture or would have previously complied. Also SB/ADs may not be applicable for few serials in a fleet or part. These decisions are important and very critical to track.
  6. Ability to define AD/SBs that are future date is mandatory. On the effective date of AD/SB, the tasks should appear for planning.
  7. Capability to handle warranty claimable, Configuration changeable and superseding SB/Ads is compulsory.
  8. Ability to generating AD/SB compliance status report is very much required for audit purposes.

Ramco Aviation Solution take cares of all the above mentioned aspects, in fact more than that. Ramco has a well-structured interface for recording the Evaluation process. Induction of AD/SBs for fleet of any size can be achieved in few minutes using Ramco Aviation Solution. Ramco has robust and easy structured solution for definition of configuration change AD/SBs, future dated AD/SBs, superseding ADs, warranty claims and compliance report. Ramco also has the capability of extracting SB/ADs from Manufacturers/Regulatory authority websites.

Ramco Aviation Solution also offers an intuitive workspace where status of entire AD/SBs enrolled in the system can be viewed. Based on status, system guides are used to take appropriate next actions. Details of AD/SBs like, tasks, schedules, compliance status and compliance information can be viewed under one roof. Compliance report for AD/SB can be generated from this workspace. Workspace also helps in evaluation of the efficiency of induction process of SB/ADs.
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Enterprise asset management (EAM) involves the management of mission critical assets of an organization throughout each asset's lifecycle. EAM is used to plan, optimize, execute, and track the needed maintenance activities with the associated priorities, skills, materials, tools, and information. The aim is to optimize the quality and utilization of assets throughout their lifecycle, increase productive uptime and reduce operational costs.

Enterprise asset management (EAM) involves the management of the maintenance of physical assets of an organization throughout each asset's lifecycle. EAM is used to plan, optimize, execute, and track the needed maintenance activities with the associated priorities, skills, materials, tools, and information.

The software helps in effective maintenance of assets through preventive, predictive, shutdown and breakdown maintenance strategies. The system also helps enterprises mitigate equipment risks by enhanced safety standards. The streamlined operations and improved asset performance helps organizations increase their investment effectiveness.

EAM is important because it helps organizations track, assess, manage and optimize asset quality and reliability. Asset intensive Organizations have hundreds, thousands, even millions of assets which needs to be maintained to maximize / optimize life of these assets to increase the return on investment.

The key features of effective EAM are:

  • Work management.
  • Maintenance Strategies (Preventive/ Predictive / Breakdown / Shutdown).
  • Planning and scheduling.
  • Supply chain management.
  • Health and safety.
  • Mobility.
  • Analytics.
  • Improved Asset Health at reduced cost through data driven maintenance Programs​
  • Complete visibilityon entire maintenance data across Equipment, across Models, across Branches to aid in analysis & decision making such as to Repair or Replace the Equipment​
  • Insightful analysis of Inspection Data to improve customer satisfaction​
  • Effective maintenance management enhanced by predictive maintenance and inbuilt analytics​
  • Increased reliability and safety, keeps complete track of all the inspections & calibration schedules​
  • Mobile Application enables users to execute work while “in the field” leading to minimized non-productive time and increased productivity and reduces duplication of work and human errors in recording information.​
  • Quick turnaround time through Actionable Notification & Alerts for every process in real time and accessible anytime and anywhere.
  • Improved Regulatory Part of asset management involves the implementation of better O&M practices, which can significantly improve compliance.

Asset Intensive companies under the following Industries :

  1. Ports
  2. Cement and Mining
  3. Utilities
  4. Fleet Maintenance
  5. Equipment Rental
  6. Other Manufacturing
  7. Real Estate & Infrastructure
  8. Power Generation

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This differs on case to case basis, based on the type of installation and unique industry specific requirements. Contact us for a meeting and schedule a demo.

This differs on case to case basis, based on the type of installation and unique industry specific requirements. Contact us for a meeting and schedule a demo.

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