Sustainment: A Herculean effort | ADM Sep 2010

A mix of modern and ageing aircraft coupled with a demanding rate of effort makes maintenance and support of Air Lift Group’s C-130 medium transports a complex undertaking.

Julian Kerr | Sydney

The operational C-130 fleet currently consists of 12 C-130Js, the first of which entered service with the RAAF in 1999, and eight C-130Hs, the first of which arrived in Australia in 1978.

Four other C-130Hs are being maintained in a state of preservation at RAAF Richmond.

A further complication in balancing the maintenance schedules and operational requirements is the Block Upgrade program for the C-130J, which seems destined to run for much of the aircraft’s service life.

While 37 Squadron at Richmond carries out routine light servicings on its C-130Hs and Js, heavier maintenance is contracted out to industry.

In July 2010 Qantas Defence Services (QDS) and the Defence Material Organisation (DMO) signed a new three-year, $136 million contract for C-130H maintenance and support, continuing work that was first awarded to Qantas in 1999.

Unsurprisingly, given the H’s planned withdrawal from service in 2013, the new agreement does not include any options for extension.

Three months earlier Australian Aerospace and sub-contractor Lockheed Martin took over responsibility for C-130J engineering and logistics management, and aircraft deeper maintenance after transitioning from QDS and Raytheon.

Support for the J model’s R2100 engines continues to be provided separately by StandardAero.

The $292 million contract covers an initial six years from its signature in March 2009 and incorporates rolling annual one-year extensions from March 2010 contingent on performance, potentially providing C-130J support until the type’s planned withdrawal date of 2030.

Both industry teams work to the DMO’s Air Lift Systems Project Office whose commanding officer, Group Captain Michael Brown, also stresses the vital role of the operational maintenance carried out by 37 Squadron technicians on both the Hs and Js as well as the work of the men and women of the Air Lift Systems Program Office efforts in maintaining the engineering, airworthiness, logistics and configuration management of both fleets.

“It’s much more than just flight line skills, it’s rectification and everything we need to support a weapons system in operation,” he told ADM.

Part of the routine

The C-130Hs are maintained via a series of routine servicings, flight servicings and on-condition maintenance.

The so-called R servicings range from an R1 through to an R5.

The higher the number, the deeper the servicing and the longer it takes.

An R1 servicing, carried out at squadron level, occurs every 65-calendar days, takes about a week, and includes cleaning, lubricants and replenishments.

An R2, performed by QDS, is undertaken every 195 days and involves two weeks of systems checks and preventative corrosion treatments.

The servicings then become increasing larger and more complex and also include the content of the previous servicing.

Thus the R1/R2 content plus some extra tasks is included in the R3, which occurs every 600 days and takes around 24 weeks to complete.

“It’s quite an intrusive inspection, it strips pretty much all the equipment out of the aircraft, it takes the leading edge flaps off, it takes the landing gear off and stretch areas and the central wing area have numerous visual and ultrasonic inspections,” GPCAPT Brown said.

“The structural engineers from both Lockheed Martin and the RAAF Directorate of General Technical Airworthiness look at the analyses and target areas that may be starting to show fatigue, based on probability, past usage, materials, stresses and local limits of the aircraft.

“It’s also an opportune time to service some of the equipment that is hard to access during normal maintenance.”

An R4 takes place every 1,200 days and takes about 30 weeks to complete.

An R5 – the date from which all servicing schedules are based going forwards – takes up to six months to complete and is carried out every six years.

This procedure includes removal of the outer wings, the tail and the floor area of the landing gear, with the aircraft being reduced to a shell and stripped back to bare metal before being inspected, repaired, built up and repainted.

The R4 is similar, but without the need for repainting.

That basing maintenance schedules on calendar days rather than flight hours can result in over-servicing of some areas of an aircraft is acknowledged by GPCAPT Brown but he believes this is justified by the operational availability of an aircraft being known years in advance.

This is particularly useful in avoiding the need for servicings while aircraft are deployed off-base.

As of July, two C-130Hs were undergoing R5s, the last time such procedures will be carried on the H fleet until its planned retirement in 2013.

The four aircraft now in a state of preservation operated virtually continuously to the Middle East in 2003-04 and had racked up the most flying hours, GPCAPT Brown said.

“But as well as the total time flown, we also looked at the missions undertaken by the aircraft and if they had operated in harsh environments, whether it be weight or tactics, we added a severity factor on top of those hours so we could understand the stresses that had been involved.”

The arrival of the RAAF’s four C-17 strategic airlifters has reduced the workload on the C-130s.

Previously the C-130H fleet was flying about 8,000 hours a year; a workload that was extending maintenance schedules.

Powering ahead

Glen Steed, head of QDS, told ADM that support for the H model’s T-56 engines had been rolled into the new three-year fixed-price contract. Rectification of additional problems discovered by the 180-strong QDS workforce at RAAF Richmond during scheduled servicings – usually unanticipated corrosion and cracking – was agreed separately with the Commonwealth at an hourly rate.

Marshalls is subcontracted for engineering support, Kellstrom for spares and logistics management, while Rosebank Engineering focuses on the hydraulics and some specialised engineering requirements.

Yet to be resolved, according to Steed, is where the two C-130Hs now undergoing their R5 servicing will be repainted since the paint facility at Richmond is no longer operational.

QDS has taken over responsibility from the DMO for the C-130H maintenance master schedule, and anticipates becoming further involved in support planning as the aircrafts’ retirement date draws closer.

The four inactive aircraft will require substantial maintenance – outside the current scope of the QDS contract – to bring them back to operational condition should they eventually be recommissioned, gifted or sold.

The rate of effort for the overall C-130 fleet is now about 10,500 hours a year, split 7,350 hours for the 12 C-130Js and 3,200 hours for the eight C-130Hs.

Supply flights by 37 Squadron to Afghanistan and elsewhere in the Middle East are now handled exclusively by C-130Js, notwithstanding their current lack of a radar warning receiver or the Large Aircraft Infrared Countermeasures (LAIRCM) system they are projected to receive.

Development of submissions for second-pass approval of the radar warning receiver (RWR) and LAIRCM is understood to be underway within DMO’s Electronic Systems Division and Capability Development Group.

Any requirement for a RWR-equipped platform for high-end activities would still be covered by a C-130H, GPCAPT Brown said.

Notwithstanding the advanced avionics systems involved in the J-model, in deeper maintenance many of these systems are removed, making the structural work and inspections broadly similar to those carried out on their older counterparts.

The C-130J servicing regimen comprises Phases 1, 2, 3 (all carried out at Squadron level) at 30, 60 and 120 week intervals, and Deeper Maintenance 1 and 2 performed by Australian Aerospace at 240 and 480 week intervals.

The minor servicings are essentially preventative maintenance, lubrication and replenishment activities although the P2 – inclusive of the P1 – focuses more on non-intrusive inspections, functional testing and filter replacements and can take up to seven days dependant on the level of coincident maintenance required.

A P3 takes on average about five to six weeks and is slightly less intrusive than its R3 equivalent while a DM1 takes about 17 weeks to complete.

Both it and the DM2, while inclusive of P1, P2 and P3 activities, focus on internal structural inspections, non-destructive inspections, rigging checks and adjustments and operational checks.

The DM2 includes removal of the main landing gear and fuel tank access for wing internal inspections and takes about 26 weeks to complete.

In house and outsourced

“We tend to have an aircraft in a DM1 with Australian Aerospace with a slight gap between finishing the DM1 and the next aircraft coming in.

“With a DM2 it’s usually a nose-to-tail scenario,” GPCAPT Brown said.

“So there’s usually one aircraft in deeper maintenance with industry and one aircraft in a bay being serviced by the Squadron.

“With the Hs, when we were operating all 12 it would not have been uncommon to have had three aircraft in deeper maintenance at any one time.

“A lot of that was driven trying to rectify a number of ageing aircraft issues.”

Landings on unsealed runways, whether in Australia or overseas, trigger a special service with a number of different inspections, including checks of the landing gear for pitting.

The size of the spares pool held by Defence is determined by a platform systems analysis that models the reliability of repairable components, up to and including avionics boxes, engines, and the main landing gear.

“How long an item takes to repair and how often we anticipate it breaking determines how many we procure,” GPCAPT Brown commented.

”If an item has a six month mean time between failure – and some can be calendar, some can be flying hours – and it takes six months to repair, we’d want to have at least two on the shelf.

“To ensure that, we’d procure three items.”

Avionics items are replaced only when they fail and often require only the replacement of a faulty circuit card. However, rather than waiting until a fault develops in a hydraulics system, components showing signs of wear are replaced during scheduled servicings.

GPCAPT Brown pointed out that a C-130J is operated by more computers than an F/A-18 A/B fighter.

This necessitates more avionics technicians to dissemble and reassemble the aircraft in deeper maintenance than had been the case with the less advanced C-130Hs.

The additional skill sets required by Australian Aviation after it took over C-130J support from QDS had been met in part by recruitment from QDS, and partly by additional training of existing or new staff, some of it on courses run by 285 Squadron at Richmond.

Both companies had done an excellent job in managing their workforces during the contract transition, he added.

Milestone reached

Australian Aerospace told ADM it had successfully completed 13 key milestones within the 12-month contract roll-in period, including establishment by sub-contractor Lockheed Martin Aerospace of a supply chain and inventory management system.

As of July, the first C-130J major maintenance activity to be carried out under the new contract by the 117-strong workforce had been completed, with work on a second aircraft due to be finished by early October.

The software-intensive environment of the C-130J will require regular block upgrades both to go forward and to maintain commonality with the type’s main operators, the US Air Force and US Marine Corps, and the other 12 existing or pending international customers.

Block 6.1 was the first upgrade block to involve collaborative development by the non-US operators of the C-130J, at that time Australia, Denmark, Italy and the UK.

These four countries joined with the US in 2003 in forming the Cooperative Systems and Software Requirement Management (COSSURM), which gives customers the ability to share in requirements selection and development.

In 2006 these same four countries signed a US$110 million contract with Lockheed Martin for development, design, test and integration of the Block 6.1 capabilities.

The lead Australian C-130J was modified by Lockheed Martin in the US in 2009 but on return to Australia had to be de-modified (by QDS) to the delivery-level Block 5.4 – largely a software exercise – because insufficient evidence had been amassed to convince the Joint Airworthiness Board that the RAAF was fully aware of the upgrade’s implications.

As of July, Block 6.1 engineering data packs were being assembled for consideration by an airworthiness board whose delayed sitting will now take place in early December.

Should the Board agree to service release, work will start immediately on replacing mission computers, loading new software, and implementing wiring changes.

The 6.1 upgrade is largely based on the USAF’s Block 6.0 modernisation, and centres on improvements to the C-130J’s communications and navigation equipment and identification friend-or-foe (IFF) system.

Additional modifications include integration of a common flight management system, expanded autopilot operation limitations to the takeoff gross weight, a ground collision avoidance system with both audio and visual cues, a PC-based data transfer and diagnostics system, an improved loading ramp, and door hydraulics to support high altitude airdrops.

The Block 7.0 program has slipped by about eight months because of issues over the flight management system and should be ready fro trial by US aircraft in 2011.

Second pass approval for the Australian fleet was announced in March.

This will be the first Block upgrade jointly agreed in its entirety by the US and the original four international members of COSSURM.

It will include Link 16 tactical datalink capability, improved processor memory and throughput, a Special Mission processor and interface, and IFF barometric altitude source selection of full reduced vertical separation minimum.

A contract for Block 8.1 was to have been awarded by COSSURM in June, but this is running behind schedule.

GPCAPT Brown said the scoping study had been agreed and the joint user group was now going through all the requirements to determine what will be incorporated into the upgrade.

He pointed out that new J-model operators Canada and Norway had paid to be part of COSSURM even though they had no input to the decisions on what was being rolled into Block 7.0.

“So there are a number of advantages in ensuring that the platforms are similar and the group is an effective way to share the no-recurring engineering work across member nations,” he added.

BDA on sustainment

Gregor Ferguson | Amberley, Oakey and Williamtown

BDA’s principal sustainment activities at present focus on the F-111, Wedgetail, Super Hornet, C-17A and the ‘classic’ Hornet, along with the training platforms it supports at bases like Oakey.

Most of these are in some sort of transition at present: the F-111 will retire late this year and the 800 people at Amberley who supported the aircraft at its peak will dwindle to about 80.

Furthermore, the last of the four Wedgetail AEW&C aircraft being modified by BDA at Amberley will be handed over this year.

The average age of the ADF aircraft fleet (much of which is supplied by Boeing) is falling rapidly; the sustainment workload is falling with it.

However, the company earlier this year signed the Wedgetail In-Service Support Contract (ISSC), worth some $800 million over the next five years.

This, along with a sideways move into civil aircraft Maintenance Repair & Overhaul (MRO) will result in steady growth in BDA’s sustainment business at Amberley, Oakey and Williamtown.

Wedgetail deep maintenance will be performed at Amberley largely by BDA personnel transferred across from the Wedgetail modification team; BDA is the local sub-contractor to the prime, Boeing Defense Space & Security.

The first Deeper Maintenance activity, an R7 service on one of the early-build aircraft, got under way in July.

This is a 6-yearly service and inspection activity defined by the DG Technical Airworthiness, which includes the mandatory C and D-checks; it requires the removal of some mission equipment (but not the radar) to enable structural inspections.

This first R7 service is slightly ahead of schedule but is necessary to get the cycle started; it’s expected to take about 9 months, but Boeing hopes to bring this down to 5-6 months as its people climb the learning curve.

The company is already an ADF Authorised Maintenance Organisation (AMO) and in 2008 was awarded FAA Part 145 Repair Station certification to perform maintenance on Next-Generation B737 airframes, engines and instruments, as well as other specialised services (see ‘News Review’).

This enables it to support the Wedgetail in-country, and also to support the P-8A Poseidon, which will replace the RAAF’s AP-3C Orions from 2018, as well as civilian B737s.

The RAAF’s new C-17A Globemaster IIIs are sustained under a US FMS agreement.

Boeing maintains the global C-17 fleet and this support extends from the USAF’s Logistics Management Unit (LMU) at Dayton, Ohio, to a 30-strong Boeing team at Amberley, with a Pratt & Whitney Field Service Rep.

Boeing also runs C-17A warehousing at Amberley as an extension of the global fleet supply chain.

The global C-17 fleet is currently at Block 17 build standard; the next iteration will be Block 18, which includes enhanced communications and RMP.3 air traffic management capabilities.

This will be implemented for the RAAF by Boeing, though the final scope of this upgrade has yet to be refined.