Aircraft Reliability – Events & when do you require further analysis?

An aircraft operating will experience maintenance in two main categories:

Scheduled –that which is planned and controlled as per a maintenance plan to maintain airworthiness

.Unscheduled –these are the tasks where we do not plan the maintenance, it is the event of a condition or event.

It is a little more complex of course because not all non-scheduled maintenance is not expected –consider events such as a wheel change if a wheel is worn to the limits of service, or a therapeutic oxygen bottle being used for a passenger in distress. These items are not scheduled to occur, but they are not necessarily a concern for our reliability either.

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Aircraft Lease & Conditions for parts usage

The replacement of parts is often noted in an aircraft lease agreement, as such the lease agreement will stipulate what can and what can not be used, on occasion it will also refer to a location and or part of the aircraft also.

The expense would be addressed by the lessee and statement such as “Lessee, at its own cost and expense, shall promptly replace, or procure the replacement of all Parts which may from time to time become worn out, lost, stolen, destroyed, seized, confiscated, damaged beyond repair or permanently rendered unfit for their intended use for any reason whatsoever”.

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SMS –Safety Management System & Conformance Assurance

While it is now commonplace to have a safety management system (SMS) in place they are reliant on some additional considerations such as people using them and reports being made.

For this purpose, we need to promote and encourage a reporting culture –it can even sound negative that we need to report, but the reality is that reporting is not negative, it is a positive demonstration of a culture that accepts it will make mistakes and is interested in how to reflect and rectify them.

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Bare Metal Inspections –End of Lease or Paint Inputs

A bare metal inspection is commonly abbreviated to BMI and is commonly used to refer to the inspection of a metallic fuselage that is stripped of paint.

It is not a mandatory task to repaint aircraft, the paint is a protective layer and while it must be maintained, it can be repaired or “touched up” as required. With this in mind then we can determine that the fuselage is not in this condition regularly.

For some end-of-lease requirements, part of this is to present the aircraft in a white livery. It might not always require a repaint of everything and might be limited only to the fuselage or only covering logo for example.

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Aircraft Reliability Training & The Value To An Operation

The value of the reliability data is important to the airline operating the aircraft not only to demonstrate compliance as a reliability programme is required by regulation but also to amend the Aircraft Maintenance Program for the operators’ aircraft (such as extending or reducing interval threshold) based on their experience and operating environment.

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