Field Focused Helicopter MRO

Tag : air tool accessories
The dynamics of the helicopter MRO industry are changing. As moreoperators deploy their equipment for longer stretches atincreasingly greater distances from home bases, the focus ofmaintenance is shifting increasingly to field repairs.
In tandem with this is a projected, overall growth in thehelicopter MRO sector, according to a study released in December2007 by AeroStrategy, an Ann Arbor, Mich.-based consulting firm.The study, which looked at the worldwide turbine helicoptermaintenance industry, predicts a 2.8% annual growth rate between2007 and 2016, at which time 31,170 helicopters will generate $6.8billion in MRO industry sales. By comparison, 23,000 helicoptersaccounted for $5.3 billion in maintenance services in 2007.
"Fleet expansion is the key (industry) growth factor, underpinnedby the growing popularity of helicopters for resource development,aero-medical services, and in para-public and military missions,"said Kevin Michaels, AeroStrategy president.
At the same time, helicopter operators are demanding fasterturn-times on servicing, according to Chris Pratt, director ofmarketing and strategic planning for the BBA Aviation Engine Repairand Overhaul Group in Dallas. "This is especially true in theutility market, where the helicopter is a tool used daily.
Pratt noted that as energy exploration is sending more helicoptersfarther offshore and the air medevac sector continues to grow,utilization will increase. "Because of customer demand, driven bytoday's high utilization, we are putting a strong emphasis on fieldrepair service. Also, new engine designs, as well as modificationsand upgrades for older engines, are incorporating technology thatis more oriented to on-wing servicing."
To cite one example, when Pratt & Whitney Canada makes the initialdeliveries of its 1,000-shp PW210S to Sikorsky in 2010 for theS-76D, that helicopter will have a powerplant with all accessorieswithin a single location, and single point access at the front ofthe engine, according to Ramy Issa, the engine OEM's director ofhelicopter engine programs and customer support in Longueuil,Quebec. "The design makes it highly maintainable at field level,because we have designed it for fast removal of parts," he said."Based on our customer feedback, field MRO has become veryimportant."
Along with this, increasing helicopter utilization translates intoescalating change-out events for life-limited components.
"As little as five years ago, the average number of hours flownannually by a turbine-powered helicopter was about 250 to 300,"said Doug Kult, sales director, international helicopters forHoneywell Helicopter and Surface Business in Phoenix. "Now it is inthe 550 to 600 hour range, which is causing the operators to hittheir maintenance task intervals much faster."
According to Kult, Honeywell is increasing life limits on someengine components, such as the gas producer (GP) turbine wheel onthe Honeywell LTS 101. "Two years ago, it had a 15,000-hour lifelimit, but today we've been able to extend that to 25,000 hours,"he noted. "Also, in 2007, we certified the T5317BCV engine with a5,000-hour TBO -- a 2,000-hour improvement over the earlier T5317Bversion."
Increasing on-wing time for engines is just one of the ways tominimize helicopter downtime, which Kult pointed out is of primaryconcern for those involved with energy industry missions. "Ashelicopters go farther away from base, it gets harder to get theengines and parts to them. At Honeywell, we are training the(operators') mechanics, and selling them the proper tooling andreplacement parts in order to authorize them to do their ownmaintenance in the field."
John Loring, director of maintenance for Hillsboro Aviation inHillsboro, Ore., said that his organization is carrying out morefield maintenance, especially as their remote operations in supportof oil and gas exploration increase. "Operators are becoming moredependent on their maintenance teams to do the work in the field,and that's just for the scheduled maintenance," he said. "Theunscheduled maintenance becomes even more complicated, because thatmeans getting the parts out on a moment's notice to the mechanics,doing the repairs at the job site."
The OEMs have yet to develop specialized support and maintenancetraining programs specifically targeting inspections and repairsaway from base, Loring said. "The operators still have to performall the inspections when they are due, by the OEM maintenancemanual. You get no special leeway just because your helicopter isaway from home."
In addition, he pointed out that it's usually the operator who hasto set up his own training program, which not only has to conformwith the maintenance manual, but also address the challenges in thefield. "When you're in a remote location, you may have to depend ona ladder and flashlight," he remarked.
Loring said that for minimal disruptions, planning ahead forpossible system failures -- in the field -- is advised. "You lookat your scheduled component overhauls, and component retirements,and plan for as little replacement away from base as possible, evenif it means changing out a component with a couple of hundred hoursof service left. Component replacement at base is usually lesscostly."
Pulling components early has long been part of proactivemaintenance planning at Fairbanks-based Air Logistics of Alaska,which operates a diverse fleet of Bell and Eurocopter models. JimFitzpatrick, the company's director of operations, reported thatit's typical for the company's helicopters in Alaska to fly anaverage of 300 to 400 hours and as much as 800 hours over afive-month period between April and August each year. During thatperiod, most of the helicopters remain deployed.
"There can be no TBOs expiring in the middle of a contract becausewe don't have the luxury of spare aircraft in the summer seasonwhen we are working all of our aircraft," Fitzpatrick said.
To assure availability, the company established a six-phase,FAA-approved aviation inspection program (AAIP) to minimize thechances of in-the-field failures. As Fitzpatrick explained, eachphase occurs at intervals of 100 flight hours while the aircraft isin revenue service. To date, Air Logistics of Alaska has appliedthe AAIP to its smaller Bell helicopter models, including the Bell206 and Bell 407.
"Each phase is focused on specific areas and has allowed us to dothe inspections as we work. In the course of the year, we will havedone all the required inspections, and we won't have to put anaircraft down for an extensive standard commercial 100-hourinspection, or an annual inspection."
In addition to the AAIP, the company carries out a more detailedyearly inspection during the off season. "It's a look-see type ofinspection, which helps us to forecast the amount of time left onlife limited components and to catch all of the items that havescheduled overhaul times before the helicopter is sent out,"Fitzpatrick noted.
In fact, for many helicopter operators today, the removal of anengine or other major component in the field is considered a lastresort, explained Greg Martin, director of business development forH+S Aviation, in Portsmouth, U.K. He noted that the demand forfield service is increasing throughout Europe. "There are threethings driving this: energy exploration, air medevac and televisionnews gathering. In response, we are training more mechanics toundertake work scopes in the field," he said.
To illustrate the importance of that, Martin reported that during2007, H+S Aviation, which maintains the Rolls-Royce Model 250 andGE CT7 and T700 helicopter engines, made between 80 and 100 fieldservice calls, which is about a 50% increase over those made in2002. "No one user (sector) accounts for an exceptional amount, butwith the ongoing rise in oil prices, there is a little more demandfor our field service from the energy industry."
Operators of helicopters on long, remote deployments also arerelying more on their own mechanics, as well as those from OEMs andservice firms. For Columbia Helicopters of Aurora, Ore., corrosioncontrol and structural issues, related to the different operationalenvironments in which their aircraft fly, are at the heart ofmaintenance planning. But, as Chad Nicklaus, the company's directorof shop operations explained, complicating matters is the fact thatthe average age of Columbia's fleet of 14 Boeing Vertol 107 andseven Boeing Vertol 234 tandem rotor helicopters is between 25 and30 years old. The fleet is used in firefighting, logging operationsand oil exploration work.
According to Nicklaus, the company has been able to use itsexperience operating the helicopters in different environments asthe basis for training its mechanics to follow the OEM'srecommended (maintenance) procedures.
"Our programs, in fact, are designed to apply predictability ofmaintenance needs to any type of mission we fly, and the programswe have set up are fully adaptable to any operation," he said. "Butthe challenge is to apply the repair schemes to systems that weredesigned decades ago, using technologies that were not availablewhen the helicopters were new."
Kurt Koehnke, Columbia's director of maintenance, added that thecompany has been able to structure its fleet support program sothat even for the helicopters it operates on oil drilling contractsin Papua New Guinea, which is about 9,000 miles from the Aurorabase, the aircraft availability has been about 95%. "All of theparts needed to support the helicopters come from our largeinventory at Aurora to support both our domestic and overseasoperations--for scheduled and unscheduled maintenance events."
But does the trend toward more field service necessarily mean thatdepot maintenance for helicopters will go away? That will depend onthe helicopter operator, as BBA Aviation Engine Repair and OverhaulGroup's Chris Pratt explained.
"When you look at helicopters used for executive transport, theytend to have a lower utilization rate, and therefore longerintervals between repairs and scheduled maintenance. They willcontinue to utilize the traditional MRO facility," Pratt remarked."When you get into the utility or resource development market, youhave higher utilization with more fleet operators, who tend to havean in-house capability -- at least for line level work. With thatinfrastructure in place, they will be doing more repairs in thefield, with the idea that they'll go to the large MRO facilitiesmostly for heavy inspections and overhauls."