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Aircraft Maintenance in Crisis
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Aircraft Maintenance in Crisis

By Paul Connors



Despite the speed of advances in every area of technology, one area where constant improvement has been slow to take root is aircraft maintenance.



While it is quite true that the United States and many of its allies plan to field new fighter and attack aircraft in the not too distant future, the current state of the Air Force?s aircraft inventory has resulted in the need for increased maintenance time and money, not to mention the additional wear and tear on airframes that are, on average more than 20 years old.



The average age across the fighter force, which includes both the F-15 and F-16, is 19 years. For bombers, it is 22 years and for tankers, most notably the KC-135 fleet, the average age is rapidly approaching 50. Age alone brings on normal wear and the attendant need for maintenance, but an increased operational tempo since 9/11 has also done much to create additional need for inspection and maintenance. The problems facing the Air Force?s career maintenance field are also exacerbated by decreased funding for this most vital function.



Most of the KC-135Es still in service in the Air Force, the Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve Command were delivered starting in 1960. Their current age, combined with constant use as first line refueling support for B-52s during the days of ?SAC Alert? during the Cold War, means that unit level and depot maintenance personnel are always busy.



An Force Times article on Aug. 2 provided the following statistics that detail the Herculean efforts that must be undertaken to keep these tankers in the air. In 1991, it took 17,000 man-hours to get just one KC-135E through depot level maintenance; in 2003, it took 35,000!



As the current Air Force fleet continues to age (in some cases without direct airframe replacement), the need for maintenance will only increase. Some people in aircraft maintenance and generation use the word ?worsen.? This situation can be found in just about every active duty unit, as well as Air Force Reserve Command (AFRC) and Air National Guard units.



As anyone who fixes or restores old cars knows, finding spare parts can often become a problem of nightmarish proportions. Spare parts for aircraft, especially those no longer still in production, can also complicate the lives of Air Force maintainers.



Many of the original suppliers are no longer in existence or if they are, have ceased manufacturing parts that were designed more than 40 years ago. Parts and subsystems that were once commonplace in an Air Force that at one time had more than 500 bombers have become more and more scarce. Technological advances in many cases have negated the need for mechanical or hydraulic systems that allowed such behemoths as the B-52 to fly and fight.



Lack of spare parts for normal maintenance has forced repair personnel to cannibalize other aircraft or re-manufacture the parts. This has a negative impact on mission capability rates, too. In 1991, after Operation Desert Storm, the availability rate Air Force-wide for KC-135Es was 82.4 percent. In 2003, the rate had dropped to 77.3 percent.



Even frontline fighters like the F-15 Eagle have felt the pinch on parts availability. Mission capability rates have fallen even further since 1991, dropping from 81.2 percent to 74.6 percent. While the average age of the F-15 fleet is 17.8 years, maintenance personnel invariably deal with airframes that are approaching 30 years of active service. In fact, the Air National Guard has the dubious distinction of operating the oldest F-15s and F-16s in service.



Fighter airframes fly in a more demanding environments than do tankers and transports. As such, they are far more prone to the effects of metal fatigue. Fuel bladders leak and the fuel corrodes sheet metal and metallic parts. Wire harnesses and cables crack and chafe and require constant inspection. To check systems and conduct inspections, Air Force maintainers have often had to cut open sections of an aircraft?s skin. What they find often leads to additional inspections, repair or replacement.



Sheet metal experts throughout the Air Force have negatively commented about cracking and the need for constant inspections. One maintainer assigned to the 1st Fighter Wing (1 FW) at Langley AFB, Va. , stated quite candidly, ?My personal opinion is that these aircraft were not intended to fly this long. They?ve passed their expiration dates.?



The Air Force is not blind to the strains that the need for maintenance has placed on the force, the maintainers and mission capability rates. Key officials in the Aging Aircraft Systems Program Office at Wright Patterson AFB, Ohio , agree with the assessments from the field. After all, their function was established to deal with the problems created by the material conditions of an aging aircraft fleet.



The F-16 Fighting Falcon, while generally newer than its F-15 counterpart, is also showing increasing indications of age-related stress. Inspectors have found cracks in the airframe and main landing gear and maintenance personnel at the F-16 school house at Luke AFB, Ariz., have noticed severe chafing in some wiring harnesses. This condition was unexpected and consequently, there were no systems in place to remedy the situation. Local fixes needed to be developed and lessons learned passed on through the chain of command.



One of the methods the Air Force is employing to cut costs is through the reduction of airframes in the inventory. As maintenance costs increase by 10 percent a year, real cost increases after inflation equal 7 percent. In the case of the KC-135E, the rates of escalation are even higher and the Air Force has decided to retire 68 airframes because their maintenance costs are viewed as too high for any potential benefit of continued usage.



Other aircraft in the Air Force inventory have also faced the axe as service officials have sought to save maintenance costs for reinvestment in the remainder of the fleet.



Over the last several years, Air Force leaders have had to make some very unpopular decisions, one of which included the retirement of one third of the B-1B Lancer fleet due to its low reliability rate and the cancellation of its expensive upgrade program. Most recently, service leaders have sought permission retire up to half of the F-16 fleet and some F-15s to save additional maintenance funds.



These suggestions have met stiff resistance because many of the F-16s to be retired are in the ANG and local units and state governors are reluctant to lose the aircraft and their unit?s assigned missions.



On paper, the United States is still the world?s only superpower and the only nation with the airlift capability to move troops anywhere in the world in as little as 18 hours (the alert brigade of the 82nd Airborne Division), but that ability comes at significant cost.



During the defense drawdowns of the 1990s, the Clinton administration slashed the procurement budgets for new equipment acquisitions and maintenance beyond what the services could rationally support. As a result, the Air Force, as the nation?s primary air battle force and provider of aerial transport, has had to take on more maintenance requirements with fewer and fewer financial resources. That failure to buy replacement aircraft when needed while the federal budget showed surpluses means the Air Force will eventually encounter a crisis of widespread block obsolescence throughout its aircraft fleet.



When Donald Rumsfeld took over as Secretary of Defense, he promised ?transformation? of the nation?s armed forces. Since then, he has spent a significant amount of time and effort reorganizing the services to provide more personnel and combat mission efficiency. Unfortunately for the men and women in uniform, he has done little or nothing to address the problems associated with the maintenance of legacy aircraft systems.



Like so many other components of the military, keeping the planes we have available today is becoming increasingly more difficult and expensive. If we are not careful, we may actually have to face an enemy who is better prepared than we thought we were.


Paul Connors is a Senior Editor of DefenseWatch. He can be reached at paulconnors@hotmail.com. © 2004 Paul Connors. Please send Feedback responses to dwfeedback@yahoo.com