Integrated Shipboard and Shore-Based Maintenance Management Decision Tool

Impact Technologies propose to further develop and test a shipboard and shore-based maintenance decision tool that can autonomously and optimally select and schedule maintenance actions for Naval Ship Systems from a readiness and cost/benefit perspective. The proposed strategies will include the capability to account for risk across critical shipboard systems, integration with CBM systems, and procedures for maximizing ship system readiness and minimizing cost based on mission requirements. These developments will be eventually implemented within the framework of a maintenance decision support software product that will provide engineering and financial justification for maintenance and support decisions. The tool will utilize relevant naval condition based monitoring and logistics system information in order to determine the optimal maintenance actions to be performed at optimal times and within the constraints of resources and mission requirements. Impact Technologies will work with Beacon Interactive Systems in a collaborative environment and demonstrate both companies’ independent tools with mutual interaction in the same system. The maintenance management optimization software will utilize various levels of engineering analysis based on shipboard system health indices/status that are coupled with comprehensive economic models that will form the basis of the automated maintenance optimization process. With the emphasis on increasing ship system readiness and reducing the total ownership cost for the future DD(X) platform, automated maintenance scheduling and resource optimization certainly are major critical links to driving these goals. As the ultimate goal is defined as maximizing readiness and/or minimizing cost, risk can be defined as either total ownership cost or expected down time. The benefits of performing maintenance tasks have been quantified in risk. The Phase I program successfully demonstrated the feasibility of shore based and shipboard maintenance scheduling by utilizing risk minimization with mixed integer linear programming. Based on the Phase I results, the Phase II program will focus on specific applications on DD(X) such as the Main Turbine System (MTS), which Impact is currently working on maintenance reasoning software for Rolls Royce Naval Marine and Northrop Grumman.