You Can Track Your F-35s, At ALIS’ Maintenance Hub
Mar 20, 2013 14:54 UTC by Defense Industry Daily staff
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For the last 50 years, newer fighters have been sold as requiring less maintenance than their predecessors, due to technical advances. As people like Chuck Spinney and the Congressional Research Service have documented, the reverse has been true.
That decades-long defense death spiral has finally reached a point where it’s prompting musings about the collapse of American TacAir, and European countries with their small and dwindling defense budgets are also strongly affected. If the F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter was to have any hope of becoming a commercial and operational success, it needed to change that operating cost dynamic. To do that, Lockheed Martin, BAE, and the international JSF team have turned to embedded HUMS (Health & Usage Monitoring System) diagnostics. Even that probably won’t be enough, absent integration with ALIS – which an IEEE paper has described as “perhaps the most advanced and comprehensive set of diagnostic, prognostic, and health management capabilities yet to be applied to an aviation platform.”
What’s On ALIS’ Menu?
The Problem
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Escalating complexity in electronics, engines, wiring, etc. delivers better capabilities, but creates multiplying points of failure. Each component may be more reliable than its predecessors on an individual level, but the math ensures that they fall short together. More maintenance equals more money spent.
In addition, escalating complexity makes fixes in the field more difficult – and sometimes impossible. This shifts more maintenance to large, specialized rear-echelon depots, which in turn requires more transportation of parts, and more infrastructure. That costs money.
The rearward shift also ensures either longer turnaround times, a larger parts inventory of expensive equipment, or both. So operations & maintenance costs rise again.
To make matters worse, not only does each new generation of fighter aircraft sport a price tag that rises faster than inflation, it’s also less available for flight than its predecessors. Lower readiness magnifies the impact of the numbers cuts from higher prices, by creating a drop in operational aircraft that’s even sharper than the drop in replacement purchases.
The military’s reaction is to keep numbers up by keeping aircraft in service for much longer periods, hence the aging aircraft issue that plagues the USAF and most other air forces around the globe. New aircraft types are also expected to serve longer, of course, which drives up their initial costs coming out of the design stage. And the flat spin continues.
Enter ALIS
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The goal of Lockheed Martin’s Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS) is to counteract the lowering readiness curves and higher maintenance costs that consistently correlate with advancing technology in fighter jets. Ultimately, they want to change the traditional 10 man-hours maintenance per 1 hour of flight ratio. Each F-35 will constantly monitor its own systems via Health and Usage Monitoring systems (HUMS) components, and automatically relay information to ALIS.
The aircraft’s technical breakthroughs with self-reporting wiring will be especially helpful, as diagnosing and fixing electrical issues is an especially large and difficult problem with most aircraft. One that tends to escalate with age.
Once that data is collected and fed in, ALIS will provide an information infrastructure that captures, analyzes (autonomously or with human intervention), identifies, and communicates F-35 characteristics and data, providing information and decision support for every F-35 customer via a global network. That way, each national F-35 fleet benefits from the global experience of all fleets. The F-35 aircraft’s health and maintenance orders, and even the location of parts, will be generated through ALIS. To close the loop, ALIS will contain easily-updated interactive technical manuals, and track maintenance issue resolution.
ALIS integrates a variety of commercial-off-the-shelf applications, in addition to its proprietary programming. Key software contributors include the UK’s IFS Applications (supply chain management) and Trilogi (interactive technical manuals), Canada’s MXI Maintenix (aviation maintenance management), and Siebel (CRM communications, maintenance request tracking, etc.).
ALIS will also interface with the Norwegian JSF4I project, which is targeted at small and medium size defense operators who might seek to use different national systems instead of, or as a supplement to, ALIS.
All of which leads us to the most important question: will even ALIS be enough? Only time, and experience, will tell.
Contracts & Key Events
2011 – 2013
Report from OUE testing; F-35 projected O&M cost not coming down.
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March 20/13: Australia. Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. in Fort Worth, TX receives an unfinalized, not-to-exceed $9.8 million modification for Australian-specific non-recurring support activities. It includes ALIS equipment and sustainment and logistics support, and will be bought under the LRIP Lot 6 contract. $4.9 million is committed immediately.
Australia was set to buy 2 F-35As for IOT&E preparation under LRIP Lot 6. The timing of their follow-on buy of 12 F-35As may be uncertain, but this contract seems to indicate that they’ll buy the 2 IOT&E jets.
Work will be performed in Fort Worth, TX (35%); El Segundo, CA (25%); Warton, United Kingdom (20%); Orlando, FL (10%); Nashua, NH (5%); and Baltimore, MD (5%), and is expected to be complete in January 2019. US NAVAIR in Patuxent River, MD manages the contract (N00019-11-C-0083).
March 6/13: DOT&E OUE. The NGO POGO gets its hands on a copy of the Pentagon’s Operational Utility Evaluation for initial F-35A training, dated Feb 15/13. With respect to ALIS, the OUE notes that it lacks a backup power supply, which can create unsafe temperatures for the system if there’s a base power outage or generator failure in hot conditions. This has already happened in thunderstorms. Beyond that, “continuity of operations plans are not written and procedures for off-site storage of back-up data are not in place.” The lack of back-up data is inconvenient and a loss, but the former would seriously impair operations. Full Report [PDF]
Nov 16/12: Hacked. Reuters reports that ALIS is at 94% of final capability, but a changing computing landscape has bitten it. A Navy “Red Team” hacked into the ALIS system. ALIS reportedly includes both classified and unclassified data streams, and the 2001 specifications didn’t require separating them to prevent intrusions. That was reportedly all the Navy team needed, and this kind of failure to plan for computer attacks doesn’t reflect especially well on all concerned.
Lockheed Martin was surprised by the result, but say that they’ve developed a “fairly straightforward fix” that didn’t involve major adjustments. The bad news? The political exercise of choosing F-35 suppliers in nearly every U.S. state, and beyond the USA, increases general exposure to cyber attacks.
The latest version of ALIS has been in use at Edwards AFB, CA for several months. It’s also scheduled for use by the Marines at Yuma, CA this year, and by Nellis AFB, NV when Lockheed delivers 4 F-35s for testing within the next month or 2. Meanwhile, The Pentagon is reportedly looking to compete ALIS operation, and F-35 maintenance, beyond Lockheed Martin, in an attempt to drive down rising Operations & Maintenance cost projections. Reuters.
Hacked
April 3/12: F-35 schedule & costs. Aviation Week’s Bill Sweetman takes a deep look into the Pentagon’s latest Selected Acquisition Reports, which was released on March 30/12. Excerpts:
“Another three-year slip to initial operational test and evaluation, the culmination of system development and demonstration, which now is due to be complete in 2019 – the target date is February but the threshold date is October… it appears that the main culprit is software and hardware, mainly in terms of… sensor fusion and emission control – that take place in the fighter’s main processor banks… In what follows, I’m going to use average procurement unit cost (APUC)… recurring flyaway is the lowest cost, but neither the US nor anyone else can put an aircraft on the ramp for that money. And all numbers are base-2012… The APUC for the F-35A in 2013-14 is $184-$188 million, versus $177m (2009 dollars) for the last F-22s. And that is at a much higher production rate.”
Most ominously for the F-35′s future cost structure:
“Although the basis of the numbers has been changed, the SAR still compares the F-35A with the F-16, and shows that the estimated CPFH [DID: Cost Per Flight Hour] for the F-35A has gone from 1.22 F-16s in the 2010 SAR to 1.42 today – versus 0.8 F-16s, which was being claimed a few years ago. Where is that operations and support money going to come from?”
SAR: dates slip, O&M rises
Sept 16/10: LRIP-4. Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. in Fort Worth, TX receives a $424.4 million cost-plus-incentive-fee advance acquisition contract modification, for sustainment activities in support of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter’s LRIP Lot IV production. Sustainment activities will include autonomic logistics information system (ALIS) operations and support, block upgrade and concurrency modification planning, site activation, training systems, and support equipment.
This modification combines purchases for the U.S. Navy ($62.0M/ 15%), U.S. Air Force ($135.7M/ 31%), U.S. Marine Corps ($194.5/ 46%), and international partners ($32.2M/ 8%). The work will be performed in Fort Worth, TX (35%); El Segundo, CA (25%); Warton, United Kingdom (20%); Orlando, FL (10%); Nashua, NH (5%); and Baltimore, MD (5%), and is expected to be complete in December 2012. US Naval Air Systems Command in Patuxent River, MD manages the contract (N00019-09-C-0010).
FY 2001 – 2011
ALIS development contracts, and support inclusions; Norway going its own way.
July 2/09: LRIP-3. Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. in Fort Worth, TX receives a $441.9 million modification, finalizing the previously awarded Joint Strike Fighter LRIP Lot 3 advance acquisition contract (N00019-08-C-0028, see also March 25/09 and June 2/09) to a cost-plus-incentive-fee/award-fee contract.
This modification adds performance based logistics support and hardware to support the ordered aircraft: 7 USAF F-35As, 1 Dutch F-35As, 7 U.S. Marine Corps F-35B STOVL, and 2 United Kingdom (UK) F-35Bs. It also includes material necessary to support activation of JSF bases; 2 Aircraft Systems Maintenance Trainers; 1 Weapons Loader Trainer; 2 Full Mission Simulators; 1 USMC and 1 UK Deployable Mission Rehearsal Trainer; 16 LM-STAR avionics test stations; hardware and software for the Integrated Training Center; Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS) shipboard certification and deployment for American aircraft carriers; ALIS depot trade study; and associated technical and financial data.
Work will be performed in Orlando, FL (42%); Fort Worth, TX (37%); El Segundo, CA (9%); Nashua, NH (2%); Baltimore, MD (1.5%); Cleveland, OH (1.2%); Rolling Meadows, IL (1.1%), San Diego, CA (1%), Warton, United Kingdom, (4%); and Cheltenham, United Kingdom (1.2%); and is expected to be complete in December 2011. The Naval Air Systems Command, Patuxent River, MD, is the contracting activity.
Dec 4/07: ALIS. Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. in Ft. Worth, TX receives a $38.5 million modification to a previously awarded cost-plus-award-fee contract to provide for the design, development, integration and testing the Joint Strike Fighter autonomic logistics information system (ALIS) central point of entry system.
Work will be performed in Orlando, FL (67%) and Fort Worth, TX (33%), and is expected to be complete in October 2013. The Naval Air Systems Command at Patuxent River, MD issued the contract (N00019-02-C-3002).
April 30/07: The ALIS system is formally switched on during a ceremony at Lockheed Martin, and will begin receiving data from the test planes. By aviation program standards, it’s an extremely early introduction for this sort of application.
Formal switch-on
Nov 9/06: The JSF4I (Joint Strike Fighter International Information Interchange Initiative) consortium is led by Det Norske Veritas (DNV), with CORENA Norge AS, Kongsberg Defence and Aerospace, and Jotne EPM Technology as equal partners. The NOK 24.3 million (about ) contract from the Norwegian government is aimed at small and medium size defence operators who might seek to use different national systems instead of, or as a supplement to, Lockheed Martin’s Autonomic Logistics Information System (ALIS) maintenance hub for the F-35 fleet. Lockheed Martin is a participant as well, contributing $800,000 and helping to ensure interoperability.
The Norwegian Defence Logistics Organisation’s terms of reference were that the JSF4I solution must be based on the international standards ISO 10303-239 (PLCS) and ASD/AIA S1000D for exchange of information between systems. The CORENA release covers a contract to support JSF4I’s exchange of product support information between the F-35 prime contractor, Lockheed Martin, and the national defense organizations who will be operating the F-35 Lightning II fighter aircraft.
Norway’s parallel JSF4I
Oct 26/01: Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. in Fort Worth, TX receives an $18.98 billion cost-plus-award-fee contract for the Joint Strike Fighter Air System Engineering and Manufacturing Development Program. “The principal objectives of this phase are to develop an affordable family of strike aircraft and an autonomic logistics support [ALIS] and training system.”
This family of strike aircraft consists of 3 variants: F-35A conventional takeoff and landing, F-35C aircraft carrier suitable, and F-35B short takeoff and vertical landing. Under this contract, the contractor will be required to develop and verify a production-ready system design that addresses the needs of the U.S. Navy, U.S. Air Force, U.S. Marine Corps and the United Kingdom. Work will be performed in Fort Worth, TX (66%); El Segundo, CA (NGC, 20%); and Warton/Samlesbury, United Kingdom (BAE, 14%), and is expected to be complete in April 2012. This contract was competitively procured through a limited competition; 2 offers were received (Boeing’s X-32 was the other). The Naval Air Systems Command at Patuxent River, MD issued the contract (N00019-02-C-3002).
Additional Readings
DID would like to thank by John Batchelor for permission to use his F-35B schematic in our article.
- DID’s F-35 FOCUS Articles – F-35 Lightning: The Joint Strike Fighter Program, 2012-2013 | F-35 Joint Strike Fighter: 2009-2010 | F-35 Joint Strike Fighter: JSF Events & Contracts 2007-08 | F-35 Joint Strike Fighter: SDD Contracts & Events 2006.
- DID Spotlight Article – Aging Array of American Aircraft Attracting Attention
- IEEE Abstract from the 2007 Aerospace Conference (March 3-10/07) – Prognostics and Health Management A Data-Driven Approach to Supporting the F-35 Lightning II
- Congressional Research Service (March 7/07) – Testimony before the House Armed Services Committee Air & Land Forces Subcommittee [PDF format]. Inter alia:
“The military services generally would prefer to invest in new aircraft rather than modernize older aircraft. They often argue that new aircraft will be cheaper to operate and maintain than the aircraft they will replace. Frequently, this has not proven to be the case. Newer aircraft are often more complex than those they replace, and cost more to operate. The estimated flying hour cost of the F-22, for example, is $22,284.00. The estimated flying hour cost of the F-15C/D it will replace is $14,139/$13,524.”
- Lockheed Martin (Oct 23/03) – F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Autonomic Logistics Supply Chain [PDF]. Presentation released as “non-technical data” for ITAR purposes’ provided via UPenn Wharton School servers.
- US GAO (#GAO-01-163, Feb 9/01) – Tactical Aircraft: Modernization Plans Will Not Reduce Average Age of Aircraft. The spiral in action.
- D-N-I (Nov 8/2000) – Defense Death Spiral
- D-N-I (June 5/99) – A ‘Walk-About’ Through the Howling Wilderness of Acquisition Reform. The dynamics described above aren’t the only problem. The author was a civilian logistician with 26 years experience working for the US Air Force. He describes the effect of poor measurement choices on the lean logistics efforts in the US Air Force, and what it means for spares and readiness. Unless skewed incentives and measurements like this are fixed, ALIS will have a limited effect on rising operating costs.
tag: ALISmaintenance, f-35alis, f-22perhour
