FLS Aerospace takes flight with PowerRetrieve

Citation

(2003), "FLS Aerospace takes flight with PowerRetrieve", Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, Vol. 75 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/aeat.2003.12775aaf.004

FLS Aerospace takes flight with PowerRetrieve

FLS Aerospace takes flight with PowerRetrieve

Keywords: FLS Aerospace, Aircraft, Maintenance

Keeping an aircraft flying is a testament to good engineering and maintenance. Every time an aircraft is serviced, specialist technicians are involved in checking everything from the Radome to the Tail Fin. FLS Aerospace is one of Europe’s leading independent Maintenance Repair Organisation. The company operates a network of maintenance centres from airports around Europe and has more than 3,000 employees world-wide. Customers include Aer Lingus, Virgin Atlantic, easyjet, MyTravel and Ryanair.

When FLS Aerospace perform maintenance on an aircraft they use a schedule of maintenance tasks known as a “workpack”. Each workpack has a series of task cards containing detailed maintenance tasks for the aircraft check. As the check is performed in the hangar these task cards are completed and signed by the mechanics working on the aircraft. These task cards are a critical account of the service history of the aircraft. The original audited workpack must be returned to the aircraft operator post check, and a copy is held by the maintenance provider FLSA.

The aircraft mechanics also use highly detailed technical manuals. These manuals may be available in either Microfilm or CD-ROM format. It is required that the aircraft mechanics have easy access to these manuals throughout the aircraft maintenance.

In October 2000, FLS Aerospace undertook a project called Formula One (F1). The main objective of this project was to increase the efficiency of the aircraft check maintenance process by improving existing procedures and adding new processes. A vital element was to reduce the turntime required to overhaul an aircraft. The use of workstations were introduced, which are basically winterms and work areas placed at each zone of the aircraft, for example, the wings, cabin, tail dock etc. This reduces the requirement for the aircraft mechanic to move away from the zone from where he is working, thus increasing production efficiency. Two important projects within F1 were identified and John Conlon, a project engineer with FLS Aerospace, Dublin was given the responsibility to deliver on the following.

1. 1.

   To fully utilise the use of workstations, it was deemed necessary that all technical manuals be available in electronic format. This reduces the ineffective time spent walking to and from the Reader Printers. Therefore, a process to both convert the analogue microfilm into electronic format and then deliver to the end users on the hangar floor was required.

2. 2.

   FLSA also required that their “workpacks” be scanned progressively as the check takes place allowing a prompt return of the workpack to the aircraft operator. Also providing the ability for both FLSA staff and the aircraft operator to retrieve this data quickly and efficiently.

Following several pilots on various systems, FLSA selected PowerRetrieve, which embeds Convera’s intelligent search and retrieval system, RetrievalWare. InfoCAP, a UK-based software developer specialising in information management and retrieval technologies and a partner of Convera, develops PowerRetrieve.

“PowerRetrieve was the only product that we found that addressed both business needs,” explains John Conlon of FLS Aerospace. The software could capture and convert the analogue microfilm manuals and store them in a format from which data could be retrieved simply and efficiently by the end users, allowing the aircraft mechanics to easily locate the appropriate section within the correct manual.

Digitising of microfilm

The process began by converting the microfilm images into a digital readable format using PowerRetrieve’s Capture feature which includes optical character recognition (OCR) turning the images into computer readable text documents, PowerRetrieve then automatically indexes the results. The resultant text and tif files are all brought together by the PowerRetrieve index, which created what is called a fileroom of the stored data. The manuals (Maintenance Manual Illustrated Parts Catalogue Structural Repair Manual etc.) can then be put onto CD-ROM for viewing. A full PowerRetrieve search engine is then used to retrieve this data on the hangar floor, which allows the user to simply type in the required ATA chapter for viewing of the image within seconds. The page can then be printed if necessary. This process has the added advantage of extending the life of the information, as microfilm can fade with use over time.

Workpack scanning

The second stage of the project was to use PowerRetrieve to transform the maintenance workpacks into a digital archive that could be indexed and searched by both FLSA staff and the aircraft operator. This consisted of both scanning the documents in an efficient manner and then user friendly retrieval of the task cards. This provides FLSA with an electronic library and efficient data retrieval resulting in close to 1 million sheets of paper taken out of circulation.

Each workpack consists of a series of task which the aircraft mechanic completes as he carries out his tasks on the aircraft. Prior to this project implementation, these cards were copied and stored in FLSA’s Quality Assurance department as paper records; this made it extremely difficult and time-consuming to find information regarding a particular part of the check maintenance.

After much research FLSA decided to use Kofax Accent Capture, a document scanning system to scan and index the task cards. This software is coupled with a hardware scanning unit. This combination allows FLSA to index each scanned document, as per task card barcode and also per document type should there be no barcode. The resultant is again a tif and text file for each image scanned. With PowerRetrieve’s index and search function, these files are transferred into an electronic file room.

In addition, the powerful index engine automatically indexes the entire contents of the workpacks providing a search capability that the end user can search for information based on the barcodes or on any content within the workpack themselves. For example anywhere “wings” is printed on the entire workpack can be retrieved, printed and E-mailed within seconds. This greatly decreases the time taken to retrieve a particular card or content within a workpack for FLSA’s Invoicing, Engineering, Planning and QA departments. Retrieved documents can be printed, faxed or E-mailed at the click of a button. This is in stark comparison to physically going through boxes of information.

“The content search proved extremely helpful,” says Conlon. “Any printed text from the whole workpack can be retrieved.”

Once the entire workpack is complete, the contents are transferred onto a CD-ROM and the data is made available across the LAN.

FLSA now has the capability to provide the unique service of providing a CD-ROM of the completed check to the aircraft operator’s technical representative. Together with a copy of the entire workpack service records, a copy of PowerRetrieve Search is also added to the CD, providing an electronic history of maintenance that allows the representative to search and retrieve any document from the workpack using a Windows-based PC. The user can then browse through folders or search on the contents of the workpacks using PowerRetrieve’s unique pattern recognition search engine. Using this new loading edge technology, FLSA can also now provide information and electronic storage of data for third parties.

One of the key benefits of working with InfoCAP was the company’s flexibility. The aerospace maintenance sector is extremely specialist and following an early trial of PowerRetrieve; the company requested several small changes to tailor the software more closely to its requirements. Once these improvements were made, the software was rolled out across FLSA.

“PowerRetrieve has been a hugely successful tool in the indexing and retrieval of both scanned documents and microfilm,” continues Conlon “The time to copy a workpack and the efficiency of data retrieval have improved greatly.”