Paul Faas

Analyzing production modifications of a C-130 engine repair facility using simulation

The LRAFB C-130 engine repair facility is one of the top T-56 engine refurbishing plants in the United States Air Force. Currently, the shop is prevented from testing potential contingencies within their environment due to the rapid nature of their engine repair process. A simulation approach is needed to test various scenarios and determine the maximum capacity the shop can handle in its current configuration. Particularly, the simulation describes the consequences of increasing engine production on the shops personnel and throughput production figures for several policy variations. A detailed verification and validation of the model are shown, establishing the computational efficacy of the model in preparation for the comparative analysis. The model is a starting block for an Air Force wide analysis of C-130 engine rebuilding production needs with an overarching goal of standardization in repair methods and efficient operations.

Vehicle health management research for legacy and future operational environments

The Air Force will require the ability to diagnose and predict component failures in order to more effectively meet the requirements of the fast and agile Aerospace Expeditionary Force (AEF) and future space vehicles. This paper will cover topics relevant to vehicle health management for current and anticipated support environments. It reflects current projects underway at the Air Force Research Laboratory in the air vehicles and human effectiveness directorates. Specifically, the predictive failures and advanced diagnostics (PFAD) for legacy aircraft, passive aircraft status system (PASS), and the space operations vehicle integrated system (SOVIS) projects will be discussed.

Organizational Development Goes Digital: Applying Simulation to Organizational Change

Organizational change initiatives are challenging for both researchers to understand and for practitioners/organizational leaders to execute. This article takes a conceptual approach to describe organizational simulation technologies as one of many approaches for use in organizational development activities while also providing two examples of how simulations have been applied to real-world scenarios. Scenario 1 involved a process re-engineering effort within a manufacturing organization where a manufacturing process was modeled to explore how numerous factors (e.g. product inputs, organizational structure, manpower allocation) influenced the simulated output. Scenario 2 included an organizational change initiative involving organizational design modifications in a command and control center. Here, two organizational design alternatives were compared and contrasted. Simulation technologies may provide organizational development (OD) professionals with the opportunity to experiment with alternative organizational designs, an inherent strength for generating potential return on investment estimates. Researchers from the Air Force Research Laboratory have used simulation technologies as one element of an overall organizational development strategy within two different projects, albeit as one aspect of a larger change management strategy. This article discusses these applied examples in the context of a conceptual discussion on the merits of simulation as a tool to support organizational change.

Collaborative Logistics on the Military Flightline

This paper discusses field experiments in the Air Force Research Laboratory’s ongoing Smart Systems for Logistics Command and Control (SSLC2) research program. Spiral 1 of this program included four field experiments conducted in the spring of 2005 at Air Force Reserve/Air National Guard bases in Indiana and Ohio. This paper describes how the recommendations from Spiral 1 pointed the way to field experiments planned for upcoming spirals-- experiments in the collaborative logistics environment of the maintenance flightline.

Integrating sensor data with system information via interactive visualizations

Development of intuitive visualizations requires a systematic approach that includes a focus on the user. Creating interactive visualizations for complex systems often requires the integration of information from existing systems and sensor data to provide the operator with real-time information. The objective of this research was to fuse information from sensor technology with flightline maintenance information to support aircraft maintenance logistics. The research was conducted in two phases. A user-centered approach was used to design visualizations in each phase; however, in Phase II a cluster analysis technique was utilized to support the design. User feedback indicated that incorporating a technique to map data and decisions resulted in interactive visualizations that were well accepted by users and provided the important information needed for their decision making tasks.

Preliminary architecture for the predictive failures and advanced diagnostics program

This paper discusses some of the major results from the initial effort of the Predictive Failures and Advanced Diagnostics for Legacy Aircraft program. The primary goals of this AF Research Laboratory/Northrup Grumman project are to enable a prognostics capability for legacy avionics systems and to enhance their existing diagnostic performance. Major benefits of this program are enhanced aircraft availability ad reduced Operation and Support costs.

Adaptive Performance: Implications for Military Logistics

The Information Age we are operating in today has created pervasive changes in the basic nature of work. As the foundations of work are being altered, new demands are being placed on the individuals performing the jobs. Although technological innovations to cope with changes in work abound, the implications at the human level have been neglected. Within the military logistics domain, numerous networking technologies have been implemented in an effort to evolve with the new Net-Centric warfare environment. If the evolution is to succeed, a coherent systems approach is needed that also addresses the human component. Starting at the beginning, we must ask what aspects of human performance are imperative in today’s warfare environment. As the foundations of work itself are being altered, so are the dimensions of performance; therefore new performance models are needed that address how work is done today. Thus, I propose a study that examines a relatively new model of performance: adaptive performance. Validation of the adaptive performance model and identification of predictors would address the human side of networked logistics by aiding in the selection and training of a workforce suitable to operate within the dynamic and fluid military logistics system that has emerged.