Flight Test Preparation of Health Management Technologies

The U.S. Army traditionally has used a time-based, on-condition maintenance paradigm that relies on at-aircraft inspections and periodic in-depth phase inspections to determine condition and ensure airworthiness. The result is a significant maintenance burden, both scheduled and unscheduled, and excessive aircraft downtime. The objective of the Aviation Development Directorate (ADD) and Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation (SAC) Capability-Based Operations and Sustainment Technology-Aviation (COST-A) program was to develop and demonstrate an integrated set of high value diagnostics, prognostics, and system health management technologies that reduce scheduled inspections and preventive maintenance while enhancing safety. More than two dozen Prognostics and Health Management (PHM) technologies across six primary rotorcraft systems (propulsion, drive train, airframe/structural, rotor, electrical, and vehicle management) were matured to technology readiness level (TRL) 6. These technologies were integrated into a prototype laboratory on-board system built around the Integrated Vehicle Health Management Unit (IVHMU) currently installed in all UH-60 Black Hawk aircraft and successfully demonstrated to perform concurrently in representative simulated flight scenarios, using playback data from healthy and faulty components. A subset of these technologies, jointly selected by ADD and SAC, has been prepared for an upcoming flight test on a UH-60M aircraft to further reduce the risk of transitioning these technologies. This paper summarizes the flight-test preparation efforts, including the implementation of associated algorithms within a representative integrated on-aircraft and ground-based system software environment. Upon deployment to the UH-60 aircraft fleet, these PHM technologies can enable the Army to transition to a condition-based maintenance (CBM) paradigm.