An investigation of the maintenance process of commercial vehicles in the Department of Defence / S. Roets

The purpose of this investigation was the development of a holistic solution toproblems of high cost and long tum around times in the maintenance processof D-vehicles (commercial vehicles) in the Department of Defence (DOD).The investigation was focussed on the technical functions of the process, butalso explored direct interfaces with the process, namely the financial,procurement and transport sections. During the research phase,benchmarking was done at various Government Departments to enquireabout best maintenance practices in a similar environment.As a result of this investigation, an improved process has been designedbased on modem maintenance practices. Results have shown that theimplementation of the proposed solution would lead to a substantialimprovement in the present state of affairs.A representative group of Defence Force units were visited during theinvestigation. The DOD managed approximately 17 500 D-vehicles at the timeof the investigation. Problems relating to the maintenance process startedsurfacing during the last few years after the change of policy, in that non-corefunctions in the DOD should be outsourced. These vehicles weresubsequently not considered to be a core function.The importance of this investigation was underlined by the enormous financialimpact that the maintenance of this large commodity has on the DefenceForce budget, and more importantly, the capability of ensuring a high ratio ofavailability of these vehicles as essential support equipment.The completed report is currently being scrutinised by the responsible DODauthorities. A decision whether the recommendations of this study will beimplemented or not, has unfortunately not yet been reached.