Reduction of life cycle costs for a contemporary helicopter through improvement of reliability and maintainability parameters

Purpose: The modern helicopters are designed with maximum serviceability and long life expectancy to ensure minimum life cycle cost. The purpose of this paper is to present a framework to incorporate the customer requirements on reliability and maintainability (R&M) parameters into the design and development phase of a contemporary helicopter, and to discuss the way to capture operational data to establish and improve the R&M parameters to reduce life cycle cost. Design/methodology/approach: From the analysis, it is established that the reliability and maintainability cost is the major contributor to the life cost. The significant reliability and maintainability parameters which influence R&M cost are identified from analysis. The operational and design data of a contemporary helicopter are collected, compiled and analyzed to establish and improve the reliability and maintainability parameters. Findings: The process depicted in the paper is followed for a contemporary helicopter and substantial amount of life cycle cost reduction is observed with improvement of R&M parameters. Practical implications: The benefits of this methodology not only reduce life cycle cost but also improve the availability/serviceability through less failure and less time for scheduled maintenance. The methodologies also provide the reliability trends indicating potential area for design improvement. Originality/value: The proposed approach assists asset managers to reduce the life cycle costs through improvement of R&M parameters.