CBM+ redefines aircraft maintenance

  • Published
  • By Daryl Mayer
  • Air Force Life Cycle Management Center Public Affairs

About five years ago, the Air Force embarked on a journey with Condition Based Maintenance Plus, to shift the sustainment enterprise from “flying to failure” to a “flying to forecast” mindset.

In a recent episode of Air Force Life Cycle Management Center’s Leadership Log podcast, Chris Damani, CBM+ Program Office chief, described CBM+ as a new sustainment paradigm that is transforming the way the Air Force sustains its fleet. The central element is leveraging artificial intelligence and machine learning to turn sustainment data into valuable knowledge that puts the Air Force in control of their sustainment and logistics operations.

“Overall the future of CBM+, as I see it, is that CBM+ model or that CBM+ paradigm just being ingrained into the way we sustain our fleet and that it’s just not just another gimmick or buzzword, it’s just the way,” Damani said.

Avoiding unscheduled downtime, being able to plan maintenance actions, forecast supply needs to avoid rush ordering parts, decreasing mission aborts and decreasing troubleshooting time are all benefits that ultimately lead to increasing fleet readiness, he said.

The program showed results from the beginning, he said. Prototype projects from CBM+ in the 2018/2019 time frame showed sufficient progress to warrant the Rapid Sustainment Office’s board of directors to order CBM+ to scale.

“Meaning that the technology had proven the benefit and we were approved to go implement the project across the Air Force,” Damani said. “Based on that decision in December 2019, less than a year ago, we were challenged to scale CBM+ to 12 weapons systems in Fiscal Year 2020.

The successful results of that effort, he said, show CBM+ as a scalable, repeatable process that can be applied to different platforms across the Air Force.

To hear the full conversation, watch the Leadership Log on YouTube at https://youtu.be/W_Tl7svaYW8. The podcast is also available by searching “Leadership Log” on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Spotify, Overcast, Radio Public or Breaker.