The Logista. Letter. from the President CONTENTS. Volume 7, Issue 1 March 2017

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1 The Logista Volume 7, Issue 1 March 2017 Obtaining Support for Early Logistics Participation & Realizing Potential Opportunities (P. 2) CONTENTS FMEA as a Valuable Tool at All Program Stages (P. 4) ALE 2017 Tentative Workshop Schedule (P. 5) Staff Member Spotlight: Antonio Scappaticci (P. 6) Letter from the President Why does ALE exist? For years, our mission statement was Our Mission is Your Success. While we are endlessly committed to the success of our customers, we decided it was time to update our mission statement to better reflect why we exist and how we help our customers succeed. We are happy to share our new mission statement: To Make Customer Systems Affordable and Sustainable. These two attributes go hand-in-hand and are the primary goals of the analyses performed by each of our three groups: Specialty Engineering, Integrated Logistics Support, and Systems Analysis. Changing our mission statement was no minor consideration, but we feel our new mission statement succinctly defines the value we add to our customers products and the promise we deliver upon for each of our projects. On each project, we do more than analyze and document what is we strive to define what can be. We will continue to identify ways to make our customers systems affordable and sustainable throughout their lifecycle. This is my pledge to our customers, and to the ultimate end-users of the systems we work on. Thank you for your continued readership and interest in Life Cycle Engineering, and I hope you enjoy this issue of The Logista. Best Regards, Renee Coogan, President, ALE rcoogan@ale.com 1

2 Obtaining Support for Early Logistics Participation & Realizing Potential Opportunities By Darryl Kellner, CRE, Program Manager, Specialty Engineering Group Lead As entry level logistic engineers, many of my colleagues and I failed to immediately recognize the impact management support had on the success of logistic analyses in the early phases of the design cycle. We were occupied with the immediate challenges of trying to learn and excel in, what to us, was the brand new field of logistic engineering, which was largely overlooked in traditional engineering classes. With over 15 years of experience, I have come to appreciate the importance of management s support in realizing the benefits of logistic analyses in a program s acquisition phase. However, after recently attending the latest RAMS conference, my fourth in the past seven years, I returned with a deeper appreciation and realization for the persistent obstacle faced in obtaining this support in the first place. The challenge is reminiscent of the chicken or the egg causality dilemma how to demonstrate the value of logistic analyses performed early in the design phase to senior management to gain their support when this support is critical for logistics to successfully participate early within the system engineering process. While at RAMS, I noticed two pre-existing and persistent topics consistently being deliberated across members of academia and practitioners in both the commercial and defense industries: (1) the challenge of obtaining management support for early assessments and (2) the resulting failure in realization of potential opportunities for equipment improvements and cost reduction. ALE presents at the Annual Reliability and Maintainability Symposium (RAMS ) From January 23 26, Darryl Kellner and Antonio Scappaticci represented ALE at RAMS 2017 and presented several papers on which they were co-authors. The papers were: Effective Application of Ignition Risk Safety Analysis by Rodney Benson and Darryl Kellner Software FMEA: A Successful Application for a Complex Service Oriented Architecture System by Darryl Kellner Management of Availability for Complex Systems by Darryl Kellner Reliability Prediction Using Limited Test Data by Elizabeth Schwartz, Steve Rogers, Darryl Kellner, & Antonio Scappaticci Single Shot Device Reliability Challenges by Daniel Foley, Darryl Kellner, & Antonio Scappaticci The most effective means of obtaining management support is, of course, demonstration of the value added to the program by early logistic assessments. Today, this value is best exhibited through (Continued on page 3) 2

3 (Continued from page 2) the identification of realistic means for cost reduction or avoidance altogether. Within the fields of logistics, these opportunities exist in the design of both the system and its support system with respect to reliability, safety, and sustainment. But how do we demonstrate the value early in the design phase when timetables are abbreviated and system maturity is lacking? One solution is a macro-level analysis that can identify key insights to important perishable issues. The approach is further enhanced and more openly received when we make use of expert knowledge within a structured approach, such as ALE s Front End Analysis (FEA) process and associated tool. The technique has been successfully demonstrated across a number of programs including the International Space Station, a naval minesweeper, a specialized optics based system, military vehicle chemical defense equipment, and the U.S. Navy s Seal Delivery System. Any on-going program that has undergone a significant adjustment in support concept offers an excellent opportunity to complete such an analysis with senior management s direct participation to demonstrate the utility of early logistic assessments. The assessment involves efforts to: 1. Develop a functional description of the system, 2. Conduct an operational analysis of the system, 3. Define an initial maintenance concept, 4. Evaluate logistic factors against the support concept for each major system concept, 5. Conduct a sensitivity analysis to determine the impacts on resource consumption or operational readiness caused by altering system concept or support concepts, and 6. Perform an analysis of the results to examine the underlying causes of resource consumption and investigation of opportunities for improvement. The analysis can be performed quickly by leveraging personnel who, while possibly not intimately familiar with the current program, are acquainted with aspects of the program and lessons learned in the form of similar designs or modifications. Using their inputs, an assessment can be performed on alternative design and support approaches to identify insights into cost drivers and potential opportunities for improvements. The results of the assessment represent the opportunity for the logistics analysts to operate effectively in the concept formulation phase. More importantly, when compared against realized results from actual field application, the results of the assessment will likely serve to successfully demonstrate the potential value of applying a brief, straightforward analysis very early in any development process to develop clear insights as to what really makes a difference. Positive results can support efforts to drive culture change and attempts to gain management support for future endeavors. However, like any other analysis or process, the technique s effectiveness is dependent upon management commitment to act on the insights and our perseverance as practitioners. 3

4 FMEA as a Valuable Tool at All Program Stages By Thomas Kutscher, CIO, Program Manager, Systems Analysis Group Lead A Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (FMEA) can be an invaluable tool at any stage of a system s lifecycle. However, what insights are desired from a FMEA will influence when one is performed. The easy answer for when a FMEA should be accomplished is, As soon as possible to gain the maximum benefit. This bottom-up inductive analytical method for assessing potential failures can be successfully applied whether the system is in preliminary design and in need of refinement before initial production, or in its tenth year of deployment. The stage of the system s lifecycle during which a FMEA is performed can, however, limit the potential benefits by making some resultant recommended design features cost and schedule prohibitive to implement. There are multiple phases of a system s lifecycle. This article will specifically discuss how FMEAs can provide value in the concept phase, design phase, and fielding/post deployment of the system. In the Concept Phase of a program, the system has a low level of design maturity. Therefore, it is typical to perform a functional FMEA, which can be used to refine requirements or influence trade-offs for design approaches. For example, a need might exist to transport several warfighters in a ground vehicle from point A to point B. Since we know it is a ground vehicle, we can assume it has a rolling mechanism (tires, tracks, etc.) to move the vehicle, and some sort of power plant to provide torque to the rolling mechanism. This level of detail forces the analysis towards a functional FMEA. Evaluating a system beyond its functions is impractical at this point because the design is fluid and the high-level insights provided by a functional FMEA are what are desired in this stage to make programmatic decisions and move the project forward. As the design matures, there are more options to direct the analysis efforts. The availability of more data defining the system allows the analysis to dive to a deeper level of detail and utilize a slightly different approach. This is commensurate with the maturity of the program, which brings us to the Design Phase. During the Preliminary Design Phase, the design matures to now define the hardware, allowing the analyst to sharpen their pencil and complete a new iteration of the FMEA. The analysis moves from identifying failure modes at the functional level to specific failure modes based on the hardware chosen to accomplish a func- (Continued on page 5) 4

5 (Continued from page 4) tion. This additional layer of detail guides the design team to implement necessary failure mitigations in the design specific to the configuration and still early in the program so as to be cost effective. Performing a FMEA iteratively throughout the design and development process, and up to the First Article Test, can also provide valuable influence to the testing program itself. Review of the potential failure modes and associated effects while developing the test plan will ensure that the test plan addresses previous and current concerns. This will also place focus on identifying the impacts (hopefully positive) of the mitigations that were implemented in the design. Related to the testing, the FMEAs can also provide background information to the Failure Review Board (part of the FRACAS system) when reviewing test failures and developing fault resolutions, as applicable. Up to this point, I ve focused on new products, but a FMEA can also be useful for modifications to existing products. For legacy systems that may not have had a FMEA performed in the past or where the FMEA data is no longer available, a FMEA can aid in identifying the potential failures inherent in the design, which is increasingly important as a system ages and is more likely to experience field failures. Also, at this stage in the legacy lifecycle, a FMEA can provide insights into related supportability analyses such as safety, human factors, reliability centered maintenance, and maintenance planning that traditionally would have been discovered during the initial analysis in the Design Phase. To reiterate the main theme of the article, no matter the stage of a system s lifecycle, or whether the system is a new design or legacy asset, a FMEA can be a valuable tool. It identifies potential improvements and mitigations for the system design as well as influences maintenance and operational activities through insights gathered on potential safety and human factors concerns. To most effectively utilize FMEAs, perform them early and mature them commensurate with the design development. ALE 2017 Tentative Workshop Schedule We do what we teach and teach what we do! Providing workshops for the analyses we perform has been a core element of ALE s business for more than 30 years. Each workshop is taught by a subject matter expert who regularly performs the analyses and utilizes the techniques being taught. Our workshops include hands-on exercises that rapidly develop the participants understanding and working knowledge of the subject. July 2017 September Day, Duel Topic Workshop: Failure Modes, Effects, and Criticality Analysis (FMECA) and Reliability & Maintainability (R&M) Indianapolis, IN 3-Day, Level of Repair Analysis (LORA) Workshop Huntsville, AL Call us at (614) or us at staff@ale.com to learn more about our 2017 Workshops, request a our full workshop catalog, or inquire about hosting a private workshop! 5

6 S TA F F M E M B E R S P O T L I G H T Antonio Scappaticci Mr. Antonio Scappaticci has been a valuable staff member in ALE s Specialty Engineering Group for over five years. An Electrical Engineer by trade, Antonio specializes in analyzing the reliability and availability of electronic assemblies and systems. He is in the process of becoming ALE s 4th Certified Reliability Engineer (CRE). He has extensive engineering experience in Design Engineering, Hardware Configuration, Product Development, Product Engineering, Hardware Testing, Regulatory Compliance, and Hardware Guide and Manual Creation. Before joining ALE, Antonio was a Design Engineer at Alcatel-Lucent, a telecommunications equipment division of Nokia. He also recently presented papers this past January at the Reliability and Maintainability Symposium (RAMS ) in Orlando, Florida. Outside of work, Antonio likes to hike and walk in the local Metro Parks. He also likes bottle collecting, home improvement projects, and learning about different wines. Antonio is a member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and the IEEE Reliability Society. CAGE code: 1Z220 Dun & Bradstreet: NAICS: WOSB Seaport-e Prime Contract Holder ALE Central Ohio Office 6797 North High St, Suite 324, Worthington, OH P (614) E staff@ale.com ALE Gulf Coast Office 4850 Gautier-VanCleave Rd, Suite 3, Gautier, MS P (228) To learn more about any of the articles or the topics discussed in The Logista, please contact us directly at staff@ale.com and connect with us through social media! 6