Techology Trends and Maintenance Workload Requirements for the A-7, F-4, and F-14 Aircraft.

Three major technology variables--system complexity, rate of technological change, and automation in diagnostics--were addressed to determine their significance in formulating a methodology for forecasting maintenance manpower requirements for new aircraft. These variables were analyzed separately for the A-7, F-4, and F-14 aircraft systems, as well as maintenance workload requirements. Conclusions are drawn from the effect of these variables on maintenance manhours per flying hour and distribution of workload among maintenance levels organizational, intermediate, and depot and work centers skills. Results indicate that system complexity, measured in terms of component reliability and density of functions number of parts per subsystem, and rate of technological change, measured by subsystem commonality, are important in forecasting the manpower requirements of a new aircraft system. Automation in diagnostics did not have a significant effect on manpower requirements. The F-14 aircraft had a significantly different maintenance distribution by levels than the A-7 and F-4 models, the biggest shift being from organizational level down 20 from other aircraft to depot level up 71 from other aircraft. This was accompanied by a much greater use of commercial support 96 of total depot support than for other aircraft. Author