DADTMA – Distributed Acquisition Digital Twin Maintenance Architecture

Enhanced Inspection

There is an urgent need to digitize maintenance records for aging fleets of defense assets. The current process is inefficient, requiring time-intensive human-performed inspections and data collection before, during, and after maintenance tasks. The process frequently requires tedious and error-prone record keeping with pen and paper before transcription to a computer for access by other teams or departments.

FTL’s DADTMA (Distributed Acquisition Digital Twin Maintenance Architecture) is a digital twin knowledge acquisition system that reduces manpower-intensive engineering costs associated with repair and maintenance inspections. DADTMA accelerates and automates inspection data collection, streamlines data sharing, and provides tools for predicting maintenance requirements. DADTMA revolutionizes maintenance and inspection decision making via a secure graph database utilizing big data mining and AI on a GovCloud web app that can be quickly accessible across departments, DoD components, or with outside manufacturers.

To enable the Navy and other DoD components to adapt to the increasing complexity of aircraft maintenance and quality assurance processes, DADTMA enables direct data-capture via USB digital tools, scanning, and modeling technologies to capture and organize digital maintenance data and automate workflow management. Of paramount importance is validation that all parts and assemblies are free of anomalies which could cause failures and increased life-cycle costs.

The optimal transition path for the DADTMA app would be for its continued use as FRC-SE with adoption across all FRCs and possibly Navy shipyards. DADTMA is data-agnostic and can be used to save maintenance time and manpower for any high value asset. FTL’s DADTMA has been developed with direct input from aerospace manufacturers Lockheed Martin, Sikorsky, and Northrop Grumman, and ship service providers like Fairbanks Morse Defense. Applications include the U.S. Department of Defense and civilian aerospace and ship-building and maintenance markets and large-scale manufacturing, such as for heavy machinery, medical devices, and silicon chips. Northrop Grumman anticipates a 10% time-reduction in inspections and yields $10M savings in lifecycle cots for a single product.

The biggest challenge facing DADTMA is gaining DoD-wide ATO approval. To that end, FTL is working with 3rd party providers for quick implementation once the technology is adopted by an end user.

Navy’s aircraft sustainment depots such as FRCSE, Jacksonville and FRCE, Cherry Point have expressed an immediate need for a comprehensive Maintenance Sustainment Tool. DADTMA has been DADMS registered and is currently undergoing testing and evaluating via time study trials on actual maintenance events. FTL Labs Corporation expects FRCSE to become the first DADTMA adopters and is excited to get DADTMA into the hands of other maintenance depots as well.