Modernizing Ship Maintenance Through Use of Digital Measurement and Displays
NCMS Project #: 142225
Problem: Despite the rapid increase in the use of digital measurement technology and digital displays to replace or assist with tasks commonly done by human technicians, America’s shipyards have often been left behind in the global transition to more efficient, digital practices. Puget Sound Naval Shipyard (PSNS) currently employs about 14,000 people, many of them maintainers, yet they have been using maintenance technology and processes across many areas of the shipyard that are outdated resulting in a waste of critical time and resources.
Solution/Approach: The overall objective of this project is to work toward modernizing the tools and processes needed to get ships safely, effectively, and efficiently back to sea once they have been sent to the shipyard for service. This initiative will use PSNS as a surrogate to integrate and assess two novels, yet extremely innovative maintenance technologies, to demonstrate a significant cost savings and increased throughput.
Benefit: Digitization has proven to be effective at improving maintenance activities across multiple commercial industries. Lessons learned from this initiative can be employed by maintenance organizations to provide a roadmap for how to evaluate digital technology upgrades that could save time, money, increase safety, and streamline efficiencies that can help get the ships back out to sea faster.
Impact on Warfighter:
- Enhance mission and warfighter readiness
- Increase repair turnaround time
- Decrease maintenance and sustainment costs
- Improve maintainer safety and efficiency
DOD Participation:
- Puget Sound Naval Shipyard (PSNS)
Industry Participation:
- Advetage
- NCMS
Benefit Area(s):
- Repair Turn-Around Time
- Maintenance Avoidance and Reliability
- Obsolescence
- Safety
- Maintenance Management Improvement
- Improved Readiness
- Reliability Improvement
Focus Area:
- Business IT and Analytics