As the Defense Department grows its fleet of deployed V-22 tilt-rotor aircraft and C-130J transport aircraft, engine manufacturer Rolls-Royce is expanding its technical support for its AE 1107C engines found in V-22s and AE 2100D3 engines powering C-130Js.
Much of this growth centers around Rolls-Royce’s months-old Defense Operations Center located at the company’s headquarters in downtown Indianapolis, Ind., Rolls-Royce Vice President of Customer Business for Defense Tom Hartmann said yesterday in a phone interview. The Defense Operations Center provides 24-hour, seven days per week technical support for engine-related issues to military customers around the world. Rolls-Royce spokesman George McLaren said yesterday about 50 people staff the Defense Operations Center.
“It’s really just a smart way to do business and a smart way to keep our customers up at a high operational state, help them save money and be more efficient,” Hartmann said.
Hartmann described Rolls-Royce’s support as being the eyes and ears of the company. Hartmann said, for example, if a V-22 comes back from a mission with some sort of warning light illuminated, the company’s deployed field support representative can quickly identify the problem and save the military time and money by preventing a major change, like a new engine. V-22s are developed by a joint venture of Boeing [BA] and Bell Helicopter, a division of Textron [TXT], while Lockheed Martin [LMT] develops the C-130J.
“Our tech reps have seen pretty much everything that can possibly go wrong with the engines,” Hartmann said. “Just by having a guy there with the knowledge and background right on base with them…gives them some expertise, some comfort that they can go out and fly the next mission.”
Hartmann said the Defense Operations Center comes in handy when a rep might have not seen some sort of problem before. The rep can call the ops center and provide technicians with actual data from the last flight for them to analyze. The technicians can then guide those field service reps with information to help prevent the loss of a flight or mission. The ops center can also review all flight data for all V-22 engines so if something has come up before, ops center engineers will be able to quickly identify it.
“So you get the brains of 2,000 engineers we have here combined with the front line experience of the guys in the field,” Hartmann said.
McLaren said Rolls-Royce has field service reps based at eight different military locations that host V-22s: Marine Corps Air Station New River, N.C.; Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, Calif.; Marine Corps Air Station Futenma, Japan; Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Md.; Hurlburt Field at Eglin AFB, Fla.; Kirtland AFB, N.M.; Cannon AFB, N.M.; and Marine Corps Air Station Quantico, Va., where Marine Corps Helicopter Squadron One is located. McLaren said Monday Quantico will receive V-22s this year.
McLaren said Rolls-Royce also has field service reps deployed in Afghanistan and the company also provides deployed services on request for the Air Force. McLaren said Rolls-Royce has about 80 field service reps deployed at different locations for DoD customers.
Rolls-Royce also provides a service called MissionCare, which is a suite of the company’s technical support offerings available to military customers. Hartmann said for a fixed-cost per hour, the company will look after engines that fly on military aircraft by providing on-site field service reps, “consumables” or small items that are frequently replaced like oil and air filters as well as guaranteeing a certain percentage of spares will be available and ready to fly. Hartmann said the $52 million Navy contract awarded to Rolls-Royce Nov. 27 for V-22 support was to exercise a MissionCare contract option (Defense Daily, Jan. 7).
McLaren said Rolls-Royce is also supporting the company’s Tay engines found in the military versions of Gulfstream IV commercial jets and its BR710 engines found in militarized Gulfstream V jets. Rolls-Royce has commercial reps that support these aircraft, McLaren said.
Hartmann said the “aftermarket” side of Rolls-Royce’s business accounts for about half of the company’s business. Hartmann described aftermarket as everything but new engines: Services, MissionCare contracts and parts. Hartmann said the military side follows that model “very closely.”