Courtesy Photo | Josh Laird, Defense Contract Management Agency Detroit quality assurance specialist,...... read more read more
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DETROIT - The defense contracting world can be as fluid as sand sliding through fingers. As customer requirements and global missions shift, the agency’s team members redirect their professional focus to prioritize goals and meet new customer needs.
So, when Army Col. William Robare, Defense Contract Management Agency Detroit commander, was informed the Ground Combat Vehicle program was cancelled due to budgetary reasons he sent an email to his team.
“I thought I would send a note to emphasize how important it is for us to highlight the great work you and your program support teams provide to the Army,” wrote Robare. “With the GCV program becoming a casualty of a new fiscal reality, these engineering change proposal programs within the Army’s ground combat portfolio are what will enable our soldiers to maintain their decisive technological edge in land combat. Hooah!”
Faced with a decision, the Army had to choose whether to replace the Bradley Fighting Vehicle or modernize the rest of its combat vehicle fleet.
“Sequestration put the combat vehicle portfolio in the difficult position where the Army could not afford both the development and production of the GCV while simultaneously addressing the remaining needs across the Armored Brigade Combat Team and Stryker Brigade Combat Team formations,” said Army Brig. Gen. David Bassett, program executive officer for Ground Combat Systems. “In the end, we needed to ensure readiness and capability across the entire formation and chose to defer the GCV (program) until those priorities had been met.”
Robare believes the Army’s decision to invest its resources into the modernization programs via the ECPs was the right approach. “It’s generally accepted knowledge that 70 to 80 percent of any system’s operations and sustainment costs are defined early in the acquisition lifecycle.
“To fully equip, operate and sustain these ground combat vehicles throughout their lifecycle will cost hundreds of billions of dollars for the Army,” continued Robare. “It is absolutely imperative we get the engineering part done right to ensure the designs of our combat vehicles not only deliver the required technical capabilities, but also drive down the O&S costs through better reliability, availability and maintainability factors.”
The men and women in charge of ensuring things are done right are program integrators and members of the Abrams, Bradley and Stryker program support teams. Each of these programs falls under the Program Executive Office Ground Combat Systems, which is one of Detroit’s prime customers.
“Our program integrators and PSTs play a pivotal role with PEO GCS in providing independent insight with actionable cost, schedule and technical performance information to positively influence program success,” said Robare. “Our supported programs place a premium on the fact that our PSTs and program integrators are co-located in the prime contractor facilities and near the PEO’s locations. Here they provide real-time information to multiple levels of the PEO and program manager organizations to positively affect their charter missions with effective face-to-face collaboration on programmatic and/or contractual issues.”
Throughout their working relationship, DCMA Detroit and PEO GCS have benefited from one-on-one interaction and real-time actionable insight. Now, with the ECP programs moved to the forefront and successful modernization in the balance, those professional interactions could prove vital to future ground combat portfolio successes.
“Detroit PSTs operate at a high level because they are proactively immersed in their respective modernization programs, working hand-in-glove with our customers, which in this case is PEO GCS,” said Robare. “Ultimately, our program integrators and PSTs understand the importance of these ECPs — that they will save lives and ensure the safety of our warfighters while enabling the Army to enhance its ground combat capabilities and maintain our land dominance in the ever-changing global security environment.”
Abrams
“We continue to add capability to the Abrams tank which is already a world class vehicle,” said Bassett. “The Army is committed to an additional incremental upgrade to the Abrams tank that will give it greater lethality, protection, ability to carry the network and greatly reduced fuel consumption. The initial stage of this upgrade will address the system architecture — power and data management systems — to support inbound technology, specifically the Army’s network.”
Bassett explained that the Abrams latter stage upgrades will focus on improving the tank’s sights and sensors, including the integration of the third-generation Forward Looking Infrared technology. “Lethality improvements via upgrades to the gunner’s primary sight and commander’s Independent Thermal Viewer coupled with new FLIR technology, a color camera and a laser range finder, will enable the tank crew to take full advantage of the capabilities of a new Advanced Multi-Purpose Round that is being developed.”
According to Jeff Stroker, DCMA Detroit Abrams ECP program integrator, General Dynamics Land Systems is responsible for integrating and delivering nine ECP prototype vehicles for test and evaluation. The first three prototype vehicles were built in Sterling Heights, Michigan. The six remaining Abrams are currently being built at the GDLS Lima facility, a government-owned contractor-operated plant in Ohio that falls under DCMA Detroit.
The agency’s Abrams ECP PST will play a key role as the prototypes progress and the Army’s modernization process moves forward.
“I attribute the PST’s success to being customer focused,” said Stroker. “The Abrams ECP PST works well with their respective colleagues within the Main Battle Tank Systems. The team has been proactive in identifying areas where DCMA surveillance can provide value-added information to the program manager, and it has developed into a valuable asset for keeping the program manager current on risks, issues and concerns identified by DCMA.”
Bradley
“The Bradley has been the workhorse Infantry Fighting Vehicle for the Army for more than three decades and will continue to be well into the future,” said Bassett. “The Bradley is a sophisticated weapons platform capable of providing tremendous firepower in direct support of the infantry it carries.”
The Bradley ECP PST and all delegations meet weekly in a variety of product team and technical interchange meetings, according to Kimberly Straw, DCMA Detroit Bradley ECP program integrator. The goal is to provide the Bradley program manager with acquisition insight that ensures all technical risk, cost and schedule goals are executed and any issues or concerns assigned via action items within each integrated product team are resolved or captured via the risk register.
“This close interaction allows the Bradley PST to be more effective in evaluating the earned value management systems and the monthly cost performance report,” said Straw. “The Bradley program integrator meets with the Bradley program manager on a monthly basis to review the DCMA analysis and understand the potential impacts to the program with regard to cost and schedule. This assists the Bradley program manager in having timely and valuable information with which program decisions can be made.”
The agency’s Bradley ECP PST members have already made a positive impact on the modernization program with many receiving certificates of recognition and command-level praise for their contributions to overall success.
“The Bradley PST continues to be a vital member in evaluating the contractor’s accomplishments and in identifying potential risks/issues with regard to cost,” said Straw. “The PST is an integral part of the Bradley ECP contract and the teaming effort to update the Bradley to the new configuration which gives the soldier increased capability, protection and ability to execute their missions.”
Stryker
“Particularly with the last few rotations of the Double V-Hull upgrade in Afghanistan, it is clear that the Stryker is an incredibly effective and survivable platform for its intended purpose as a fast, highly mobile medium-weight vehicle,” said Bassett. “A total of 20 Stryker brigades have deployed to both Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. Stryker was the only ground vehicle in combat through the duration of OEF and OIF that consistently maintained an operational readiness rate well above 90 percent — far exceeding any other combat vehicle.”
The Stryker PST formed a sub-team designed to specifically support its modernization ECPs. The contract management office provided a deputy program integrator and an additional engineer to enhance the team’s strengths, according to Dan Croteau, DCMA Detroit Stryker lead program integrator. “Since this is a developmental program which is a cost-plus-incentive fee, we have a requirement for earned value. This is being handled by our engineer.”
The sub-team currently consists of a program integrator, an engineer, an EVMS engineer and a software engineer. Once the test assets are being assembled, an additional quality assurance representative will be added to perform direct oversight on the assembly, explained Croteau. Additionally, delegations have been issued to the manufacturing sites for engineering and QA oversight.
Currently, the ECP sub-team strives to assist the Stryker program in maintaining a technological edge in combat. In the future, it hopes to save the American taxpayer money.
“What will ultimately save the taxpayers’ dollars is the upgrade of an additional brigade set of double ‘V’ hull variants using the exchange program where they trade in a used flat bottom vehicle, harvest the common parts through a reclamation process, and build a new DVH vehicle with a combination of new and reclaimed parts,” said Croteau. “In the case of the next brigade set, the ECP upgrades will be incorporated into exchange.”
A core belief that reverberates throughout all three PSTs is an understanding their efforts positively impact the warfighter and ensure the Abrams, Bradley and Stryker “maintain their decisive technological edge in land combat.”
“In today’s fiscally constrained environment it makes sense for the Army to conduct incremental upgrades through ECPs to Abrams, Bradley and Stryker so that these legacy combat vehicles can use the latest optics, munitions and technological advantages to enhance their lethality, mobility, and survivability,” concluded Robare.
| Date Taken: | 03.31.2015 |
| Date Posted: | 03.31.2015 15:07 |
| Story ID: | 158693 |
| Location: | DETROIT, MI, US |
| Web Views: | 362 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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