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USS Gerald R. Ford’s (CVN 78) aviation intermediate maintenance department (AIMD) recently achieved three important milestones ahead of the ship’s post-shakedown availability (PSA) period.
The department saw the first successful calibrations of its Consolidated Automated Support System (CASS) High Power Radio Detection and Ranging test station and Jet Engine Test Instrument (JETI), as well as the official certification of its Micro/Miniature (2M) Electronics Repair shop.
The Navy utilizes the CASS to troubleshoot and repair aircraft at sea and ashore, allowing equipment to be quickly and efficiently returned to readiness status.
“When a squadron is embarked on the ship, if there’s anything wrong with their aircraft’s circuit-specific radar systems, they’ll bring those components to our shop,” said Aviation Electronics Technician 2nd Class Maria Lake, from Los Angeles. “The CASS station will help us diagnose the problem and figure out the steps we need to take to get it working again. From there, we can repair or replace the components and get it back to the squadron in working order as quickly as possible.”
Before AIMD could calibrate the CASS, they first had to assess the system to ensure it was functional, which provided its fair share of challenges to the crew.
“We learned that it definitely takes a team to do this calibration process,” said Lake. “You can have the most seasoned technician, but they still need several people to help. This particular system proved to be complex at times, but now that we’ve accomplished this, we feel confident in our ability as a team to calibrate the other, less-complex systems in our work space that will require this process.”
For the more intricate avionic components such as wiring, circuitry and cable repair, Ford’s 2M Electronics Repair shop recently acquired the official certification necessary to accomplish such mission-critical tasks.
“The 2M work center is unique in its certification because of the particular types of hazardous material we have to utilize and vapors that have to be regulated due to industrial hygiene standards,” said Aviation Electronics Technician 1st Class Michael Rupe, from Wausau, Wisconsin. “It’s a bit of a lengthy process with evaluating the shop’s design, evaluating any dangers or hazards the work presents, and also ensuring all personnel are certified to perform the work and that all equipment is adequate for performing repairs. Achieving this certification gives the AIMD 2M shop the ability to help keep the air wing’s jets and the ship’s electronic components in safe working order.”
Across the hangar bay in the jet shop, jet engine testing is essential to the carrier’s mission of launching and recovering aircraft, because when an engine is repaired, it has to be tested before it can be reinstalled in the jet. The successful calibration of the JETI is one more step closer to bringing Ford’s AIMD to a fully-functional status.
“When the jet shop is running a jet engine’s diagnostics, we use the JETI to make certain all operational requirements are met before sending the engine back to the air wing,” said Aviation Machinist’s Mate 1st Class Ganesh Arjun, from New York. “If we didn’t have a JETI at our disposal, we’d basically have to keep installing entirely new engines into the jets every time an engine stopped functioning, which wouldn’t be cost effective at all for the ship or the Navy. So having a JETI is crucial to our ability to repair the jet engines as needed.”
Arjun said AIMD will continue pushing itself to become fully functional for a large-scale deployment, and has a goal of testing its first jet engine on this particular JETI before the ship completes its upcoming PSA period.
USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN 78) is the lead ship in the Ford-class of aircraft carrier, the first new class in more than 40 years, and will begin the phased replacement of Nimitz-class carriers.
The ship incorporates advances in technology, such as a new reactor plant, propulsion system, electric plant, an Electromagnetic Aircraft Launch System, Advanced Arresting Gear, machinery control, Dual Band Radar and integrated warfare systems. The Gerald R. Ford-class carriers will include more than 23 new or modified systems, in comparison to Nimitz-class carriers.
| Date Taken: | 05.24.2018 |
| Date Posted: | 05.29.2018 12:59 |
| Story ID: | 278682 |
| Location: | NORFOLK, VA, US |
| Web Views: | 147 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, USS Ford AIMD Celebrates Three Important Milestones, by PO1 Joshua Sheppard, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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