Simulating F-22 Heavy Maintenance and Modifications workforce multi-skilling

The U.S. Air Force aircraft maintenance depots face complex operating environments due to the diversity of aircraft or mission design series (MDS) maintained by each depot and the variability of maintenance requirements for each MDS. Further complicating their operations is the variability of maintenance actions required from one aircraft to another within each MDS and a highly specialized workforce that has inherent inflexibility to compensate for the workload variability. Air Force Materiel Command is reviewing maintenance personnel multi-skilling as a method to efficiently absorb the variability of workload and maintenance requirements between aircraft. Using a simulation built in ARENA 14®, we studied the F-22 Heavy Maintenance Modification Program through a series of designed experiments. Our study analyzes whether using a multi-skilled workforce impacts the productivity of depot maintenance personnel through simulation of several multi-skilling policies.