A significant proportion of Air France's Airbus A220s is on the ground, waiting for replacement parts.
LE BOURGET—As the suppliers of engines and other aircraft equipment are late with spare parts deliveries, Air France Industries-KLM Engineering & Maintenance (AFI KLM E&M) is striving to develop more repairs to keep its parent companies' and customers' aircraft flying.
The maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) specialist sometimes has to cope with feet-dragging suppliers. Meanwhile, a significant proportion of Air France's Airbus A220s is on the ground due to issues with the Pratt & Whitney GTF's combustor and bearing No. 4, waiting for replacement parts. Given the cost of a new repair development and the deviation from a situation where suppliers would deliver spares on time, AFI-KLM E&M's effort means a return to normal will not happen any time soon.
Instead of replacing parts (and possibly sending the damaged ones to the manufacturer for repair), AFI KLM E&M has been increasingly repairing them at its own MRO facilities. “Enough is enough—you are not delivering, so please cooperate on parts repair development: That is what we tell some noncooperative suppliers,” Executive Vice President Anne Brachet said on the sidelines of the Paris Air Show here on June 16. “The complaint we filed against Woodward [over alleged anti-competitive practices] has suddenly made things moving again, it seems.”
Brachet lamented current 50 to 60-day delays, compared to extensive work conducted under Lean Six-Sigma methods to shorten a turnaround time by just one day in the past.
On the CFM Leap turbofan alone, AFI KLM E&M has devised 200 repair procedures. For cabin components, the company has created 49 additive-manufactured replacement parts.
Nine A220s, out of a total 43 in Air France's fleet, have yet to return to service after premature engine removals. “The oil leaks bearing No. 4 may cause means we have to remove the engine after just a few hundred hours sometimes,” said Géry Mortreux, Air France's executive vice president for engineering and maintenance. “That will be the first cause of removals in the coming years.” The current practice is to replace the part with the same design, as Pratt & Whitney has yet to find a solution.
As mitigation measures, AFI KLM E&M is using vibration measurement and analysis to predict the need for a removal and therefore organize it at a convenient time and place. Separately, Pratt & Whitney has recommended a change of oil type, Mortreux added.
To meet Leap MRO demand, AFI KLM E&M is to start operating a Leap-1A test cell at each of its Paris and Amsterdam sites this month, before Leap-1B test cells join them later this summer.
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