Aviation Ground Support Equipment: The Forgotten Enabler

CENTERS OF EXCELLENCE

The PM AGSE maintains both the Nondestructive Test Center of Excellence and the Corrosion Prevention Control Center of Excellence. The Nondestructive Test Center of Excellence provides technical support to the Army engineering community as well as to the warfighter in the field. It also provides technical support to all current weapon platforms by developing inspection procedures, conducting onsite technical assistance visits and training the Army National Guard on nondestructive testing. The Corrosion Prevention Control Center of Excellence provides a unified approach to corrosion prevention control by standardizing procedures and corrosion prevention compounds, providing technical expertise and coordination, maintaining a clearinghouse for depot maintenance work requests and technical manual updates and supporting the Army Materiel Command's corrosion program.

SHORT-TERM ACTIONS

To alleviate immediate operational support shortfalls, PM AGSE has?

• Procured, assembled and shipped battle damage assessment and repair kits directly to deployed units
  
  
• Push-issued unit maintenance aerial recovery kits to Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom
  
  
• Fielded shop equipment contact maintenance platforms to AVIM units
  
  
• Overhauled the current aviation vibration analyzers for direct return to Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom, with a 24-hour depot turnaround
  
  
• Begun reset of aviation ground power units and established theater repair cycle float for Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom [Resetting the power units takes the equipment as it returns from an operation and conducts the maintenance needed to bring it back to a fully operational state. A theater repair cycle float is a pool of equipment that can be loaned to a unit in place of equipment being repaired.]

The path ahead for PM AGSE is changing with Army aviation. PM AGSE has designated several internal focus areas for meeting the challenge of change?

• Finding a maintainer for AGSE
  
  
• Reprioritizing AGSE products to meet soldier and mission needs
  
  
• Developing evolutionary acquisition strategies with a goal to "field a Chevy, not a Cadillac"
  
  
• Developing multipurpose systems that are configurable and reconfigurable
  
  
• Pursuing modularization, flexibility, and interoperability in the design, procurement, and support of AGSE
  
  
• Improving diagnostic and prognostic capabilities
  
  
• Reassessing the level of repair analysis
  
  
• Conducting a complete sets, kits, outfits, and tools onsite review for AGSE in the first and second quarters of fiscal year 2005
  
  
• Ensuring that designs of new AGSE systems support a two-level maintenance process

PM AGSE continues to look at families of systems and systems of systems to fill capability gaps. Its top priority is providing the logistics soldier with the best equipment, reducing his workload and enhancing readiness in support of a diverse range of missions. Aviation logistics' keystone enabler?AGSE?is no longer forgotten.