Today’s flight training simulators are so advanced that a training pilot can safely accomplish his first landing in a specific jetliner, after only having trained on a flight simulator. Before flight simulators were this progressive, learning typically occurred in the aircraft itself during an actual flight. Simulators have aided airlines in avoiding the inherent risks of training maneuvers.
However, simulators are not just for pilot training scenarios. They can just as effectively deliver training to aircraft maintenance technicians (AMTs). With simulators, technicians can train on the most current aircraft in use, without risking damage to an actual aircraft during training. The gaming world has made it possible to model maintenance and repairs in a three-dimensional (3-D) space.
John Hayward, senior vice president and general manager of TRU Simulation + Training's Government division, reports simulator training is advantageous because “You are able to teach a full maintenance curriculum without taking the aircraft or the platform out of service. You can acieve high levels of interaction which improve knowledge transfer. You can accomplish training at a lower price point. You are also able to insert faults and allow maintenance students to practice their fault isolation procedures and skills, so they can identify what’s not functioning and do the repair or removal and replacement of that component, without taking the platform out of service and without the limitations imposed on the learner by the real aircraft. If it’s an aircraft specifically, you are not potentially damaging the aircraft or having to pull the aircraft back in for recalibration of doors or other things to make it safe for flying again.”
Lenny Genna, president of L3 Link Training & Simulation, states, “This is very different than in the old days where you had what you called an iron bird that you learned from. You replaced parts on that aircraft, but you were limited to what you could and could not do. In the virtual world, there is no limit to the types of things you can and cannot do in training.” L3's Unified Maintenance Solution, for example, eliminates the gap between the training students receive in school and the units they support in the field because they master their skills on the aircraft they’ll eventually repair.
Simulator training offers a host of advantages, one of which is improved mastery of skills. Bryant Nielson, publisher and managing editor of YourTrainingEdge.com, explains this phenomenon in an article titled “The Benefits of Using Simulation.” He explains participants in simulation training learn to perform an action to obtain a specific outcome, and that, once learned, retention of this knowledge is higher. “One of the essential bases of adult learning theory is the experiential component, so we know that adults learn better through experience,” he writes.
Nielson further notes the mistakes participants make in a simulation are true learning experiences. He writes, “In other words, the outcome is not damaging to the organization, its equipment or its personnel.”
Finally, he writes that the “simulation environment also provides consistent, constant, and immediate feedback. If the simulation is designed to offer feedback at various points throughout the timeline, participants can take the feedback, make corrections, and move forward. Plus, if they have truly made costly mistakes, the immediate feedback helps them right away and not when it’s too late. The best part of immediate feedback is that it leads to immediate application of knowledge. Application is, like experience, a major component of effective adult learning.”
For the reasons above and more, the application of simulation training for AMTs is growing. The fact that the Dassault Training Academy recently graduated its 1,000th trainee from its Falcon Practical Training course, which utilizes high-end virtual reality technologies in addition to practical training done on a real aircraft, underscores the growing popularity of this advanced, hands-on educational tool.
Why Aviation Needs Simulation Training?
In September 2018, Brett Levanto, vice president of communications for the Aeronautical Repair Station Association (ARSA), presented workforce data that painted a troubling picture for the aircraft repair industry. The data from the international trade association for repair stations, maintenance facilities certificated by the FAA, and other civil aviation authorities finds 82 percent of respondents to a recent ARSA survey report having difficulty finding technicians and projects as there are at least 2,500 unfilled technical positions to date. ARSA’s research further reports, that in 2017 alone, unfilled positions cost U.S. maintenance companies an estimated $1.95 billion in lost opportunity and revenue.
The technician shortage means companies are taking longer to complete repairs and are even turning work away, rendering the nation’s aviation system less efficient. That’s what is happening today, but if nothing changes, this situation is expected to continue. In fact, Boeing projects a need for approximately 189,000 new technicians in North America over the next two decades. In addition, with thousands of senior techs expected to retire in the years to come, the gap may widen.
In this environment, employing virtual training simulators to educate potential AMTs makes sense. If the industry only relies on traditional training methods, where AMTs learn on the job under more senior staff, it will fall short on the number of technicians it requires. But simulation training can speed up this effort. Falcon Immersive Practical training, a 3-D virtual reality training tool, allows up to 10 trainees and their trainer to simultaneously access any component or part (even in the narrowest, hardest-to-reach areas of the aircraft) without using actual hardware. This is in stark contrast to traditional training where each student waits for their turn to perform a specific task.
Hayward notes that TRU’s simulation training for AMTs allows teams to use high-fidelity, physical mockups of an aircraft in a virtual environment. Students feel like they’re working on a real aircraft or real components, but the simulation allows more students to get through the curriculum at a time.
“Physical training devices are great for teaching students certain tasks, but you have to put them back together for every student, so if you have six students in a class and one has to go through the process of isolating a fault, you’ve got to go through the same process for each student,” Hayward says. “But if you have a virtual classroom, like TRU's F-35 solution, you can have all six students performing tasks at the same time. This dramatically increases throughput and reduces the amount of time students spend in class, while they get the same learning experience they would get in a physical environment.”
L3 Link Training & Simulation has been offering simulation training for 90 years. Its president calls simulation training “a force multiplier.” A classroom-lab training solution puts limits on how many students can perform a specific task. “How many people can change a tire at one point in time?” Genna asks. “Not many. But if you’re using a virtual space, where the student is interacting with monitors and computer screens, you can have many more students do it. With 3-D technology, students can look at a smartphone, personal device, or desktop PC, and be training from anywhere.”
Better Quality Graduates
Simulation not only increases student throughput, it also improves the quality of the student coming out of training, Genna and Hayward report.
“We all learn in different ways, but most people learn a lot more if the training is interactive,” Genna says. “In the old days, you would have read a manual, then you would have performed the repair. You probably would have done it once, because there are not that many devices to use. Or, you may not have gotten a chance to do it on your own. You may have only watched someone else do the repair.”
Simulation training leverages 3-D technology to represent an aircraft, engine, or aircraft component in the virtual space and then uses artificial intelligence or machine learning to keep track of what a student is doing and give cues or scoring on performance. Genna continues, “With simulation training, everyone has access to the technology, and because of that, they’re all going to learn it, and it’s going to be much more interactive. They’re going to understand the material and because of the technology available to them, they can practice a lot more on their own to become even more proficient.”
The best outcomes, however, utilize a blended solution where the virtual world meets the classroom world, reports Hayward. “We offer physical fidelity or high-fidelity task trainers that address specific tasks that are commonly performed,” he says. “But for uniquely difficult tasks, or where there is a complex piece of support equipment that you want to teach a student how to physically use, a physical training environment works best.”
Training a student to do an engine change on a C-17, for example, is best done in the physical world. “There are a lot of unique elements to doing that engine change,” Hayward says. “From how the engine comes off the pylon, to how it goes onto the engine lift trailer, to how you position the engine lift trailer; all of that is taught best in the physical world.”
However, he adds, “If you are talking about performing engine borescope or maybe an engine oil change, this can be taught with other media like an interactive multimedia instruction. These things would be perfect for a virtual reality solution where you put on a set of goggles and work a borescope probe through your hand while seeing the engine through virtual reality goggles.”
Genna adds, “Simulation answers the question of: How do I train people with the right rules in place to do something correctly? More importantly, if they are doing it wrong, how can I give them the proper instructional oversight to correct that? In the old days, a lot of that oversight may have come from people. Nowadays, because of technology, that oversight can come from a machine that provides feedback, whether it’s voice communications or commands or simply a warning signal.”
Simulation technology also addresses the needs of today’s learner. Genna explains, “When a 19-year-old needs to figure something out today, he goes to the internet and finds a YouTube video. When I was 19, if I needed to change a carburetor, I would have bought a Chilton’s manual and read it. Today they can find a video online and learn to do it in five minutes.”
Better Assessments
Assessments with simulation trainers are accomplished in two ways. For instance, TRU’s C-17 training, developed for the Air Force, has students performing the work with an instructor looking over their shoulder. But the training system also captures student actions so instructors can review a student’s actions and compare them to a set of expected results to produce a student grade.
Genna reports simulations simplify student assessments, even when the tasks are performed virtually, because every maintenance task follows a maintenance guide. “There is a set of instructions that say do this first, then do this second, and do this third,” he says. In other words, students know they need to torque this bolt to 45 pounds, put proper lubricant on this, etc. and that they must go through the set of procedures in order. “If they don’t follow the procedure, the system scores them accordingly,” he says.
The F-35 training from TRU, which is now a virtual training device, enables instructors to virtually track each student’s actions, but the scoring occurs automatically within a grading algorithm in the system itself. “This information is used to flag the instructor when a student is having an issue so that the instructor can zoom in on that student and monitor what they are doing,” reports Hayward.
The F-35 student grading system examines the student’s work, and if the student is struggling with a specific task, it forces them to repeat that section of training again until they’ve mastered it. “We’re going to send you back through the module again and again and force you to repeat it, until you’ve learned it,” Hayward says.
L3’s solution works the same way. “Depending on their scores, they either progress to the next level or they don’t,” Genna says. “Instructors can focus their efforts on the students who need it the most, and because the system does the scoring automatically, he or she can now instruct four to 10 students instead of one or two.”
Security within both TRU and L3’s solutions ensure that the correct student is doing the work. For example, with L3’s solution, students must go through two levels of identification to get online. They log in to their own unique account and then must pass two levels of authentication to start working.
In a world where throughput and student mastery matter most, simulator training offers a real-world solution to readying AMTs for work.
Ronnie Wendt is a freelance writer based in Waukesha, WI. She has been writing about aviation for a decade.
