2016 Maintenance Innovation Challenge 76 CMXG Reverse Engineering And Critical Tooling PROBLEM STATEMENT Sustainment of aging aircraft presents unique challenges due to the lack of complete technical data, aging legacy tooling, and the need to rapidly respond to unanticipated repairs to a wide variety of aircraft and exchangeable end items. BENEFITS Rapidly prototype parts for fit checks and iterate design changes very quickly Reduces material waste and machining time Print low production run tooling for sheet metal forming, welding, and drilling on demand Reduces tool cost, lead time and storage footprint Create novel light weight and ergonomic solutions when standard fixtures or tooling doesn’t exist Improves employee safety and satisfaction TECHNOLOGY SOLUTION Laser scanning and measurement to meet the needs of depot maintenance operations Compare items to technical data Create a model from a sample part Additive manufacturing to rapidly prototype solutions Custom repairs Innovative tooling Validate/enhance technical data Printed tube tack weld fixture made from Ultem (Below) GRAPHIC Printed modified form block made from Ultem (Above)