Industrial and Systems Engineering Review, 3(2), 2015 ISSN (Online): 2329-0188 The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author(s) and do not in any way represent the views of the United States Army or any entity of the United States Government. ISER © 2015 124 http://iser.sisengr.org Modeling and Analysis of the Rotor Blade Refurbishment Process at the Corpus Christi Army Depot Nathaniel Green, David Jaye, Stephen Kerns, and Gene Lesinski Corresponding author's Email: Eugene.Lesinski@usma.edu Abstract: Much of the Army’s equipment is coming to the end of its planned life cycle. At the same time, the Department of Defense and the Army are facing severe budget reductions for the foreseeable future. As a result, the planned modernization and acquisition of new equipment will be delayed. The Army is now forced to keep and maintain current equipment as opposed to retiring old systems and buying new ones. With the increased investment in the current systems, the organizations and depots that maintain and refurbish the Army’s equipment are becoming increasingly valuable assets. Corpus Christi Army Depot (CCAD) is the Army’s only facility for repair and overhaul of rotary wing aircraft. CCAD receives approximately 10 rotor blades per day for the Black Hawk helicopter. Each blade is routed through a detailed inspection and rework process consisting of approximately 67 sequential operations which take approximately 45 days per blade. Recently CCAD has expanded and reorganized the rotor blade refurbishment facility which provides an opportunity to re-examine processes, adjust positioning of work stations, and improve efficiency. In this research we develop a discrete- event simulation model of the CCAD rotor blade refurbishment process in order to identify inefficiencies and examine “what if” scenarios to improve key performance metrics. The key performance metrics used to analyze model input include throughput, work in progress, mean queue time, mean queue size, and workstation utilization. The baseline model revealed that there were two crucial bottlenecks that severely limited the throughput and overall performance of the refurbishment process. Adjusting the capacities of these workstations was very effective in reducing the number of blades in WIP and reducing the impact of the queues in front of these stations, but failed to increase the throughput to the desired amount. Additionally, we found that the loss of one whirl tower’s production would not be a significant factor for CCAD’s performance in terms of throughput since operating with only one whirl tower did not significantly impact metrics of interest for the process. Keywords: Simulation, Depot Maintenance, Sequential Manufacturing, Work in Progress (WIP), Throughput, Bottleneck Analysis, Discrete-event Simulation 1. Modeling and Analysis of Army Rotor Blade Refurbishment Process Much of the Army’s equipment is coming to the end of its planned life cycle. At the same time, the Department of Defense and the Army are facing severe budget reductions for the foreseeable future. As a result, the planned modernization and acquisition of new equipment will be delayed. The Army is now forced to keep and maintain current equipment as opposed to retiring old systems and buying new ones. With the increased investment in the current systems, the organizations and depots that maintain and refurbish the Army’s equipment are becoming increasingly valuable assets. 1.1 Background Starting in 1961, what became Corpus Christi Army Depot (CCAD), the Army Aeronautical Depot Maintenance Center began operations on a retired Naval Air Station with the mission to return rotary wing aircraft and components to the Department of Defense and its organizations with the highest quality, lowest cost, and in the shortest time. CCAD sets these goals for its mission and is also challenged by Army Demands in three different areas. The first area is performing “overhaul, repair, modification, retrofit, and modernization for Army and DOD rotary wing aircraft. Secondly, CCAD provides “hands- on training for Reserve, National Guard, active duty, and friendly foreign military personnel” (Military, 2011). The last area is that CCAD provides maintenance support for other depots that include “on-site maintenance teams, crash damage analysis, and chemical technical support” (Military, 2011). All the U.S. Armed Forces benefit from the contributions of CCAD. The Depot is a major contributor to the repair and maintenance of helicopters as well as engines and components. While CCAD is not the only depot for the Army, it is the Army’s only facility for repair and overhaul of rotary wing aircraft. Among the various major aircraft components processed