Increased Customer Value and Reduced Cost of Aeropropulsion Testing Through Reengineering

Abstract

Despite shrinking research, development, test, and evaluation (RDT&E) budgets, development of advanced gas turbines and extension of service life on fielded engines continues today, with increased emphasis on decreasing life-cycle cost, shortening development cycles, and improving engine durability. Testing and evaluation (T&E) of these engines plays an important role in maturation of their technology, evaluation of proposed improvements, and, ultimately, system affordability and reliability. Reengineered T&E processes and tools which can deliver increased customer value at decreased cost and which can potentially reduce the system development cycle, the number of development or component improvement program (CIP) engines, the amount of flight testing, and the program risk, are in high demand. This paper reports specific T&E examples of increasing customer value and decreased costs through - Consolidation and streamlining of national T&E assets - Integrated test and evaluation (IT&E) technology development, validation, and application - Application of information technologies (IT) to routine engine RDT&E These efforts involve integrated DoD Service planning and execution, application of integrated aeropropulsion ground testing, modeling and simulation, and flight testing (IT&E), and demonstrations of enhanced customer value. Applications to current system developments and component improvements are described.