Sunday, June 25, 2006

Demanding tasks

During the start of this week I completed the task of data collection, which in itself was a huge task. After this I read books on Six sigma in order to learn about its theory and literature. But then I started studying the reports and engine in order to find the defects which are occurring in the engine. I made list of all such defects and their frequency, and then using Microsoft excel worksheet I made the model for finding the sigma level at which each defect is working at present. Once the sigmisation of defects was over, I tried to figure out the various reasons which can be the possible causes of the defects and preventive & remedial measures that can be taken corresponding to the defects.

In regard to the project on Automated replenishment system, there was no material available. So I talked to various officers so as to find the system by which the Planning and provisioning cell of BRD is working. And I was shocked to find that there is not much emphasis put on it, as they simply find the average consumption for last five years which is taken as the demand for current year, known as CAR. The CAR value is multiplied with the number of years for which the stock has to be made out in order to find the overall quantity that is required. Then I tried to find out details about ARS but I was not able to do so. I searched a lot and found that there is a problem regarding the procurement of non moving non mandatory spares. So I talked to officers regarding this after which I decided to abandon my project on ARS and do a project on the Non moving non mandatory spares, which could be very helpful to Air force.

Sunday, June 18, 2006

The real work begins

Week 5
Start of Project Work

After a month of observations of different departments of the BRD, now begins the era of the project work. The last week saw meetings with AOC R.K Srivastava and Group Captain M.F Alam, both meetings aiming at the betterment of the start & consequent working of projects. And both officers wish me luck for my project. I had an option of five projects but only three of them were feasible as other two involves software programming. These 3 projects were ‘Six sigma analysis of the AI-20 engine’, ‘Fatigue analysis of aircraft’ and ‘Modernization of the Flushing Rig’. Out of these I choose the first project.

My project is basically to find the defects that are occurring in the engine, their frequency and the Sigma level at which the engine division is working. After this I had to suggest some measures to improve the current system prevailing here. After deciding about the project I had a meeting with Wg Cdr S.Shukla and Gp Cpt S Singh. I must say that, of all the officers that I have met here, I found Gp Cpt S Singh the most intelligent & practical of all of them. He is the men who has a lot of knowledge and wants to improve each & every system to the best possible. He gave two lectures regarding my project, its need & requirement and on Six sigma. After all this introduction & briefing of the project, I started working on it. The initial part involves collection of a lot of data from various places and this itself is an enormous task. Most of the data has been collected and I had started working on the project.

Another thing to mention is that I was very much interested in doing some project on industrial engineering, so I talked to WC A Bharti and Gp Cpt Alam. They guided me to talk to Grp Cpt Y Sathe. I had a meeting with him and he suggested me to do a project on the provisioning of ARS (Automated Replenishment System), which is the most important & fast moving part of the helicopter. I had asked the provisioning division to provide me the data for last 5 to 10 years and they asked me to wait as it will take around 2 to 3 days.

I am very much enthusiastic about my projects and will work to my best potential to do the projects as efficiently & effectively as possible. And I also hope that my projects will benefit to 3BRD & IAF and thus to my country.

Sunday, June 11, 2006

End of the 1 month learning process

Week 4 at 3BRD

Continuing from where I left last week, I had visit to general engineering squadron, Indigenisation squadron and QAS (quality assurance squadron).
In GES I visited the remaining bays which were left in the last week, some of which are Rubber bay, rubber testing lab, CNC wire cut machine etc. Rubber testing lab has all the facilities for testing properties of rubber such as elongation, tensile strength, compressive strength and hardness. The lab also has facilities for testing tensile & compressive strength and other properties of metals also. Various machines used for this purpose are universal testing machine, hardness tester etc.
After this I visited Indigenization cell which is the most important part of 3BRD as well as Indian air force. This cell is associated with indigenizing as many parts of the helicopters and aircrafts as much as possible. ISC of 3BRD has indigenized around 13000 different parts of the helicopter whereas IAF has indigenized around one million parts. But to everyone’s disappointment all these are simple & single parts and ISC has not been able to made any complete system. At present they are working to make the complete Fire extinguishing system and if they are able to do this then it will be a major achievement in the history of IAF.QAS is associated with the testing and maintaining the quality standards of all the tools, machines & services used & provided in 3BRD. It maintains check on the preventive maintenance that is carried out in the BRD. It does various work, from dimensional check to micrometry check. There are offices and labs for quality check in every department

Sunday, June 04, 2006

Exploring the departments

Three weeks have passed and the last week was same as previous two weeks in terms of both the hectic schedule as well as learning experience. It was devoted to the Engine component repair system (ECRS), General engineering section (GES) and Central scientific instrument organization (CSIO).

I had already learnt about the helicopters engines and now it was the time to know about the overhauling of the engine of Mi8 & AN32. I went to the ECRS lab where this was done. There I met with Sq Ldr Kuldeep who showed me different bays and told me everything about the overhauling of the engine which basically has 19 components.
He told me about the importance and need of an engineer in this section as some sort of innovative ideas are required here. I also saw the Jig made by HAL and used for the testing of the engine under simulated conditions for various parameters. There were some Jigs which have been brought from Russia in 1960’s and are still working in good conditions.

After this I went to the GES which is considered to be the heart of the BRD. It has seven bays-Heat Treatment and Welding Shop, Machine Shop, Organic Shop, Fastener Shop, Rubber Seal Bay, Ratable Bay and Sheet Metal Bay. This section was very interesting as it was related to my field and I learned a lot about the manufacturing of various components of the helicopter. There were many CNC machines such as EDM machine, Milling machine etc. The welding shop has facility for Magnesium welding also. Rubber bay was the most interesting one and in this bay the rubber seals are made. But still there are some bays in GES which are not yet explored and I will do that in the next week.

There was also a special visit to CSIO which is a part of CSIR (central scientific instrument research). It is the body for the design & development of defense related instrument. Here firstly I went to the Environment Monitoring Control Division where I learned about various instruments used for measuring environmental pollution. Some of them are Smoke density meter, Turbidity meter, high volume sampler, Chemilumiscent tester for nitrogen oxides, Sulphur dioxide analyzer, CO analyzer, Infrared gas analyzer etc. After this I went to the research lab where I saw HUD (Head-up-display) which is used in fighter aircrafts. HUD is the most important instrument developed by CSIO and it has caused a revolution in the whole world.

To conclude I would say that it was one more productive week at IAF-3BRD and I have learned a lot. And now only one more week of observational training is left after which I will start my project. And I hope that this week would give me all the information and knowledge about the 3BRD which I haven’t got till now.