LIFE CYCLE MANAGEMENT MATRIX - OPTIMISING

LIFE CYCLE MAINTENANCE OF NAVAL SHIPS

The demand for increasing the operational availability of the naval ships is at its peak due to the
increasing mission commitments across the world. The exponential cost of building complex
naval ships coupled with the global economic slowdown has constrained even the most
powerful governments from venturing in to the programs for fleet expansion at a rate
proportional to the existing demand. This situation
has forced the world navies and leading naval ship
builders to focus on optimizing and strategizing the
maintenance aspects of the naval platforms and
the equipment onboard in order to provide
enhanced availability and a robust Through Life
Management of the assets.

The requirement is to increase the operational

availability of the existing assets through the
implementation of efficient maintenance strategies
and to optimize the life cycle maintenance of the future assets through the application of
logistics engineering right from the design and construction phase up until the disposal phase.
The engineering decisions taken during the various phases of the life cycle of a naval platform is
not only relevant from an overall cost perspective but also has the potential to make serious
impact on the efficiency and availability of the platform to deliver the role and functions
envisaged during the conceptual stages.

This paper focus on identifying the key elements and areas of logistics engineering which needs
to be considered during the life cycle of a naval platform for optimizing the maintenance
requirements and to establish an efficient and cost effective maintenance program.