Lufthansa technik, a global commercial aircraft repair, maintenance and repair service provider, is now using rfid technology to track aircraft components。
Lufthansa technik attached the passive epc uhf tags to a written document accompanying the aircraft's components, and the company would like to be able to mark the components directly if there is an rfid label on the market that is recognized by the airline industry and that meets its specifications。
The labels to be applied to aircraft components must meet a variety of safety requirements and meet high technical standards, such as exposure to bad weather, volatile temperatures and various chemical substances and liquids for use in the aviation industry. The label must be flammable and be electromagnetic compatible. All rfid equipment must be certified for use in an explosive environment, and label sizes must be relatively small to apply to a variety of equipment。
Lufthansa technik (a subsidiary of lufthansa air germany) requested the supplier to provide an unsourced uf label that met the above requirements and iso 180006c standards. In parallel with the development of ic based on rfid, with an ideal memory, the company is working with the international air association (ata) to develop flexible data standards for labelling。
Ats members include a number of giants in the aviation industry, such as aircraft manufacturers (airbus, boeing and brazilian airlines embraer), oem (rockwell collins, thales), airlines and mro service providers (american airlines, continental airlines and lufthansa technik), rfid systems integrators and development companies (sita, fujitsu, intelleflex and tego)。
Michael scheferhoff is the chairman of the rfid/autoid working group of ata, who coordinates all rfid activities of lufthansa technik (including lufthansa technik logistik)。
He stated that, although several label providers were currently working to develop labels that met the technical requirements of lufthansa technik, none had so far been successfully developed。
From now on, lufthansa technik has marked each aircraft component document, which follows the process of dismantling, repairing and re-installing the component. In july, lufthansa technik and lufthansa technik logistik completed a four-month rfid application at their headquarters in hamburg, germany, and at two third-party maintenance plants, during which they acquired valuable experience with rfid applications. As the rfid application reduced or eliminated the input of manual data, thereby greatly expediting the repair of components, the company officially launched the application at all german factories in november。
By labelling the documents, lufthansa technik's employees no longer need to collect information on each component manually. Previously, the workers had manually recorded the implementation and the required steps, and the sorting station workers were not allowed to enter the information in the computer. As this is a manual intensive process, it usually takes days to get a component to a suitable repair plant。
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Read labeled aircraft parts files using readers
"thanks to the rfid tags on the file, we will no longer rely on vision to receive dismantling information from mechanics," scheferhoff says. “our future goal is to complete the process of unloading a component from an aircraft to the maintenance plant within 24 hours.”
Lufthansa technik provides services not only to lufthansa aviation, but also to other airlines, as well as large stocks of spare parts. In order to fully complete the rfid implementation, the company will have to mark these stocks, “which is expected to take a long time because of the large number of components and their permanent cycle”
The pilot project and the rfid file tracking application used the unsourced epc uhf smart label of upm raflatac, which met the epc gen 2 air interface standards. Readers and antennas are provided by motorola。
Once a permanent rfid label has been installed on the aircraft parts, the mechanics will use the rfid readers and computers to read the labels of each component directly on the aircraft, and then enter information on the steps that have been implemented and that still need to be implemented. The lufthansa technik program label will not only store the tag id number, but will also contain production records of components such as serial numbers of components and the name of the manufacturer。
To link to the project mentioned above, lufthansa technik established a rfid project management team to coordinate rfid activities of lufthansa technik. Project management supports various types of rfid projects and advises on technology, vendor selection and application processes to avoid differences of opinion within the group on the future of rfid applications. The group is also closely following the development of rfid technology and making the latest developments available to the ata members in a timely manner。
In the future, the lufthansa technik also plans to apply rfid to other areas, such as cabin management: rfid helps crews to check life jackets, seat belts and oxygen generators for life, which usually take a long time。
In addition, lufthansa technik would like to apply rfid to internal processes, such as some bar code-prone stains or other environments。
