Maintenance technicians conduct regular, and sometimes unplanned, visual inspections on aircraft. This is a time-and cost consuming, yet fundamental aspect of maintenance operations.
What if this process could be made more efficient? It can! Namely with the help of drones. Here are the 7 most important reasons why in just a couple of years, maintenance technicians and drones will work hand in hand around the world.
With a drone, the visual inspection procedure turns from a manual into an automated process. As well as being challenging it can take days to complete a visual inspection. Often there is pressure involved in the process, especially when there is a new lessee already contracted to pick up the aircraft. What can take maintenance technicians up to two full days of work can be done by a drone in a matter of 2 hours, saving everybody valuable time.
It does not matter whether your fleet consists of smaller jets such as the Embraer 190, narrowbody aircraft such as Airbus A320 or widebodies like the Boeing 787. Mainblades is able to inspect any kind of aircraft. No changes to our system are required, making it a flexible solution for mixed fleets. We save your maintenance technicians time and assist them to focus on their true expertise: analysing defects and making informed decisions on the maintenance tasks to be performed.
Hangar space is expensive to rent and not always available for aircraft operators. This is especially the case when unscheduled maintenance is required due to lightning strikes or other incidents. After a series of successful indoor tests our team was therefore eager to push our technology further in a way that it does not require a closed hangar environment. We worked hard to make outdoor inspections possible, allowing maintenance technicians to make quick assessments on the spot.
Whether it houses a full-service FBO, aircraft service and repairs, prop shop, or repair facility, a commercial aircraft hangar is a busy place. Performing a drone inspection in this dynamic environment therefore may seem like a challenge. However, the precision of our navigation software paired with a variety of safety features guarantees a completely safe operation that requires zero preparation for maintenance technicians. Maintain peace of mind while full maintenance ops continue normally.
Build it or buy it. Certainly, a debate that applies to data labeling. One of the first and most crucial steps in the machine learning development cycle and probably constantly on the mind of any data scientist. In this blog, Julian von der Goltz, Head of Machine Learning at Mainblades discusses the considerations we made to…
A very special year for us. We turn five! Five wild years to say the least with uncertainty, changes and major milestones all around. From the first proof of concept to flying in operational hangars every day. This is our story. Read on to get a glimpse into our past, present and future. Before you…
Have you seen Aviation Week Network’s latest article about how we tackle challenges with paint chipping on Boeing 787 aircraft? A hot topic in aviation right now! The software developed in cooperation with KLM Engineering & Maintenance automatically identifies and labels both paint damage as well as high-speed tape using high-resolution images and measurements. This way it can predict where damage…
Robots that operate in particularly challenging environments such as aircraft hangars, require fast and accurate state estimation. With poor lighting and no GPS that can be a challenge. That is why the Mainblades development teams are proud to release a new, in-house developed lidar odometry algorithm that has been in daily operation in the maintenance…
AI and drones. This unique combination can make big waves in your hangar, through which you can work even more efficiently. That’s not the future, but the practice Mainblades is currently working towards. No idea how to imagine that? Let us explain it to you.
Despite many turbulences in the aviation industry, Mainblades can look back on a year full of achievements and key milestones. We signed two partnership contracts, gave demonstrations across two continents, flew over 200 automated inspections, participated in several international conferences and managed to secure approval for outdoor flights at active airports in Europe.