Methods to reduce direct maintenance costs for commercial aircraft

Direct maintenance costs (DMC) of commercial aircraft make a significant contribution to an aircraft's cost of ownership. The aim of our research is to find out some methods to reduce DMC. The paper first points out that design and fault diagnosis are the key factors to influence DMC, disregarding factors unique to a particular airline. A new concept of R&M design - maintenance free operating period and fault diagnosis expert system are discussed in this paper, in order to reduce DMC.