ANNnews – Day to day of
10 March 2022
We dedicate this section to our colleague Andrés Pérez Alcalá, an industrial engineer who left his native San Sebastian (Basque Country) in 1999 to establish in Vitoria (Basque Country), where he settled and began working at Gamesa Aeronáutica, now Aernnova.
ANNnews wanted to interview him to better to understand his day-to-day life at the Company, as well as the work of an engineer of product in Aernnova Aircraft Services (AAS) in Miñano.
ANNnews: Andrés, why did you decide to go into aerospace industry?
Andrés: Actually, I studied industrial engineering and in 1999 I started working with a scholarship at Gamesa Aeronáutica, now Aernnova. In fact, the first project I took part in was for a wind project. Later I joined the aerospace projects, so the decision was a bit of a unexpected.
ANNnews: What has been your career within the company?
Andrés: When I arrived at the company, the complete wing of the ERJ 145 was already being assembled, which was the company’s first major project in terms of product engineering and manufacturing. Also, at that time, there were other projects underway, at different stages, such as the SJ30-2 fuselage or the S92.
Within the design area, I participated in several aerospace and wind projects, until 2006, when I joined the team that was formed for the launch of Aeroblade.
From 2006 to 2019, as a member of Aeroblade, I carried out design, tooling and industrialization tasks and, finally,support for “in service life”. This cycle was interrupted on a couple of times, to collaborate with Aernnova Engineering on the development of the KC390 and to participate in the relaunch of production at a GE plant in the UK (which suffered a fire a few months before us).
At the end of 2019, the opportunity arose to join Aernnova Aircraft Services (AAS), in the newly created position of production engineering at Miñano, and I joined the team.
ANNnews: What exactly does a production engineering manager at Miñano do? What does your day-to-day work consist of?
Andrés: First and foremost, we guarantee complete assistance, offering spare parts and repairs, product support and problem solving. It is a job that involves being in permanent contact with the customer, aligned and committed to their objectives.
To contextualize and be a little more specific, let’s say that within the engineering area of AAS in Miñano there are three legs:
Maintenance engineering, the team that deals with Service Bulletins, manuals and the necessary tools to carry out aircraft maintenance.
In Service Engineering, which is the team that provides support for fleet problems (they are the ones who define the repairs to be carried out, both in-house and at the operator’s premises).
Manufacturing Engineering: which is where I am. At the moment I am the only member of this team, and I develop the production engineering activities, mainly focused on product repairs and field support.
ANNnews: Can you give us an example of a working day?
Andrés: In a normal process, once the customer has approved the repair, the production documentation is made based on the layout given by engineering. This documentation, which we call work cards, contains the operations to be carried out in the Miñano workshop, which are detailed depending on the complexity of the work to be done and those aspects that go beyond the reference documentation (manuals, plans, manufacturer’s standards, etc.).
Once the documentation is ready, it is checked to verify that it contains all the information necessary to repair all the defects and that it does not deviate from the approved data, i.e. that no document or standard that has not been approved is referenced.
Once the documentation is released, it is delivered to the workshop and support is given whenever requested.
One aspect to highlight is that we are always ensuring that we meet the deadline committed to with the client, which is one of the key objectives in the activity of AAS.
ANNnews: What is your vision of AAS?
Andrés: Despite my short experience in the company, and the fact that my view is reduced mainly to activities related to repairs, I have been able to see that it is a company with processes aimed at satisfying customer commitments, especially in terms of response time, which is one of the main monitoring indicators. In this way, the management of repairs seeks to guarantee the minimum response time.
In some cases, AAS is completely autonomous in carrying out the repair, from the definition and design of the repair, through the collection of materials, development of the production documentation, execution, validation and assignment of the product.
At other times, given the diversity of activities that AAS undertakes, it is necessary to rely on the rest of the organisation (both approved and non-approved maintenance facilities). Having the capabilities that the group has when it comes to dealing with repairs is a great advantage.
A perfect example of the latter happened a few weeks ago, where, thanks to the Aerometallic Tarazona team, it was possible to provide service to a customer in a timely manner, as AAS was able to rely on the capabilities, resources and people of this company.
I have not yet had the opportunity to see how the world of spare parts is managed, but from what I have seen so far, the process is also geared towards minimizing response time, especially in AOG, where the delivery of the spare part is prioritised over any other activity.
ANNnews: What would you say are the synergies between AAS and AED (Aernnova Engineering Division)?
Andres: We mainly call on our AED colleagues when we need help with fatigue and damage tolerance analysis to support the repairs that are defined.
In addition, when the operator or their documentation cannot be called upon to provide ‘approved data’ on which to base repairs (an essential requirement), it is engineering as a design organisation (DOA) that has the capability to issue that approved data (to put it very simply).
For example, Aernnova’s DOA is regularly used for Sikorsky repairs, as it is not possible to get the approved data from the OEM.
It is precisely on Sikorsky repairs that the ‘Triple release’ has been most often applied, which means that the repair covers the requirements of EASA, FAA and TCCA, the latter qualification, which we as MRO have recently obtained from Transport Canada Civil Aviation, allowing maintenance of structural components with flight hours to carry out changes and repairs within the scope of approval.
ANNnews: What lessons would you highlight from your professional career? Can you tell us an anecdote, a trip, a curiosity?
Andrés: That, unfortunately, you learn much more from your mistakes than from your successes. I would also highlight that these years of experience have helped me to appreciate the importance of communication to ensure the proper functioning of teams and organisations.
As an anecdote, I had never traveled by plane before starting Aernnova, and in fact my first flight was on a business trip. And since then, I have had the opportunity to travel all over the world with Aernnova, from Uruguay to Australia, passing through Mexico, India, Korea, Benavente… it’s not all about international travel!
At the end of the interview, Andrés showed us the Miñano facilities where you can appreciate the work carried out at AAS, from the office area where you can find programs, business development, engineering, logistics, spare parts, repairs and warranties, quality, resources and finance, to the spare parts warehouse area and the area for receiving parts under repair, workshop, clean room, sanding plenum, etc. A whole gear that makes it possible to carry out the great work of our colleagues at AAS.
