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Supportability of DoD weapon systems has become a national issue. The ability to perform diagnostic and maintenance tasks impacts our world position both through our efficiency and our effectiveness. The following statements indicate that current maintenance methods are not capable of performing as required: One-third to one-half of F-15/F-16 maintenance man-hours were expended on chasing problems where no defects were found. [AFSB86] 20% - 50% of avionics maintenance actions resulted in removal of items with no evidence of failures. [RIDD86] Nearly two thirds of the 900 responding technicians indicated they used Fault Isolation Manuals less than 50% of the time to troubleshoot faults.

The objective of the program was to architect a vehicle health management (VHM) system for space systems avionics that assures system readiness for launch vehicles and for space-based dormant vehicles. The platforms which were studied and considered for application of VHM for guidance, navigation and control (GN&C) included the Advanced Manned Launch System (AMLS), the Horizontal Landing-20/Personnel Launch System (HL-20/PLS), the Assured Crew Return Vehicle (ACRV) and the Extended Duration Orbiter (EDO). This set was selected because dormancy and/or availability requirements are driving the designs of these future systems.