Technical records

Technical records contain information, such as airworthiness directives or customer service notices, from vendors, manufacturers, and regulatory agencies. Technical records can trigger maintenance events and affect work planning forecasts.

The Technical Records (CM) application stores technical records from manufacturers, vendors, regulatory agencies, and others. Technical records can have complex criteria to define which assets they affect. The Technical Records (CM) application tracks the following information:

When you create a technical record, you can specify whether an upgrade is applied to multiple assets. Typically, software items are updated in this manner. You can upgrade all the software within the top-level asset at the same time, including the child assets that are in build positions that are defined on the technical record.

Multiple maintenance plans, each with an associated job plan, can be created for a technical record. Each maintenance plan is used to create a PM record for each affected asset. The PM records are used to create work orders to implement the requirements of the technical record. When you specify a maintenance plan for a technical record, you can optionally select to automatically complete all associated maintenance plans. By using this option, when any individual work order is completed, all PM records that are generated from the technical record for a particular asset are automatically completed. If you choose not to automatically complete all associated maintenance plans, you avoid deactivating associated maintenance plans, and each PM record work order must be completed individually. You can also select to complete all associated maintenance plans before the method of compliance is reported for each of the associated asset.

When you specify a maintenance plan for a technical record, you can define a range of frequency iterations so that regulatory compliance is maintained. A frequency iteration defines how many times inspections are completed to comply with the requirements of the technical record.

On the Maintenance Plan tab, you can define and view frequency iterations by clicking Frequency Iterations. When you create a frequency iteration, you can specify whether the PM record is deactivated when the last frequency iteration is completed. You can change whether the PM record is deactivated only during the last frequency iteration. If you add iterations during the last iteration, the check box for deactivated the PM records after the last frequency iteration is set to read-only.

A frequency iteration can be time-based or meter-based. You have flexibility in defining a frequency iteration, and iterations can occur at different intervals. For example, you can define a frequency iteration that consists of three meter-based iterations: the first inspection occurs every 10,000 miles for two iterations. The second inspection occurs at 25,000 miles for three iterations, and the third inspection occurs at every 50,000 miles. You can also define alert and warning intervals for each frequency iteration.

Technical records include the following types of records from manufacturers, vendors, and regulatory agencies:

Technical records are managed at the item set level because technical records are associated with models and configuration-managed items. When you create a technical record, you can specify an organization and a site to further limit the applicability of the technical record. For example, you can opt not to specify the site and organization so that the technical record applies to the entire item set. If if the technical record applies only to the assets that are stored at a single site, you can specify that site so that the technical record has limited applicability.

You can add a terminating action to a technical record. A terminating action defines a condition that is required in order for a recurring inspection to be terminated, for example, a certain level of physical wear is recorded. Terminating actions are useful because not every requirement in a technical record can be reduced to a series of programmable statements. Terminating records ensure compliance with the requirements of the technical record.

You can track design changes and requirements by relating technical records. A related technical record can provide information, define a relationship that requires action when maintenance events occur, or define a relationship to a modification record. Relating a technical record to a modification record creates a complete record of the engineering design standard.

You can edit some attributes of an active technical record to ensure that the applicability and embodiment processes accurately define the requirements of the technical record. Before you edit an active technical record, assess the impact of your planned changes. Changes to an active technical record can require manual updates to PM records or work orders that are associated with the technical record. For example, you update the item number or serial range of an applicable asset that was already embodied. If the updated item number means that the asset is no longer applicable, you must manually change the embodiment status of the asset to not applicable. Similarly, if you update an interval or threshold on a maintenance plan that is associated with a technical record, you must manually update the associated PM records.

You can use the Edit Technical Record action to edit an active technical record. When you select the Edit Technical Record action, you can edit build items, item numbers, serial ranges, and models. You can also add maintenance plans that are associated with the technical record. You can delete maintenance plans only if they have not generated any PM records. If a maintenance plan has generated PM records, you can select the Deactivate PM check box on the Maintenance Plan tab to change the status of all associated PM records to inactive. On the Technical Record tab, clear the Create PMs check box to prevent PM records from being automatically created for assets that are associated with an active technical record.

To make technical changes to other attributes of a technical record, create a superseding record and specify the superseding publication and the supersedence date on the original technical record.

Enterprises typically must maintain and report the status of their technical records to external regulatory agencies.

Examples of using technical records

The records department of your enterprise receives a new bulletin, directive, notice, or other type of publication. This publication might come from a manufacturer, vendor, regulatory body, or another authorized department in the enterprise. You create a technical record to document the new information and attach any supporting electronic documentation. You establish criteria to identify the assets that are affected by the technical record. Criteria can include position, part number, serial number range, models, or configurations of models. You can create initial PM records, job plans, and possibly follow-up PM records that establish work requirements. You can also enter PM actions to define the interaction among PM records. Other technical records might deactivate the PMs.

If your records department receives a new bulletin, directive, notice, or other publication that supersedes an existing technical record. You define the superseding technical record. Then, you open the superseded technical record and change it to point to the superseding technical record. The status of the superseded technical record is changed from Active to Superseded.

Your enterprise receives a new asset and decides that it is a configuration-managed asset. You create an asset record for it and designate it as configuration-managed. The build data interpreter identifies the technical records that the new asset must comply with PMs and any work orders that are necessary to initiate the compliance process are generated for any technical records that the new asset must comply with.

A regulatory body or an internal audit department notifies your enterprise that it plans to investigate the incorporation status of one or more technical records. You create a report to identify the compliance of assets that are associated with the applicable technical records.

Parent topic: Creating technical records