Page 76 - Australian Defence Mag Sep 2020

76 DEFENCE INDUSTRY
SEPTEMBER 2020 | WWW.AUSTRALIANDEFENCE.COM.AU
TAE KICKING GOALS IN NEW FACILITY
environment. Since 2013, the company has provided maintenance and engineer- ing support of the Honeywell AGT1500 gas turbine engine in the Australian M1A1 Abrams Main Battle Tank fleet. Be- fore TAE became involved, engines had to be shipped back to the US for overhaul at a US Army repair depot – a process which could take between 9-12 months before being returned to Australia. This support has now grown to include several other maintenance and technology activities.
TAE now provides engine fuel control and oil system maintenance for the Australian Army and the US Military from their Texas Facility. As the region’s only Collins Aero- space approved overhaul facility, TAE also support fire protection systems on every vehi- cle within the Australian Army that has such a system fitted. This includes, the M1A1, ASLAV, M88A2, Bushmaster, Hawkei and in the future, the Boxer CRV. The company is also completing the development and field testing of a Health and Usage Monitoring System (HUMS) for the AGT1500 engine, a development which provides the potential for significant sustainment cost savings for Army through the introduction of a data driven condition-based maintenance outcome.
ABOVE LEFT: TAE has moved its facility off RAAF Amberley to Ipswich.
RECENTLY it was reported that Australia’s TAE Aerospace achieved a world first be- ing the first organisation outside of the US to complete F135 engine fan mod- ule maintenance. This was completed in TAE’s new 16,000 sqm Turbine Engine Maintenance Facility in Ipswich. While an outstanding achievement for the com- pany and Australia, there is much more to this local success story.
Currently, TAE has relationships with engine manufacturers such as Pratt & Whitney, General Electric, Honeywell and Rolls-Royce. The relationships don’t end with engine maintenance either. Others trusting TAE as a partner include Collins Aerospace, Woodward, General Atomics, L3Harris and many others.
Increasingly, TAE is becoming known for providing essential support in the land
DEPLOYING RAPID DEPLOYMENT REPEATERS IN EMERGENCY INCIDENTS
SETTING up two way radio communications at an emergency incident can be a chal- lenge. Incidents such as bushfires raging in the wild, outbreaks of fire in urban areas, occurrence of natural disasters such as lo- calised flooding or emergency mission tacti- cal scenarios require public safety agencies to have the right communications technolo- gies in place before these emergencies hit.
Organisations can extend their current Land Mobile Radio wide area coverage or setup a dedicated communications net- work at the scene in minutes with a rapid deployment repeater. It is robust and reli- able, secure, easily transportable and can withstand the physical demands of the mission critical environment.
With an added option of a link capability to the rapid deployment repeater, it is flex- ible enough to provide greater coverage where Government Radio Network (GRN) blackspots exist. The link with a GRN also provides the added benefit of passing voice information from the local talk group and repeat into a GRN radio and out onto the selected GRN talk group, this allows in- tegrations with other digital operators or systems. The link capability also provides GRN connectivity and enables command to control events remotely.
Simoco rapid deployment repeaters have been designed for easy deployment even by non-technical staff with limited knowl- edge of professional mobile radio systems.
TAE
SIMCOCO