DDPMAS - Indian Military Airworthiness and Certification Document?

1.  DDPMAS

            ‘Procedure for Design, Development and Production of Military Aircraft and Airborne Stores’ (DDPMAS) is a document released by Secretary, Defence Production, Ministry of Defence, Government of India on 30^th October 1975. The document was issued to define the procedure to be followed by various agencies involved in the design, development and production of military aircraft and airborne stores. The document was reviewed and reissued in 2002 as DDPMAS-2002.

2. Contents of DDPMAS

            The document is divided into five sections as follows:

           Section I:      Definitions

           Section II:     Process of Development

           Section III:    Design, Development and Production of Aircraft, Aero Engines and

                                Major Airborne Equipment

                                Chapter 1: Prototype and Development Phase

                                Chapter 2: Pre-Production, Production and In-service Phase

                                Chapter 3: License Projects

                                Chapter 4: Bought –out Aircraft

           Section IV:    Design, Development and Production of Airborne Equipment, Raw Material and AGS Parts. 

           Section V:     Procedure for Flight Testing of Experimental and Prototype Equipment.

3. Omissions and Exclusions

1)  Design, Development and Production of Airborne electronic equipment /stores are   excluded from the scope of DDPMAS and will be carried out as per DDPIL-2000  Procedures. Installation of such equipment on military aircraft would follow JSG: 755:2001 and procedures stipulated in DDPMAS -2002.

2)      DDPMAS – 2002 is not applicable to UAV and missiles unless they are carried on manned aircraft.

4. DDPMAS -2002

            DDPMAS -2002 was issued to incorporate various organizational changes in the Ministry of Defence, e.g. DTD&P (Air) renamed as DGAQA; airworthiness functions changed from Directorate of Aeronautics (through CREs) to CEMILAC (through RCMAs). In addition to Air Force, the Army and Navy came in a big way in aviation wing, thus the terms ASR was replaced by ASR/NSQR/GSQR and CSDO by CSDO/NSDO/MAG (AVN) etc. In addition to these changes, the regulatory bodies also added certain additional requirements over and above DDPMAS-1975 requirements.  

5. Changes Incorporated in DDPMAS 2002

1) General content - General content of DDPMAS -2002 is similar to DDPMAS -75; however certain changes have been incorporated. 

2)    ‘Section – V: Procedure for Flight Testing of Experimental and Prototype Equipment’ has been made in two chapters as, ‘Chapter -1: Development Flight Testing’ and Chapter -2: Flight Testing by User Services’.

3)    Annexures: DDPMAS -2002 has added five more annexures compared to DDPMAS -75 (all of them added in Section 3, Chapter-1). Two annexures have been split in to two     parts. The new annexures added are shown below:
     1)    Annexure –R: Declaration of Design and Performance
     2)    Annexure –S: Request For change in configuration
     3)    Annexure –T: Hardware/Software Delivery Note
    4)    Annexure –U: Responsibilities of CEMILAC
   5)    Annexure –V: Requirement to be submitted by Developing Agency for             clearance of Airborne Equipment imported from abroad.  
 6)    Annexure – G is split into two annexures as ‘G1: Certificate o Flight Trials –          Aircraft’ and ‘G2: Certificate of flight trials – Helicopters’.
 7)  Annexure – K (annexure J in DDPMAS-75) split into two; ‘K(i): Local                   Modification Committee -Details of Modification Proposed’ and ‘K(ii): Advance        Modification Information’.

6. Changes Related to the Procedure for Ab-initio Development

            Section – III, Chapter -1: ‘Prototype and Development Phase’ has been substantially changed, the discussion on the changes are shown below:

    1) Progression of certification – A new para (para 3) has been added indicating two certification routes viz., ‘certification commences after completion of all design activities’ and ‘concurrent certification approach’ could be followed. However, DDPMAS 2002 supports the concurrent certification approach only.

2)    New Concepts brought in – Formation of ‘Airworthiness Group’, ‘Configuration Control’, ‘Technical Reviews’ and ‘Bought out Items’. Necessary details however has not been provided.

3)    Design Standard of Preparation – A new para (para 17) added in addition to the     original para of ‘Design Standard of Prototype Aircraft’ appearing at Para 68. Both the     paragraphs discussing ‘Design Standard of Prototype Aircraft’ create contradictions and        confusion.  

  

4)    Certificate of Design – In DDPMAS -75, ‘Certificate of Design’ (COD) was part of the   Type Record (Para 18(a)). In DDPMAS -2002, in addition to the above requirement,  ‘COD’ has been made a requirement from the vendor before issue of first flight    clearance. CEMILAC participates in Design Reviews, evaluates Design Reports, approved test schedules, participates in test and verification trials and finally accepts test reports. So, the requirement of ‘COD’ for each system for issue of flight clearance  does not appear justified. 

5)     Section III, Chap – 2: describes the activities to be performed during ‘Pre-Production   and Production Phase’. What is ‘Pre-Production’ phase and what are the activities to be     performed during this phase has not made clear.

7.  Discussion on the Changes of DDPMAS-2002 from DDPMAS-75

   a) Annexures – Though five annexures have been added, the annexures are not sequentially arranged in the text.

    b)    Declaration of Design and Performance (DDP) – DDP concept has been introduced in DDPMAS-2002 under configuration control. The DDP route is followed in Civil Aviation Procedures. An aircraft development house accepts equipment (parts & appliances) for installation on prototype aircraft on the basis of the DDP issued by  equipment developer, who is a DOA (Design Organisation Approval) holder from Civil Aviation Authority. As and when the prototype aircraft is certified by the CAA, the equipment also gets certified and only then, the equipment manufacture can issue  ‘Airworthiness Release Certificate’ for the equipment. As CEMILAC itself is certifying the LRU (parts and appliances), DDP may not be applicable. 

   c)    Design Approval of Firm and Airworthiness Group – The design approval of firm is to be carried out as per CEMILAC/5342/1 dated Jun 1999. The document does not indicate any privilege or delegated authority to the approved organization. The procedure for approval of airworthiness group is to be carried out as per CEMILAC/TC/03 dated Sep 2000.  

  d)    Bought Out Item – Appendix ‘V’ to DDPMAS – 2002 includes information to be   provided by vendors on bought out items. It is understood that ‘RCMA’ is to clear the BOI for installation on Prototype aircraft based on the annexure –‘V’ checklist and DGAQA is to comment on the QA process of manufacture. 

                 For ‘Of the shelf’ items, the procurement should be supported by ‘Authorized Release Certificates’ or ‘DDP’ from the vendor or ‘TSO Authorisation’ for TSO items.During prototype development stage only a very limited quantities are procured and the supplier may not provide the QTR, FMEA, MTBF/MTBR, Reliability/maintainability reports. Requirements for these documents will lead to great bottleneck and delay to aircraft design and development project. The appendix ‘V’ is abnormally big and does not provide any value addition to safety and airworthiness of the aircraft or aero-engine being developed. 

8.  The Document DDPMAS

    a)    Purpose of DDPMAS - The purpose of DDPMAS as indicated in its ‘foreword’ and ‘preface’, is to evolve an optimum coordination among various agencies involved in the design, development and production of military aircraft and airborne stores. The document was written with concurrent engineering concept with the assumption that the design and manufacturing house (HAL), the regulatory bodies (Chief Resident Engineer and Chief Resident Inspector) and user (Air Force Liaison Office) are co- located.

  b)    Certification Procedure Document – DDPMAS is not a certification procedural documents like CAR 21 (DGCA), FAA order 8110.4c, ‘Type Certification Procedures‘ or USAF Policy Directive AFPD-62-6:’USAF Airworthiness (Jun 2010)’ and USAF Instruction AFI 62-601: ‘USAF Airworthiness (May 2011)’. DDPMAS does not define the procedure, responsibilities and delegated authorities vested on approved design and production houses.

 c)    Development of Electronics Item - Development of electronic items is not covered under DDPMAS documents. An extract of DDPIL may be included to give a general overview of the concept and to appreciate whether it significantly differs from development concepts of other airborne equipment.

  d)    Approval of Design Organisations - ‘Design Organisation Approval’ (DOA) is an important step toward design and airworthiness control. The DOA recognizes the   capability of the firm and define responsibilities of the design signatories and delegates necessary authority to them. The Design Assurance System (DAS) of the DOA carries out control and supervision over design and design changes.The airworthiness authorities monitor the functioning of the DAS and accepts the design and test reports by the authorized signatories. The ‘Design Approval’ (DA) by CEMILAC is similar to  DOA and the ‘Airworthiness Group’ of CEMILAC DA is similar to DAS of DOA as per CAR (Civil Aviation Requirement). If the above design approval procedure is followed no separate approval will be required for airworthiness Group.  

  e)    Approval of Quality Management System – In the lines of the Production   Organisation Approval (POA) in CAR, DGAQA confers Approval of Firms Quality Management System (AFQMS). Here, AFQMS does not delegate any authority to the  firm and DGAQA resorts to spot check to detect quality deficiency. DGAQA have restricted the AFQMS limited to Government and Public Sector Undertakings only.

   9.  General Comment  

   a)    It is essential to have a separate document bought out by CEMILAC detailing the procedure for design certification starting from the establishment of certification basis to the culmination of issuance of type certification.

   b)    A separate document should be brought out by DGAQA detailing the procedure for Quality Assurances through AFQMS during manufacture of the prototype as well as series production.

    c)    The procedural documents released by both CEMILAC and DGAQA should clearly define the responsibilities and authorities delegated to the approved signatories so as to cater for situations where the vendors and regulatory bodies are not co-located.

  d)    The procedural documents should be made available in the electronic media so that it become accessible to the vendors, development houses and the users.