
Thanks to its outstanding reliability, the Rafale has lower maintenance costs.

This ease of maintenance means that technicians can be trained quickly: Rafale conversion training and aircraft support was organized for an export client within a matter of weeks, providing the client with the operating autonomy it needed to successfully deploy its fleet.

And only two types of carriages and cradles are necessary to perform all armament loading / unloading.Īll of these maintainability features were validated from the development phase by French Navy and Air Force support specialists, and have demonstrated their reliability in combat during various operations. All ground support equipment is compact and foldable in order to be easily transportable by It can be used without external power.The built-in auxiliary power unit (APU) makes engine start-up possible even when no ground power cart is available.Optronics are cooled by a closed-loop nitrogen circuit, which negates the need for a dedicated nitrogen supply.Ground support equipment for the production and transportation of oxygen is no longer required. The Rafale is fitted with an on-board oxygen generation system (OBOGS) which suppresses the need for liquid oxygen re-filling.To allow the Rafale the greatest possible autonomy during deployments, it requires only minimum ground support equipment: With the M88 engine, it is no longer necessary to perform checks on an engine test bench before reinstalling an engine on an The M88’s groundbreaking design means that the engine can be changed and the aircraft can take off again within an hour.Precision manufacturing techniques together with the use of CATIA eliminate time- consuming boresighting procedures following cannon, head-up display (HUD) or radar exchanges.The centralised armament safety system makes all safety pins and last chance / end- of-runway actions unnecessary, minimising the risk of errors and accidents, and contributing to achieve an unbeatable “turn-around time” (TAT).Human factors engineering work has been conducted with CATIA in order to ensure the accessibility of the components within aircraft bays, so that all flight line operations can be carried out by a single Special attention has been paid to minimizing the duration of these operations and the occurrence of errors.Thanks to accurate and comprehensive testability features, it allows targeted replacements to be made on the flight line, down to electronic circuit boards and specific components.
Accordingly, it has been decided on the Rafale to extend it to all aircraft systems.
#Rafale flight cost per hour plus
Based on 20 years plus of experience gained on the Mirage 2000, integrated testability of the Weapon Delivery and Navigation System (WDNS) has proven itself.The following examples, selected from a range of unique and innovative features, demonstrate the advance in reliability, accessibility and maintainability brought by the Rafale:
