• Military & Defense
Case DARA Featured

The solution

DARA Fleet­lands suc­cess­ful­ly mod­ern­ized its doc­u­ment man­age­ment sys­tem using GTX solu­tions, enabling faster mod­i­fi­ca­tions, improved engi­neer­ing effi­cien­cy, and seam­less inte­gra­tion with CAD work­flows. This ensures that mil­i­tary heli­copters remain oper­a­tional, safe, and ready for deploy­ment at all times.

Case DARA Thn

DARA Fleet­lands: Dig­i­tiz­ing mil­i­tary heli­copter main­te­nance drawings

Main­tain­ing heli­copters for the Roy­al Navy, Army, and RAF, DARA Fleet­lands need­ed a mod­ern­ized sys­tem to update tech­ni­cal draw­ings effi­cient­ly. GTXRaster­CAD® enabled hybrid edit­ing, auto­mat­ed raster-to-vec­tor con­ver­sion, and stream­lined work­flow effi­cien­cy, ensur­ing air­crafts remain mis­sion-ready with opti­mized main­te­nance processes.

DARA Fleet­lands, based in Hamp­shire, UK, is the pri­ma­ry main­te­nance hub for heli­copters used by the Roy­al Navy, Army, and Roy­al Air Force. With a work­force of 1,100 pro­fes­sion­als, DARA Fleet­lands ensures that Chi­nooks, Sea Kings, Lynx­es, and Gazelles remain oper­a­tional for res­cue mis­sions, mil­i­tary oper­a­tions, and human­i­tar­i­an aid. Man­ag­ing tech­ni­cal mod­i­fi­ca­tions and repairs effi­cient­ly is crit­i­cal — but many lega­cy engi­neer­ing draw­ings still exist­ed only on paper, cre­at­ing work­flow challenges.

Chal­lenge

DARA Fleet­lands faced dif­fi­cul­ties in mod­i­fy­ing and updat­ing tech­ni­cal draw­ings for air­craft main­te­nance and test­ing equipment.

  • Many engi­neer­ing schemat­ics were only avail­able on paper, mak­ing revi­sions slow and time-consuming.
  • The Engi­neer­ing ser­vices and Design divi­sion need­ed to update equip­ment spec­i­fi­ca­tions to match mod­ern air­craft mod­i­fi­ca­tions but lacked an effi­cient way to inte­grate old­er draw­ings into CAD workflows.
  • Ensur­ing accu­rate updates and quick retrieval was essen­tial for mil­i­tary readi­ness and oper­a­tional efficiency.

Solu­tion

DARA Fleet­lands adopt­ed GTXRaster­CAD® and GTXRaster­CAD PLUS, inte­grat­ing them into Auto­CAD® 2000 to enable fast raster-to-vec­tor con­ver­sion and hybrid editing.

  • Scan­ning & dig­i­tal cleanup: Large-for­mat scan­ners dig­i­tized lega­cy engi­neer­ing draw­ings, enabling engi­neers to enhance and edit images seamlessly.
  • Hybrid edit­ing work­flow: GTX allowed raster draw­ings to be mod­i­fied like vec­tor files, pre­serv­ing orig­i­nal data while ensur­ing mod­ern CAD compatibility.
  • Auto­mat­ed vec­tor­iza­tion: GTXRaster­CAD PLUS pro­vid­ed fast and pre­cise vec­tor con­ver­sion, ensur­ing ful­ly com­pat­i­ble Auto­CAD® DWG files for ongo­ing use.

Result

By dig­i­tiz­ing tech­ni­cal draw­ings, DARA Fleet­lands sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduced main­te­nance delays, ensur­ing fast access to crit­i­cal schematics.

  • Engi­neers effi­cient­ly update air­craft test rigs and com­po­nents, keep­ing mil­i­tary heli­copters ready for deployment.
  • The GTX-pow­ered work­flow elim­i­nat­ed time-inten­sive man­u­al redraft­ing, accel­er­at­ing repair process­es and improv­ing oper­a­tional reliability.
  • The sys­tem stream­lined doc­u­ment stor­age and access, ensur­ing long-term engi­neer­ing data sus­tain­abil­i­ty for mil­i­tary applications.