E62 – Rethinking Aircraft Maintenance with Perfect Point EDM

<p>Buying a fighter jet is the cheap part.</p><p>Mike sits down with <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/jim-becker-48449790/" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Jim Becker</a>, President and CEO of Perfect Point EDM, to talk about the biggest line in any defense program: keeping the fleet flying.</p><p>Perfect Point builds the E-Drill, which uses electro discharge machining (EDM) to pull aircraft fasteners. Founded in 2005, it turned a lab curiosity into a fielded tool that removes a rivet in about 30 seconds instead of 10 minutes, with no debris and almost no rework.</p><p>Jim's take is blunt. The aircraft modernized, the maintenance tooling did not, and the industry keeps papering over it by leaning on a shrinking pool of skilled mechanics.</p><p><strong>Topics include:</strong></p><ul><li><p>Operations and maintenance as the biggest cost in a program</p></li><li><p>Electro discharge machining applied to fastener removal</p></li><li><p>Cutting a 10 minute rivet job down to 30 seconds</p></li><li><p>Eliminating foreign object debris and rework on titanium airframes</p></li><li><p>Why maintenance tooling never modernized</p></li><li><p>Winning over risk-averse engineers with the material science case</p></li><li><p>The shrinking pool of skilled aircraft mechanics</p></li></ul><p>SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE to get more intel on defense tech, news, and happenings!</p><p><strong>Links</strong></p><ul><li><p>Sign up for the newsletter!<a href="https://www.themerge.co/" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"> https://www.themerge.co/</a></p></li><li><p>Support us on Patreon!<a href="https://www.patreon.com/the_merge" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"> https://www.patreon.com/the_merge</a></p></li><li><p>Perfect Point EDM homepage<a href="https://www.ppedm.com/" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"> https://www.ppedm.com/</a></p></li><li><p>Perfect Point EDM LinkedIn<a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/perfect-point-edm/" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"> https://www.linkedin.com/company/perfect-point-edm/</a></p></li><li><p>Jim LinkedIn<a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/jim-becker-48449790/" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"> https://www.linkedin.com/in/jim-becker-48449790/</a></p></li></ul><p><strong>Follow us on...</strong></p><ul><li><p>LinkedIn<a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/themerge" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"> https://www.linkedin.com/company/themerge</a></p></li>