Several months ago, the 1st Theater Sustainment Command-Forward was in a bind. One of its Patriots in the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility was down as a result of a broken hydraulic hose. With the replacement part’s lead time at 900 days, the unit called Army Materiel Command for help.

Its Rock Island Arsenal-Joint Manufacturing and Technology Center in Illinois had the ability to craft a homegrown replacement. Personnel reverse engineered the part, studied its composition and material, and printed a temporary hydraulic hose on one of their 16 3D printers.

The turnaround time was 45 days.

The part was not “fully qualified,” meaning it wasn’t certified for long-term use, but it gave the unit the ability to fix the Patriot while it waited for a certified replacement, said  Brig. Gen. Beth Behn of U.S. Army Tank-automotive and Armaments Command.

“It’s probably still on that Patriot right now, given the lead time for the actual part,” Behn told an audience attending the Association of the U.S. Army’s 2025 Annual Meeting and Exposition in Washington, D.C.

The Army is embracing advanced manufacturing by using 3D printers and machining to repair battle-damaged platforms and address gaps in the supply chain that can happen when logistics are interrupted, parts become obsolete, manufacturers go out of business or lead times are too long.

The service has created a process for identifying parts that could be good candidates for the Battle Damage Repair and Fabrication program, which determines whether the service has the capability to produce them and the need for the parts.

Shortly after the Army began producing these temporary replacements, officials wondered if they could create fully qualified parts—ones that could be stored as a secondary supply source. As of July, Army Materiel Command has the authority to fully qualify, with all due process, advanced manufactured parts, Behn said.

Behn said the service is not attempting to replace vendors; it is looking for innovative ways to keep its equipment working in the absence of available parts, especially with legacy systems. Their 3D printers produce parts with a variety of materials, from polymers to titanium. And the Army is partnering with places like the National Institute for Aviation Research at Wichita State University in Kansas to dissect systems, reverse engineer them, create 3D models, test the parts and determine what materials work best.

As of Oct. 1, Army Tank-automotive and Armaments Command has fully qualified 61 parts for Army platforms—items like an access panel for a Bradley fighting vehicle and the hydraulic hose.

Not only is the technology being considered to craft replacement parts, it is essential to the service’s effort to grow its drone production capabilities, Behn said. The service is looking to use composite-based advanced manufacturing to produce 10,000 drones a month. The bodies will be built at Rock Island, and the circuit cards and motors will be created at Tobyhanna Army Depot, Pennsylvania. Red River Army Depot, Texas, will contribute propellers and batteries and conduct final testing.

The idea, again, is not to replace what industry can build, but the effort will help build the service’s capabilities.

“[It’s] not the only way to get our hands on unmanned aerial systems, and it’s insufficient to the requirement, but we need to have an [organic industrial base] capability, and so that is what we are generating,” Behn said.

— Patricia Kime for AUSA