At the Fleet Readiness Center East (FRCE) Innovation Lab, a team of two fulfilled a request from the F-35 Joint Program Office to use additive manufacturing – commonly referred to as 3D printing – to produce an O-ring installation tool used for all three variants of the fifth-generation fighter jet. With innovative thinking and the use of forward-leaning technology, FRCE helped fill the gap and put 2,000 tools in aircraft maintainers’ hands within days.
