DIT-MCO International has been a leading provider of wire harness testing systems for nearly 80 years. The company is now looking to the future, developing a new software tool designed to significantly improve helicopter operators’ ability to manage their cable inventories — and to help ensure the long-term health of their adapter cables and test systems.
DIT-MCO has worked in wiring harness testing for decades, supporting both commercial and military helicopters, as well as a wide range of other platforms, including fighter jets, submarines, and satellites.
This work is crucial on several levels. Every helicopter relies on a wiring harness that runs from the nose through the tail and serves as a kind of electronic “umbilical cord” for the aircraft, connecting all components that require wiring, noted Kent Williams, director of sales, marketing, and customer service.
A system analyzer is required to run tests across every component of the helicopter. However, the complications do not stop there. The analyzer itself must be connected to the aircraft using an adapter cable. That adapter “allows the system to talk to the helicopter and start running tests,” Williams explained.
AMP – Cable Manager Software
Perhaps surprisingly, these adapter cables are often the biggest investment operators make in testing, more so than the test system itself. That’s because an operator typically needs several adapter cables to test a single helicopter, or may be testing multiple helicopter types and therefore require adapters for each of them.
“Many of our customers have hundreds of adapter cables,” Williams said. “It’s a huge inventory, and it’s a huge investment. You might have $800,000 invested in test systems and $2 million to $3 million in adapter cables.”
Managing all of these cables presents two key challenges. First, given the sheer number of cables involved, inventory management becomes critical — sometimes as basic as knowing exactly where a specific cable is stored at any given time.
Second, operators must understand the health of those cables. Because they are repeatedly mated and de-mated, moved, and handled, adapter cables can suffer invisible wear and tear. In fact, many test failures originate in the adapters themselves, leading to “false” failures and additional troubleshooting work.
That’s where DIT-MCO’s new AMP – Cable Manager Software (ACMS) comes in. At its core, ACMS is designed to treat adapter cables as strategic, trackable assets rather than consumables, Williams noted. A significant number of labor hours are wasted trying to locate or repair the correct adapter cables needed for a specific test. With ACMS, operators always know where every cable is being used or stored and whether it needs repair prior to testing, saving both time and money.
“Think of it as managing your inventory of all those cables and the health management of each of those cables at the same time,” he explained.
Unique capabilities
- ACMS offers several core capabilities and differentiators, including:
- Inventory management: With ACMS, operators have real-time visibility into their cables’ locations, whether in use, storage, or repair. The technology also offers predictive procurement analysis, enabling users to budget for repairs or replacements before a cable becomes unusable;
- Health management: The software tracks the condition of cables throughout their lifecycle, starting from the “born-on” date. Health reports provide a history of every project — including users involved and any repairs performed — while usage history, wear indicators, repairs, and other factors are continuously logged. Early warnings also indicate when a cable is unavailable or no longer in a healthy condition;
- Predictive maintenance: One of ACMS’s key differentiators is its ability to shift teams from reactive troubleshooting to predictive maintenance. The technology learns from real-world usage patterns and flags when cables are approaching failure thresholds;
- Failure pattern detection: The system correlates failures across tests, programs, and adapter usage to reveal hidden patterns that may not be visible through visual inspection. This helps identify suspect adapters associated with repeated issues and remove problem cables before they disrupt production;
- Job planning and scheduling: The software connects cable availability directly to job planning and test scheduling, ensuring everything is ready before a unit reaches the testing phase. This capability can help prevent last-minute bottlenecks.
Importantly, the technology is designed for adoption, not disruption, Williams noted. Built on an SQL Server database, ACMS can easily integrate with existing manufacturing, quality, and business intelligence (BI) tools.
Growing demand
The importance of wiring harness testing will only increase in the coming years, as military and civilian operators expand their fleets and new platforms enter the market. Williams pointed in particular to growing demand from the emerging eVTOL sector, which is a key focus for DIT-MCO both now and in the future.
As of early 2026, ACMS was in its beta testing phase, with DIT-MCO expecting to bring the technology to market before the end of the year.
Tom Woosley, the company’s marketing manager, said a combination of cutting-edge technology and decades of experience positions DIT-MCO as a trusted partner for customers across a wide range of platform types, with a strong emphasis on understanding individual operational needs.
“Our sales teams are focused on understanding the customer’s requirements before working with our production and engineering teams to ensure we’re meeting every single need,” he said. “It’s very customized, and it’s very focused on the cables being tested.”
This sponsored article was created by Insight magazine, the sponsored content division of MHM Publishing.
