How do I keep my Mavis squadrons in the air?

[moose1999]

I'm having trouble keeping my Mavis squadrons flying.
I put them on 50% naval search and in a matter of a week or so they're all down to about 50% readiness and falling still - most of the planes undergoing maintenance.
I've got plenty of air support at the bases, both land and naval (from AVs), there's plenty of supply and none of the squadrons are flying in hostile airspace.

I see the Mavis has a service rating of 4(!).
That seems pretty high and must be a big part of the problem.
But is there anything I can do to keep my Mavis squadrons flying other than lowering the naval search setting?
Going to 30% seems awfully low and would really hurt my situational awareness in the mid-Pacific.

I was thinking of using Nells for searching instead - but I'd much rather have them torpedoing the AKs and APs fumbling around everywhere... [:D]

[Mynok]

Reduce your search range first. Then you can switch down to 30% and still discover threats in time to react to them.

[findmeifyoucan]

Don't forget these planes are 4 engine planes so it makes sense that they need to be serviced on a regular basis. You could try splitting them into two smaller groups and rotatiing then.

[DivePac88]

If you have your Air Search Assets on extended range, and over 70% operational, you are going to have a lot of downtime. To stop working them into the ground; I keep My altitude up around 9000 feet. I also keep my Search arcs tight and focused in the direction of threat.

[xj900uk]

The IJN generally suffered from inability to maintain its 4-engined Mavis & Emily flying boats (mainly due the fact that they had 4 engines & IJN facilities were small).  My advice is, unless something is brewing,  don't put search % higher than 50 and also cut the search range back by a couple of hexes - it's quite mega so you'll still get plenty of warning if anything is cooking.
Interesting point re Nellies,  as they don't have teh armour/protection to really operate by themselves outside of escort range.  On the other hand they do make good spotting/search aircraft & are probably slightly smaller targets than the FB's...