Flight Crew Multiengine; Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP); Flight Crew Instrument
Troubleshooting; Situational Awareness
Aircraft Equipment Problem Less Severe; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy
General None Reported / Taken
Environment - Non Weather Related; Aircraft; Weather
We operated the ZZZ to ZZZ1 flight. The landing numbers were run for Runway XXL with the ATIS showing south winds at about 7 kts. and temperature about 90 degrees. Normal flaps 30 approach was flown and I used thrust reverser to about 100 kts. before getting on the brakes. Normal brake pressure was used and we took the high speed taxiway. Taxi time to the gate was about four minutes; and I released the parking brake once we were in the chocks.The Operations Agent came in and asked if we 'got on the brakes'.  I said no and he said that our Company has blown about six plugs in the last couple weeks. I received a call from the Operations and was told what happened. I also called Maintenance and answered some questions regarding the flight. Everything on this flight was normal and I believe we did not brake the aircraft down more than a normal landing.  We actually mentioned there was no reason to brake hard due to the three minute limitation on the MAX.Might consider leaving the gear down on such a short flight. Using the carbon brakes; it would be nice to have a temperature gauge for the brakes.
Our first indication that there were any concerns was as the Operations Agent met us upon arrival in ZZZ. He asked if we had used heavy braking on landing because recently he had seen 6 events where the wheel fuse plugs had deflated the tires on this particular flight. The Captain immediately ensured that the parking brake had been released to allow for improved cooling. The oncoming FO (First Officer) met us after he completed his walk-around. He noted that the brakes seemed pretty warm. However; at this point the fuse plugs had not melted yet. We turned the aircraft over to the new crew and headed to the hotel. The Chief Pilot called the Captain at the hotel to inform him that the fuse plugs had melted and deflated the tires after we left. I do not believe the landing data indicated that brake cooling was required. Once at the hotel I tried to re-run the landing data to confirm that there wasn't a brake cooling message. There was not; as far as I could tell; but I could not recall the actual landing weights. I also tried to run the brake cooling module but couldn't get it to run because the release data had expired. This led me to go dig in the books for the brake cooling charts. I believe the brakes on speed was approximately 100 kts.; because I remember seeing the runway exit coming and checking the speed as I felt the increased deceleration from the Captain applying the brakes. Using this and estimated landing conditions I used the Landing Data Charts in the MAX performance manual. This indicated that no special brake cooling procedures were required. However; I noted some interesting facts in this section of the airway manual: If we had used Autobrakes 3 and VRef 145; it puts a lot of additional energy in the brakes; requiring at least 40 minutes of cooling time; and possibly into the 'Caution' for hot brakes; depending on the landing data used. The cooling time chart seems to suggest that 7.3 minutes of cooling Inflight Gear Down is equivalent to 50 minutes of cooling on the ground. The text in that section states; 'Total energy is the sum of residual energy plus energy added.' This is important to note since the previous flights of this particular aircraft had landings at high elevations on high temperature days.
B737 MAX 8 Flight Crew reported after a flight the wheel fuse plugs melted while using normal braking.