NOTES FROM
THE FIELD
VOLUME 4
PLANT
MAIN22
TEN
ANCE
PIECES
OF PEER
ADVICE
Optimizing the
life span and
value of physical
plant assets
PRACTICAL ADVICE
from manufacturing experts on solving critical issues.
WHAT IS “NOTES FROM THE FIELD”?
To help manufacturers with some of the
key industry issues Columbus has asked the
Manufacturing Community “What advice
would you give your peers to optimize the
lifespan and value of physical plant assets?”
Experts from our manufacturing customers, our
employees, analysts, consultants and partners
from all over the globe have fed back either
directly to Columbus or via our social media
channels to give their “Notes from the Field.”
We received hundreds of responses which were
distilled into this document which we hope you
will find useful and interesting.
PLANT MAINTENANCE
Plant maintenance plays a key role in
Manufacturers need the ability to make
minimizing disruption to production
proactive decisions that prevent equipment
schedules and ensuring quality output. Many
breakdown scenarios and maximize staff
businesses seek to introduce preventative
productivity. End-to-end maintenance, repair,
maintenance to increase machine uptime
and overhaul (MRO ) support can enable
and minimize lifecycle costs. Real time
control over work orders, resource allocation,
links to shop floor equipment present
spare parts management, and all costs.
opportunities for condition monitoring and
predictive maintenance.
NOTES FROM
THE FIELD
Q:
What advice would you give your peers
to optimize the lifespan and value of
physical plant assets?
Setup and maintain a preventive
maintenance program. Where
possible, have the OEM execute
the service of the asset, and
hold them accountable for
performance.
“ Efficient and timely maintenance of plant assets
is crucial to the overall financial performance of a
manufacturing facility. Downtime caused by lack
of ability to maintain and repair impact bottom line
profitability instantly. Plant Maintenance integrated
with ERP provides the ability to perform real-time
management of plant assets, thereby increasing
the overall life span of equipment/machinery and
prolonging the useful life and value. “
NIELS SKJOLDAGER, United States
CHRISTOPHER JOHNSTON,
United States
I have seen in manufacturers
with an efficient maintenance
“ Proper maintenance of plant equipment can
significantly reduce the overall operating cost, while
boosting the productivity of the plant. Although many
management personnel often view plant maintenance
as an expense, a more positive approach in looking
at it is to view maintenance works as a profit center.
The key to this approach lies in a new perspective of
proactive maintenance approach.“
KURT HATLEVIK, Norway
department and effective
Preventative Maintenance
program improve delivery times
and production quality which
not only increased customer
satisfaction but also improved
employee satisfaction.
DEBORAH VERMILLION,
United States
It is important to have a
Link directly to your production
solution that handles the
orders to capture quantities to
preventive maintenance of
drive your PM program.
your plant machines. And that
the maintenance downtime is
DEBORAH VERMILLION,
United States
incorporated in the production
capacity.
“ Make sure you set up a Planned Maintenance routine
OLAV BÆKKEN NATVIK, Norway
and KEEP TO IT. Just cleaning a piece of kit once a week
can make a big difference to its life span. Also get the
operators of the machinery to buy into it, show them
what happens and how much it costs when it goes
wrong. ”
STUART MACKAY, United Kingdom
“ Having an integrated plant maintenance solution
gives you the ability to predict when maintenance
needs to take place and manage the impact on the
business with down time. With the added benefit of
managing stock and labour to minimise the impact
of down time is a great benefit. Many businesses run
separate plant maintenance solutions which means it
is difficult to manage the impact on the business. “
MARTIN BURDEN, United Kingdom
Set required maintenance dates
in the system. I would recommend
using this with an asset quality
test once a month. The best way
to improve life span is to keep the
machine healthy!
DAVID ARONSON, United States
Implement
production
equipment
maintenance system.
ANONYMOUS, Latvia
Printing equipment manufactured
by Mueller Martini, a Columbus customer
Pumping equipment manufactured
by Met-Pro, a Columbus customer
“ MRO supplies must be treated as inventory and
managed with the same importance as raw materials
and finished items. Too often maintenance supplies
are an after-thought and the result is poorly
maintained equipment, missed orders, frustrated
staff, expensive repair parts hidden and off the books,
over-ordering of parts, and machine down time. ”
JEFF POWELL, United States
By using an Enterprise Asset
Management system you would
be able to plan preventative
maintenance for your plant and
machinery. You would also be able
to better manage downtime of
If we talk about our factory
said plant.
machines and workers! Keep it
JOHN ROBINSON, United Kingdom
simple, start up small and built up
when ready/time.
“ Constant equipment maintenance and technical
KEN JARLFORT, Denmark
“ Production Schedule visibility is critical in optimizing
the value of plant assets. Preventative Maintenance
is obviously beneficial for optimizing the life span of
a machine, but when performing PM too often we
assume that machines operate in a “vacuum”. To truly
optimize the VALUE that machinery delivers over its
lifespan it is critical that we incorporate the planning
of maintenance into the production schedule to
minimize impact to production. “
TOM NALL, United States
support are necessary. Responsible people and
deadlines should be assigned and production should
be optimized constantly. The optimal goal is the
efficient replacement of products during production
time. Production optimizing systems should be used
to optimize the performance of equipment to collect
and analyze work time and productivity data. ”
ˉ
JOLANTA ŽALUDIEN
E, Lithuania
Provide timely updates and
optimize the spare parts
warehouse.
EDVINAS T, Lithuania
“ Companies invest millions of dollars in capital
equipment that needs to be maintained. But more
costly than the assets themselves are the impact to
orders it could have if a piece of asset is not working
or poorly working. In order to optimize its use and
life span, manufacturing companies should make
sure they have a systemic way of doing preventative
maintenance to assure a high uptime. Companies
should also keep close track on costs associated with
the maintenance of an asset as well as throughput
as it could be that a new asset would yield a higher
return than continuing to maintain and older one. The
important part is that there is actionable information
that is derived from an integrated system where
assets and production are directly connected to drive
results. ”
LUCIANO CUNHA, United States
Track usage and schedule
maintenance on the plant assets.
Maintenance can be scheduled
based on counter registrations of
hours used or quantity processed
in addition to the periodic
scheduling.
KEVIN BRANDT, United States
“ Planned maintenance systems can mean a big
difference in a manufacturing environment.
Nothing spells lost production/time more than
non-maintained machine resources. Goes for Human
Resources as well. “
In order to get the maximum benefit out of
this process mapping, I would recommend
the you go for an automatic closure of
calendars when a breakdown happens.
This will help in considering the work
centers which are “breakdown” when the
master planning engine is run. For this, a
little bit of customization has to be done
on the service order when it is approved.
Currently, for each breakdown, you have
to manually close the calendar for the
respective date and time. This could
become unmanageable when the number of
resources are increasing as the organization
is growing. For this, they will have to link
each resource to the service agreements
so that, the automation is easier. I also
recommend updating the activities against
each resource (Service Agreements)
periodically so that the system generates a
correct Preventive Maintenance Calendar.
Otherwise, the maintenance calendar will
give a wrong picture and the benefit of this
mapping will not help you. It is easier to go
with the actual (Breakdown) maintenance,
because these solutions are straight fit to
the requirement.
ANTONY PRABHATH, UAE
HENRIK DALL, United States
Systematize your plant
maintenance. This is the 21st
century. Log books and PM
cards don’t allow maintenance
managers to easily evaluate the
effectiveness of maintenance.
MIKE MAKELA, United States
“ Start with planned worked orders and drive
accountability for the process. Pay attention, gain
from your learning, and as the organization grows in
adherence, look to data history to assist you in moving
to a Preventative Maintenance (proactive) scheme
where regular maintenance occurs at proper intervals.
At this evolved state, you will see your life span of key
plant assets optimizing. ”
ROB TERRY, United States
HOW CAN COLUMBUS HELP?
COLUMBUS PRODUCT ENGINEERING
BENEFITS
To maintain critical plant assets and resources and
service customers efficiently, your maintenance staff
needs current, accurate information and guidance
that help them achieve goals for up-time and
longevity.
1. WORK WITH ONE SET OF DATA, ONE SET OF COSTS, AND
ONE SOURCE OF THE TRUTH. Enterprise Asset Management
uses Microsoft Dynamics AX Inventory, Purchasing, and Planning
modules, simplifying complexity and costs. You’ll eliminate
redundant data entry, system duplication, and the need for
third-party add-on solutions.
With Columbus Enterprise Asset Management,
part of the ColumbusManufacturing ERP solution,
businesses can make proactive decisions that
prevent equipment breakdown scenarios and
maximize staff productivity. Tight integration
with Microsoft Dynamics AX eliminates the
need to maintain a separate system. End-to-end
maintenance, repair, and overhaul (MRO ) support
enable tight control over work orders, resource
allocation, spare parts management, and all costs.
Just as important, fleet functionality allows you
to manage, track, and maintain trucks, vans, or
rolling stock. Whether you’re maintaining your own
assets or servicing customers, Enterprise Asset
Management delivers an investment that saves
time and money from the start and contributes to
performance and profitability.
2. SMOOTHLY CONNECT ERP AND PLANT MAINTENANCE
PROCESSES. Microsoft Dynamics AX automatically triggers
the maintenance system with critical production information.
Enterprise Asset Management capabilities will then reserve
the corresponding downtime on the Microsoft Dynamics AX
production schedule.
3. MINIMIZE PAPER TRAILS AND TRANSACTIONS WITH
A SOLUTION PEOPLE WANT TO USE. Users can plan and
schedule work orders, add standard tasks, back flush parts,
spares, material, and labor in one transaction, automate creation
of follow-up jobs to check quality, and monitor all work and
inventory with fast access to relevant information.
4. MINIMIZE DOWNTIME FOR EQUIPMENT AND OPTIMIZE
PRODUCTION. Preventative maintenance offers a complete
overview of the condition of machinery and tracking for all spare
parts consumption, enabling proactive production planning,
tight management over spare parts consumption and costs, and
optimal scheduling for inspections and servicing.
5. IMPROVE BOTH SHORT AND LONG-TERM PERFORMANCE
WITH ENHANCED KEY PERFORMANCE INDICATORS (KPIS).
Gain significant production benefits with enhanced KPIs for
equipment uptime, Meantime Between Inspections (MT BI),
Meantime Between Failure (MT BF), and Return on Investment
(ROI ).
The full ColumbusManufacturing solution includes our best practice business
process modeling with RapidValue, our own Advanced Discrete Manufacturing
and Supply Chain Solution modules, Microsoft Dynamics AX, and our proven
implementation methodology, SureStep+.
A big THANK YOU to everyone who
has contributed to the Manufacturing
Notes from the Field including:
Aleksandar Jovanovic, Antony Prabhath, Ashley
Doust, Christopher Johnston, Claudio Tirelli, Dave
Ward, David Aronson, David Csordas, Deborah
Vermillion, Desikan Srinivasan, Dex Rimington,
Edvinas T, Emad Akhtar, Eva Foss, Helge Hansen,
Henrik Dall, Jeff Powell, John Robinson, Jolanta
Žalˉ
udienė, Jon Anders Haugland, Jørgen Gjerde,
Ken Jarlfort, Kevin Brandt, Kurt Hatlevik, Linas
Tamkutonis, Luciano Cunha, Martin Burden, Mike
Makela, Mike Wilson, Morten Skogbrott, Niels
Skjoldager, Niraj Nanda, Norman Carmichael,
Olav Bækken Natvik, Pål Linde, Rob Terry, Rune
Kinden Sjursen, Sam Graham, Steve Weaver, Stuart
Mackay, Thomas Hauge, Tom Nall, Troels Kjemtrup
and Victor Waschtschenko.
The ColumbusManufacturing Notes From The Field Series:
Volume 1
Volume 2
Volume 3
Volume 4
Volume 5
Volume 6
Engineering
Change
Sales Quotations
Advanced Projects
Plant Maintenance
Service
Management
Supply Chain
For more information on Columbus, our clients’ experiences and our solutions, please visit www.columbusglobal.com
ABOUT COLUMBUS:
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within the food, retail and manufacturing industries. We exceed 20 years of
experience and 6.000 successful business cases, and we’re proud to offer our
customers solid industry know-how, high performance solutions and global reach.
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