New McLanahan condition-monitoring programme
New programme helps customers to understand machine health and improve maintenance programmes
McLANAHAN have developed a new condition-monitoring programme with the aim of helping customers understand the health of their machines, whilst giving McLanahan technicians the ability to dial into a machine remotely and to pass any data back to the company’s engineering team to improve future machine designs.
Daniel Fairwebster, electrical design manager with McLanahan, explained: ‘The package allows us to better understand the condition of the machine out in the field so that we can better service our clients in terms of purchasing spare parts or scheduling maintenance on the machine.
‘Condition monitoring is typically a slow-moving animal, so we’re looking at trends over a long period of time to actually see how the machine is performing, but because it’s a real-time operating system, we do have the data immediately, so if there is something that happens unexpectedly, we do get that data and can generate a report as it happens.’
The condition-monitoring programme is a modular package that consists of sensors that are strategically placed around the machine. These sensors are connected to a remote data communication device that sends the data back to McLanahan. From there, McLanahan technicians interpret the data and share their findings with customers to improve their maintenance programmes.
‘Customers can then take their maintenance strategy from planning solely based on a calendar event to actually determining whether the machine does require some form of maintenance,’ said Mr Fairwebster. ‘They can potentially push out maintenance windows or they can bring them forward, depending on the condition of the machine. That can help reduce unplanned downtime.’
The condition-monitoring package can be easily added to any existing machine or installed as part of a new build. It can be tailored to fit any size operation and to monitor a variety of machine component conditions, including temperature, vibration, pressure and more.
‘The McLanahan condition-monitoring package can be installed on the full suite of McLanahan equipment, from the smallest machine to the largest machine,’ said Mr Fairwebster. ‘We can offer a machine with a basic level of instrumentation, and we can scale it up accordingly as required.
‘The McLanahan condition-monitoring programme is our commitment to customers that we are supporting them to reliably operate our equipment, and we’re utilizing that to improve our machines in the future.’
