Monday, April 20, 2015

Predictive Analytics - Factory Floor Alarms




Alarms are part of factory floors. They are ‘wanton disruptions’ set by factory operators to focus on a particular activity if it crosses a critical given threshold. However, a traditional manufacturing floor is abuzz with lot of alarm activity. So many alarms [when they all go at once] create chaos; nor do they help operators to focus on any particular activity. Frequent use of alarms even for small activities creates disaster on a plant floor. There should be an alarm setting strategy for every smart factory floor. Alarms, which are not in use or active since a long period and are unnoticed, have to be removed. Besides, all those alarms whose purpose is not known have to be removed.  The management has to make sure to educate every operator about the purpose of an alarm when it buzzes.

Now, enter Analytics 4.0; traditional factory is replaced with smart factory. All that what happens on the plant floor is displayed in the top floor, which puts them in command of the whole situation. When it comes to alarms, earlier in traditional factory floor, one can hear redundant, delayed, inhibited, dead band, etc., alarms. However, this chaos scene changes in the smart factory floor. Using predictive analytics backed alarm solution, you can control this chaos. By default, all the analytics based alarm solutions are created based on the following flow: assess [where in the process alarms are required], design [design the solution], implement [based on new alarm strategy and priorities], and optimize. As per the flow, only alarms with purpose buzz on the plant floor at any time and all the operators know the reason why a particular alarm went off. 

This is one more area where predictive analytics gives us outright smart results. 

Anyone listening?          

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