Installed base evaluations key to actionable plant maintenance

When it comes to seeking actionable intelligence for facility maintenance, plant managers should partner with a distributor capable of providing exceptional installed base evaluations.

What are installed base evaluations?

Installed base evaluations (IBE) are used to gather data that is essential to developing and supporting a plant’s strategic maintenance plan. They’re needed when a plant lacks any of the following:

An accurate plant model that identifies physical assets.
Comprehensive knowledge of obsolescence risk.
Spare parts in the event of unexpected machine downtime.
A bill of materials for all critical asset parts in a plant.

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Actionable intelligence and detailed analysis

An IBE is much more than simply counting parts. It’s a thorough analysis of a plant’s critical assets, as well as their condition. By partnering with the right distributor partner, plants can access data needed to make investment decisions regarding their base assets.

An IBE helps a plant manager understand and pinpoint lifecycle risk by site, area, line, machine and panel. By optimizing a plant’s maintenance, repair and operations (MRO), the right distributor partner will help ensure the right parts are available, in the right place, at the right time.

A 3-step solution

Field data collection: On-site data is collected by a field service professional who works with a plant to develop a systematic model for data collection, which can include a review of that plant’s complete electrical and mechanical installed base. The right distributor partner will focus on the process and machines in place, providing analysis in the context of the most critical facility performance.
Data processing and analyzing: Using customized software for analysis, a field service professional will determine a plant’s lifecycle risks and overall MRO inventory status. To determine recommended inventory levels, field service professionals review installed products, plant operating hours and product mean time between failure (MTBF) data.
Delivering reports and recommendations: This can help plant managers optimize their install-base and inventory levels. Using a consultative approach, the distributor partner will deliver the analysis to the plant, along with recommendations for next steps. The reports will detail what’s installed, what’s missing and what equipment is nearing the end of its critical life.

Core advantages of IBEs

Reduced cost through the identification and elimination of excess inventory, which helps improve return on net assets (RONA).
Increased uptime by ensuring critical spares are on-site to support production and maintenance.
Broader visibility into plant assets.
Mitigated risk associated with supporting legacy equipment.

Accessing the best IBE professionals

Border States and Rockwell Automation, for example, can provide a plant hierarchy model for a specific facility, with terminology and plant descriptions that are meaningful to its respective workers.

With valuable insight to a facility, plant managers can update equipment, replace parts or add a new line, knowing exactly what will be affected in their installed base, as well as its impact on their spare parts management strategy.

To ensure staff can focus on doing what they do best – running the plant – it’s crucial a distributor partner can successfully capture:

Environmental conditions
Operating hours per process
Part catalog numbers

The right distributor partner should also be able to generate a series of reports that can be sorted according to highest risk.

What’s included in a final analysis?

Easy-to-read reports
Identification of inventory, including critical spares
Lifecycle analysis

This blog post was drafted in partnership with Rockwell Automation. For more information on installed base evaluations, contact a Border States Account Manager near you.

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