Industrial machinery and equipment maintenance is an essential activity but seldom gets the attention or investment given to production. One consequence is to leave maintenance data in silos, making it harder than it should be to implement effective maintenance strategies and optimize spare part inventories.
This blog describes how a holistic approach to maintenance, repair and operations (MRO) data management builds a solid foundation for improving operational efficiency.
Introduction to MRO data management
MRO data consists of all the records the business keeps relating to asset care. The four main categories are:
- Asset data: Includes description, location, purchase date and price, depreciation/current book value and manuals and instructional materials.
- Maintenance records: All the preventive and breakdown work performed provides a basis for projecting future maintenance needs.
- MRO inventories: Spare and replacement parts, consumable materials, tools, and records of components sent for rebuild.
- Supplier information: Details of where MRO items are purchased, plus contractual terms such as holding/placing of consignment inventory.
This data often lives in multiple locations. If the business uses them, much will be in the Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) and the Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) system. Some inventory records may be in the ERP system, while others could be on paper cards or in spreadsheets. Accounting and Purchasing may have other data useful for maintenance.
This siloing of data makes it difficult to develop and act on strategies that reduce costs while improving efficiency and maintenance operations effectiveness. Pulling this data into an MRO master data management system improves visibility and enhances maintenance operations planning. Benefits include lower MRO inventory, higher equipment availability and lower costs.
The role of MRO data excellence in asset lifecycle management
Asset lifecycle management spans four phases:
- Planning for asset acquisition
- Procurement process
- Operation
- Disposal
With quality MRO data, each phase can be undertaken efficiently.
Maintenance and breakdown histories support equipment specification and selection, along with spare parts purchasing. Likewise, preventive maintenance is optimized by understanding common failure modes and frequencies for similar equipment. The same data can guide implementation of predictive maintenance technologies like machine health monitoring sensors.
MRO data also defers the point at which disposal becomes the most economical step in the lifecycle of the asset, so extending asset operating life.
A concern in MRO inventory management is identifying obsolete spare parts and guarding against future obsolescence. Linking MRO inventory data to assets helps with identifying the impact of equipment disposal on inventory while also making commonalities between different assets visible.
Linking EAM systems with MRO usually requires specialized software for robust data exchange. The typical process is to establish a single set of MRO master data and share it with the EAM and other systems. This is something an MRO data management software vendor should be able to support.
Implementing MRO data management best practices
The key to harnessing MRO information is to establish a single source of master data accessible by the people and systems that need it. This starts with standardizing the nomenclature used, which prevents duplication, followed by MRO data cleansing to correct errors and omissions.
Maintaining the MRO master data as the single source of truth requires following good data governance principles. This means introducing procedures and workflows that prevent inconsistencies and ensure effective master data management. These should be supplemented with regular data audits to verify compliance and identify any procedural problems.
Integration with other business systems is a critical aspect of MRO data governance. If the ERP, EAM and other systems are unable to access the MRO master data, users will create duplicate systems and undermine effective MRO master data management.
MRO data and maintenance scheduling optimization
Good data is essential for planning and scheduling preventive maintenance work. While data from specific machine types is the most useful, there are benefits from identifying component commonalities between different items of equipment.
For example, the same pumps, motors, bearings and valves could be used on a wide variety of machinery. Information on wear and failure rates, taken in conjunction with running hours and specific operating and environmental conditions, can improve the accuracy of their predicted lifetimes.
MRO data, plus the ability to anticipate service lifetimes and failure rates, improves PM scheduling, in turn reducing downtime and breakdowns. Adding machine health monitoring sensors provides another layer of data and facilitates a move towards predictive maintenance.
With such an approach to industrial asset management, maintenance work can be delayed to the last possible moment, increasing equipment availability while reducing maintenance workload and costs.
Inventory management and optimization through MRO data
Optimizing MRO parts inventories poses several challenges.
- Inventory is costly: Money is tied up and space is needed for storage.
- Low-inventory risks: Extended machine downtime and expedited shipping costs.
- Erratic consumption: Equipment usage and the maintenance effort expended are driven by many factors and are uneven throughout the year.
- Risk of obsolescence: As industrial assets are retired, the parts associated with them may no longer be needed.
- Repairable parts: Need careful tracking to log repair status, inventory levels and locations.
A single source of MRO data helps in managing all these challenges. Better visibility into inventory and the MRO supply chain reduces ordering and storage duplication and creates cost-saving opportunities. Likewise, links to predictive maintenance systems and maintenance planning allow timely ordering without incurring expedited shipping charges.
Managing repairable components and subassemblies is an aspect of maintenance often lacking rigorous controls. Effective single source data management provides better visibility over such MRO parts, helping reduce waste and lower inventory levels.
Key steps in achieving these improvements are:
- Introduce standardized naming conventions
- Create connections between parts and assets to reduce obsolescence waste
- Implement demand/usage/consumption forecasting
Leveraging big data and cloud computing for MRO management
Bringing disparate MRO datasets together to create a single set of master data creates a “big data” challenge and opportunity. “Big data” refers to extremely large datasets, especially those where data is unstructured or only partially structured. Big data in manufacturing can relate to quality, process optimization, supply chain management, maintenance or any other aspect where large volumes of data require processing for actionable intelligence.
The analytical tools used for processing big data typically reside on remote server, as they and the datasets are too large and complex for individual PCs. Furthermore, the cloud provides storage capacity and simultaneously allows access by those who need to use the information.
In the case of MRO data management, cloud computing enables cost-effective storage along with the analytic tools to extract valuable insights into aspects of maintenance operations. For example, this could include:
- Spare parts consolidation: Identify instances of identical parts stored under different names in separate locations.
- Consolidated MRO procurement: Find where identical components are purchased from different vendors.
- Improve PM scheduling: Spot patterns in wear rates related to environmental and processing conditions.
Benefits include higher storeroom efficiencies, lower inventories, more accurate MRO classification and streamlined master data governance.
Your industrial maintenance and MRO partner
Industrial MRO relies upon and generates large volumes of data. Effective data management can unlock significant improvement in cost control and operational efficiency, but only if appropriate systems are put in place. MRO data management requires a disciplined, systematic approach to every aspect of data governance, from audits to data enrichment.
Many manufacturers find the best way of unlocking the benefits of MRO data is by partnering with an organization experienced in unraveling and organizing the many existing datasets. As the leader in outsourced data cleansing and maintenance, ATS has the expertise and experience to help. Our services run from MRO asset management to comprehensive maintenance services that increase availability and reduce costs. Contact us to learn more.
