High availability of measurement, inspection and detection systems over their entire lifetime is a basic requirement for smooth production operations in rolling mills and process lines. If a measurement system fails unexpectedly, this usually means that the entire line comes to a standstill. Such incidents are associated with high losses in revenue, especially in the production and processing of steel and aluminium.

As part of Industry 4.0, predictive maintenance has already found its way into many industrial sectors. This AI-driven form of maintenance, also known as Maintenance 4.0, is essentially about optimising maintenance strategies and measures and increasing the service life of machines and systems.

IMS Messsysteme GmbH is the first company in the industry to offer operators of rolling mills and process lines the opportunity to integrate the measurement systems in their production facilities into a specially developed predictive maintenance process. The pilot project to this end is nearing completion and is already benefiting from the high level of interest shown by pilot customers and the real-time monitoring of the first measurement systems to be used in live operation and integrated into the proactive maintenance process.

Additional sensors of various types continuously transmit physical parameters relevant to operation, such as times, currents, flow rates, accelerations, humidity and more, which are continuously stored on a server. The status of all active systems worldwide is displayed on a control monitor called MARS (Monitor All Remote Systems) and monitored by our service team. The status report includes not only the current operating status of the system, but also a forecast of when and in which components a failure is likely to occur.

This monitoring and forecasting mechanism enables our service colleagues to proactively inform customers of expected problems and plan an appropriate service visit to repair or replace the component in question. In addition, the analysis of the transmitted data allows general conclusions to be drawn about the environmental conditions in the production facilities, thus offering fundamental potential for optimising the production system.

The benefits of proactive service are obvious:

• Optimum plant availability through reduced downtime
• Maximum output with the highest product quality
• Maximisation of service life of measurement systems
• Optimised deployment of service teams on site and predictable maintenance times

Would you like to be one of our pilot customers and benefit from the attractive advantages of our predictive maintenance services at this project stage? Our pleasure! Please use the contact form below to register now.