ROSEMONT, Illinois — Preventive maintenance might never have the mainstream buzzworth of, say, the Internet of Things or 3D printing, but it definitely hovered over and filtered through the Manufacturing & Technology Conference & Expo.
A handful of speakers focused on preventive maintenance and Advanced Technology Services, which is headquartered (relatively) just down the road in Peoria introduced its new DRIVE system, a multifaceted maintenance, repair and operations asset management solution, on the showroom floor.
DRIVE is geared for factory storeroom management and is designed to improve manufacturing performance through interconnected programs, root cause analysis and, of course, preventive maintenance, according to Mike Waltrip, VP of the company’s Industrial Parts Service.
“When you think about the traditional integrated storeroom service, our solution is a little like that, but it’s really geared toward maintenance and reliability organization within manufacturing companies,” Waltrip said. “At the end of the day, we’re optimizing inventory and we’re optimizing the productivity of the manufacturing facility.”
The system is available and “can be molded and fit to anybody with a need to make their storeroom run better and their operation be more reliable,” Waltrip said, rattling off aerospace, tire manufacturers, food and beverage, and consumer packaged goods as just a few industries ATS sees implementing it during the next year.
“Typically, reliability organizations are focused on how to make the process more reliable,” Waltrip said. “What they’re overlooking, unfortunately, is that a lot of the failures of premature wear are at the component level. It’s not necessarily the process line and a breakdown in the value stream of the process; it’s a component. It’s a bearing, a drive, a motor.
“This allows for strategy behind that storeroom operation.”
DRIVE encompasses inventory management, repairable parts management and supply chain & procurement, in addition to storeroom management. Among the other benefits, ATS lists factory performance, worker productivity and bottom line profitability. And at its core, it’s focused on snuffing out problems before they really become problems.
