Mobile Data Capture in Shop Floor to Eliminate Manual Logbook

In this world of digitalization, industries are continuously adopting the advanced technologies to ensure that they withstand the growing competition amongst theindustries. Adopting these new technologies have proved to be an advantage as ithas increased the rate of production, decreased the downtime of the machines,which has ultimately led to the profits and expansion of the industries. Now,we must understand the process and the technologies that are trending to enhancethe growth of the industries. You must be aware of the technologies such asIndustrial Internet of Things (IIoT), that helps in the complete digitalizationand automation of the plant by integrating the data from various sources suchERP, SCADA, PLC’s, etc. and then analysing it to enhance the production.

As automationand digitalization has taken over the industries, data can be stored in thedata base or on cloud and accessed anytime by using the E-logbook system. Thiscan’t be done if the data is maintained using the manual logbooks. Alsomanaging data with the manual logbook turns out to be ineffective as well astime consuming. Additionally creating reports, or data analysis may become a tediousjob with higher possibilities of error. But adopting E-logbooks, where you caneither enter the data manually or by directly integrating it with the equipmenthas created a great impact on the overall efficiency of the plant. The data inthe E-logbooks can be accessed anytime and can be analysed at multipleplatforms to create reports, dashboards, trends, etc. that helps in identifyingthe equipment condition, provide predictions about the equipment functioningand also give alerts if any anomalies are detected. So, application ofE-logbook can extensively affect the plant performance in a better way.

Also integratingthe data from the machineries to directly available IoT platforms has reducedthe manual paperwork and possible wrong data capture. Earlier the data wascaptured manual logbooks and daily, weekly, or monthly reports were created toexamine the performance of the machineries and the output. This included higherchances of wrong data capture and error in reports created.  As E-logbooks can also be maintained by directlycapturing the data without the manual entry, multiple protocols are availablein the market that helps in integrating the machinery data with IIoT withoutany manual work, where the data is captured and analysed to give various reports,trends, etc. Proper management of the mobile data at the shop floor results inthe instant visibility of the status of the industry that helps in machineutilization and Overall Equipment Efficiency (OEE).

Theelimination of manual logbook and adoption of E-logbooks has resulted into variousbenefits and advantages to the industries that includes

·        Increased productivity through visible production data.

·        Improved equipment efficiency.

·        Decreased downtime of the equipment.

·        Accurate data analytics to find out trends.

·        Real time monitoring of the equipment.

·        Easy access to the core problem in the entireplant.

·        Instant alarms and notifications to the personresponsible if anomaly occurs.

·        Errors can be easily rectified with the help ofgraphs, dashboards and trends created by analysing the data captured.

·        Decreased paperwork and manual work.

As we have gone through the benefits of mobiledata capture on the shop floor, it will be of great interest to you to know thatRubus IoT consist of the E-logbook module that improves the data reliabilitywith minimum human errors.

To practically understand about the influenceof mobile data capture on shop floor, let’s go through a use case study aboutthe KokusaiPulp & Paper Co.Ltd which has a Biomass power  plant. The aim of the project was to improvethe plant performance and process optimization. To achieve the goal, the firststep is data acquisition or capturing the shopfloor data. The plant consistedof the DCS system, the data from the DCS system was integrated into the RubusPlatform using the OPC protocol. The E-logbook module in the Rubus Platform isused to maintain data from various equipment such as Boiler, Turbine, Conveyor,Generator. This data is then used to create dashboards, trends, graphs, reportsby data analysis, and provide prediction about the equipment health and create alarmswhen required thereby resulting into increased plant efficiency.

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