With the advanced technology available today, equipment owners can have access to real time information about the health, utilization and location of their machines. But the data provided by Cat Product Link, Cat VisionLink and Scheduled Oil Sampling is only useful if it is monitored regularly and interpreted accurately ― a complex task that some equipment owners don’t have time for, and others prefer their service professionals to handle.
Responding to this need, Ring Power became one of the first Cat dealers to offer Condition Monitoring (CM) as a value added service to assist customers with asset management.
Seven years ago, Danny McCabe (former Business & Technical Systems Support Manager, now retired) and Mike Lack (now Technical Communication Foreman) established a CM Center in Tampa, dedicated to interpreting data from multiple application sources to help customers make timely, informed decisions regarding maintenance, repair, availability and efficiency of their machines.
Today, CM Analysts Mike Coronado, Annah Tarallo and David Seal share the responsibility for monitoring and managing electronically gathered machine data, oil sampling and preventive maintenance test results on more than 2,500 “connected assets” owned by Ring Power customers. They have been assigned to more than 800 connected assets each, and will spend from eight to 10 hours every day attending to hundreds of emails containing fluid analysis results from the Oil Lab, event and diagnostic alerts from VisionLink, hardware issue messages from Product Link and requests for reports from service managers and PSSRs.
Given the high dollar value of the machines, evaluating event and diagnostic alerts, fuel burn, run time, idle time, and other asset data is the biggest part of a CM analyst’s job. All alerts are investigated using CM software to identify the machine, the customer who owns it, what (if any) action is required, and who needs to be notified. When an emergency diagnostic (equipment fault) alert reveals an opportunity for support or service, the PSSR and/or service manager or dispatcher associated with the asset is notified and they contact the customer to schedule the repair.
Monitoring our customers’ equipment is a complex and daunting job that requires a unique combination of product knowledge, computer proficiency, mechanical aptitude and customer interaction skills. Although CM software has simplified the job by automating the reporting that used to be manually compiled, it is still up to the CM analysts to interpret the collected data, filter out the anomalies and identify the significant trends so they can provide customers expert advice on equipment maintenance.
We commend Mike Coronado, Annah Tarallo and David Seal for helping to make Ring Power the leader in connected assets. Their commitment to providing the most accurate machine information possible creates positive experience for our customers and business opportunities for us.