Evolving Maintenance Practices Into Guided Decision Assistance Tools

Summary & ConclusionsThis paper aims to discuss how the evolution of maintenance in a digital age has been influenced by technology to allow for the previously established procedural norm can be re-evaluated and modified for improvement when it comes to the tools and capabilities that can be provided to users performing maintenance. As an example, the established procedural norm may instruct maintainers to simply remove and replace part ‘x’ in order to complete the maintenance action. We will seek to show how this task is not as simple as it may seem to be, and how data is allowing for additional decisions to be made, the creation of tools that support the user with aid in these decisions, and how the evolution of maintenance is going to change because of it.We also hope to show how Guided Decision Assist tools increase effectiveness at the point of need, both in the field and on the manufacturing floor, by providing aid in cognitive and situational clarification to decisions that would otherwise be reliant on human intuition. Through this examination, the paper will discuss tools that would present the user with opportunities to address topics such as, but not limited to scheduling (equipment/personnel), Asset commitment conflicts, environmental conditions that may help or hinder the repair/maintenance process, replacement part availability, and similar failures that could be addressed more efficiently if done in conjunction with other actions. These additional inputs are valuable to the user as it can mitigate the need/reliance a given individual, as well as allows the user make more efficient and effective fix/fight decisions for the equipment and its performance requirements.