RFind answers the question, “Where?” for a world renown construction equipment manufacturer, providing them with Real Time Locating (RTLS)
of their heavy duty construction wheel loaders “in process”.A leading machine manufacturer was looking to increase efficiencies, security and revenue with a cost effective and flexible real time locating solution for their heavy duty construction equipment plant and its surrounding storage yards. In carefully considering all of the concerns deploying an advanced RTLS technology; particularly in harsh metallic environments and in extremely large open yards without the means of cabling or posting equipment, they found that RFind Systems’ Tag to Tag™ communication technology provided the right solution. The simplicity of this system, asset tags talking to tags used as fixed points, eliminates costly reader infrastructures found in conventional RFID systems. This significantly reduced installation time and equipment costs as there was very little cabling. Easily installed in user customizable configurations, these robust tags can be placed in locations to exactly suit the level of accuracy required for asset management. Using tags that are self contained as reference points, a truly wireless solution, they can be added to or picked-up and moved at anytime when reconfigurations are required—a very scalable and flexible system!
In this manufacturing plant, machines are moved from the assembly line and parked in one of several vast storage yards awaiting special parts, painting, quality assurance processes or final shipping. These machines can be removed from the line and parked several times within the complete assembly process. With plant shifts running from early morning to midnight, tracking machines in these parking lots was labour intensive and time consuming, often resulting in scheduling and shipping delays. These vast storage yards were always full when machines were parked for extended periods of time due to delays, with overflow lots being required to accommodate machines newly off the assembly line.
A gradual roll-out began, requiring RFind’s system to locate the wheel loaders to within five meters of the nearest point of the wheel loader 85% of the time and to within ten meters of the wheel loader 99% of the time. Tags used as known co-ordinates were embedded in the pavement in a grid pattern while the asset tags were suspended on the machines’ rear view mirror making them clearly visible and consistently located for easy placement and removal. The tagging procedure was seamlessly added to the assembly process; entering the tag’s serial number and matching it with the work-order, either manually or using a standard barcode scanner, in RFind’s Expeditor 2D browser-based locating software. At the workstation, when the location of the wheel loader was identified in the software, users had the ability to blink the translucent tag, setting the length of illumination time required to easily find it outside in the lot. When machines were finally shipped from the yard, a gateway securely recorded the exit and tags were removed, decommissioned and then made available for reuse.
The installation at this facility demonstrated RFind’s ability to provide a cost-effective and very scalable RTLS, a critical component of maximizing efficiency, reducing the cost of doing business and maximizing return. It succeeded in reducing one of the most time consuming non-value added costs of their manufacturing: the time spent looking for machines. The manufacturer found a viable working solution with RFind’s technology which resulted in an extremely positive business case. Their overall savings for search time was about two hundred thousand dollars per year, with five minutes being the average time to pick-up parked machines. Now that search times have been eliminated and the plant has realized efficiency, they will focus on the many other ways that RTLS can enhance their operations.
RFind Systems Tag to Tag™ communication technology has changed the game of Real Time Locating Systems (RTLS) solutions. Industrial clients who need an accurate, affordable, flexible and scalable means of asset and logistics management are discovering a better ROI when they deploy the reliable light infrastructure of the RFind system.
CONTACT US and RFind will help you—Answer the question, “Where”?