TROUBLESHOOTING SOFTWARE - Manufacturing Floor 1

[kkykylkyle]

Hi,

I work in the electrical motors business and I'm looking to begin a project that essentially acts as a troubleshooting guide for the entire shop floor. What I want to do is gather and compile all of the 'problems' that can occur on the shop floor, the causes to said problems and the solutions. The reasoning behind this is simply to be able to solve problems quicker and more efficiently (because chances are they have allready occured). I'm looking for any SOFTWARE out there that may be able to facilitate not only the troubleshooting process, but make it easy to input data and possibly even impliment on the shop floor to have employees log the problems they face with equipment/IT, the cause and the solution.

Any ideas????

THANKS!!

Kyle

 

[MadMango]

What about an Excel based trouble log?

"Art without engineering is dreaming; Engineering without art is calculating."

Have you read faq731-376 to make the be

 

[PSE]

I have used Excel for creating troubleshooting logs or checklists with some success (as long as the operators use or refer to them rather than immediately calling for help). I would consider Access or an equivalent as well since it could become a bit more relational.

If you do proceed with the intent on shop floor implementation. Get the operator's input and try to get a feel for their comfort level with some PC programs such as Excel or Access etc. You would also need to work out some protections for the software to prevent or mitigate potential damage from the inevitable "oops" that happen with data entry and editing.

Regards,

 

[MadMango]

Depending on the size of your company, you may have an IT/Computer specialist that helps with the network and such. You could try approaching this person to see if they can give you a little space on the servers for an intranet site for the troubleshooting efforts. That person will probably be more than happy (and a bit excited) to also help set-up a PHPnuke or Mambo based website with a forum that workers can post faults and other troubleshooting related information. They might even dabble in MySQL or something similar and can create an online form tailored to allow input of only specific information (this would be searchable, etc) you request.

Some shop workers can get a little apprehensive around a "program" but have no concerns about interacting with a web page. Amazon and eBay have tempered them.

"Art without engineering is dreaming; Engineering without art is calculating."

Have you read faq731-376 to make the be

 

[BillPCMfgE]

If you run into some canned software please post it for me.

My company is going lean and monitoring various aspects of manufacturing is important. the problem with using Excel is that it is not multi user friendly and to look up a problem requires manual intervention and having access to the Excel file.

Problems usually come in two varieties quality issues and production issues. Response time is of greater importance. A quality issue needs to addressed where it occurs not fixed later in the process. I am about to have my contract programming house build a database driven application meaning there will be multi-user access, time logging, e-mails automatically generated notifying people of the problem and problem resolution tracking.

 

[PSE]

BillPCMfge,

Our european group implemented this software and I was part of the initial evaluation. I wanted to implement it in the US but have since moved on to different duties and it got set aside. Of interest was how you could link it into multiple databases and get an overall dashboard of current status.

http://www.winspc.com/

You might want to see if it would be appropriate for your needs.

Regards,

 

[gbarry]

Just seen your post - maybe a little too late but you could try our tried and tested logbook software - elogger - can be customized to suit all your needs. check it out at

http://www.synappnorth.com

or contact me directly george barry - gbarry@synappnorth.com 281 995 0015