Faster & more productive system development incl. relocation during the project thanks to PIA Industrial App
PIA Fact Check
- Shortening the project duration
- Central source of information: real-time data on quantities, messages, cycle times, and availabilities
- PIA apps used: piaVisibility, piaOptimum, piaOEETracker, piaAnalyze
Complex eDrive project: change of delivery country during project phase
PIA started a challenging project of a complex assembly line for eDrive products where the country of delivery was changed during the project. The line includes 30 control circuits/modules, 110 stations, 15 robots, and 42 operators. An international PIA team, including colleagues from China, Austria, Croatia, and Germany were involved in this project.
Challenges and solutions using the PIA Industrial App Suite
The customer's wish to operate the plant in Germany instead of China posed numerous challenges. Different technical requirements, infrastructure, and technologies had to be taken into account. One particular challenge was replacing the already integrated piaLine controller with an MES used by the customer, which led to functional problems as the MES used did not meet the complex requirements. Mechanical adjustments and additional integrations in the system controls were also necessary in order to operate the system successfully.
Due to the enormous scope and complexity of the assembly line, efficient project management and monitoring of the project was required to ensure smooth commissioning. Changing personnel on the customer side and the associated loss of knowledge about interfaces made coordination even more difficult. However, in this situation, the PIA Industrial App Suite (IAS) proved to be an indispensable aid and tool for overcoming these challenges.
The PIA Industrial App Suite as the key to project success
The PIA IAS, consisting of piaVisibility, piaOptimum, piaOEETracker, and piaAnalyze, acted as a central information medium for all project participants. Without the digital service applications from PIA, the project team would not have had any quick information during construction and commissioning, about quantities or fault messages, and would have had to rely exclusively on daily reports from the customer. This would have significantly extended the project duration.
Thanks to PIA IAS, the current quantities produced, messages, cycle times, and availability of the entire system were available live and centrally. This not only enabled those involved in the project to monitor the project transparently on site, but also remotely. During the ramp-up phase, the most frequent fault messages, slowest stations, and longest downtimes were analyzed daily and individual measurements were derived. In the event of quality problems, measurement and result values from critical processes were successively linked to the IAS. This led to a targeted focus on key points and effective tracking of measurements as part of project management.
This project demonstrates the flexibility of the IAS to adapt according to the course of the project and the problem and to be used to find and optimize solutions.
