Reliability Strategy to unlock the value of your undercarriage investment

Unlocking the true investment in your Undercarriage Components on tracked machines requires a strategic approach. At the center of this strategy are the Reliability Engineers and Maintenance Planners who carefully balance the investment of time and resources and the performance optimization.

The foundations for this team to not only achieve good ROI, but to excel at the task include: –

1. Selection of correct components for the conditions – the selection of the correct components is critical to setting the undercarriage up for success. The OEM or supplier will provide the best advice as to what components should be used for the particular environment.

• Proactive maintenance during the life of the components is a 2 pronged approach practiced by this team.
  • Immediate attention tasks – these are tasks that have been identified that need immediate attention to stop accelerated wear of the components. Typical examples are – Track Tension, misalignment, collapsed track rollers, dry joints etc.
  • Scheduled longer term tasks – these tasks are planned over the medium-term and cover such items as: Track Mid-lives, Track roller swaps, full undercarriage replacements, track frame rebuilds.

• Scheduled Track Inspections enable the metal to be sighted, touched and imaged creating the basic data driving the maintenance decisions: –
  • measure the components to determine the % worn, capture observations.
  • Identifying signs of accelerated wear
  • Visually viewing other machine parts to identify any damage or causes of accelerated wear.

• The Inspection and Service History data accumulated over multiple fleets of machines provides a rich source for creating benchmarks. The Reliability and Maintenance Planning Team will use these benchmarks to highlight success of their strategies, ultimately resulting in improved bottom line profitability and ROI.

What is measured can be managed and improved. Data driven decisions provide the power improve Undercarriage Life Performance, which ultimately flows to the bottom line in improved profitability.