Scania partners with SPM to develop new vibration monitoring unit

Published:  26 August, 2015

Scania Industrial Maintenance, which is responsible for the preventive maintenance in all Scania production facilities in Sweden, has chosen to partner with SPM in developing a new vibration monitoring unit.

In cooperation with SPM, Scania Industrial Maintenance has tested the newly developed vibration monitoring unit Intellinova Parallel MB. The goal is to improve machine availability for the manufacture of machined components for Scania's range of engines, gearboxes, trucks and buses.

The vibration monitoring unit is suitable for installation on critical machines, for example various applications including machine tools to measure bearing condition and imbalance on machine spindles. Anders Ramström, senior maintenance engineer, commented on Scania's strategy and long-term goals for its condition-based maintenance, and what it means for Scania: "Our long term strategy is to engage in more preventive and condition-based maintenance. We would like to avoid all types of emergency and unplanned stops; partly because it is more difficult to plan such jobs, but also because it is more expensive with equipment stoppages. A planned renovation of a spindle typically costs less than one third compared to if the spindle would break down."

Scania works with so-called machine ownership, meaning that operators are responsible for and have deeper knowledge of one or more machines and call for maintenance when necessary. To encourage a sense of ownership and increase understanding as to why machine ownership and operator maintenance is important, Scania has held many operator trainings.

Ramström, added: "We were looking to find a straightforward and reliable technology to have the machine itself tell the operator if something is not right. With a functioning and reliable vibration monitoring unit in place, we can save a lot of man-hours by not routinely performing route-based measurement but measure only when it’s called for."

Initially, the vibration monitoring unit is installed in the engine plant in Södertälje, Sweden where the units have been field tested for over a year.