To address the customer’s needs and satisfaction are the most important goals for Trimek and Innovalia Association. Being consistent in meeting their needs, the existing manufacturing systems have to be adaptable while maximizing the quality of their products.
Z-bre4k is a 4-year project that started in October 2017 inside the HORIZON 2020 initiative and is dealing with strategies and predictive maintenance models wrapped around physical systems for Zero-unexpected-Breakdowns and increased operating life of factories.
Maintenance in general and predictive maintenance strategies in particular should now face very significant challenges to deal with the evolution of the equipment, instrumentation and manufacturing processes they should support. Preventive maintenance strategies designed for traditional highly repetitive and stable mass production processes based on predefined components and machine behavior models are no longer valid and more predictive-prescriptive maintenance strategies are needed. The Z-Break solution comprises the introduction of 8 scalable strategies:
1) The prediction occurrence of failure (Z-PREDICT)
2) The early detection of current or emerging failure (Z-DIAGNOSE)
3) The prevention of failure occurrence building up, or even propagation in the production system (Z-PREVENT)
4) The estimation of the remaining useful life of assets (Z-ESTIMATE)
5) The management of the aforementioned strategies through event modelling, KPI monitoring and real-time decision support (Z-MANAGE)
6) The replacement, reconfiguration, re-use, retirement, and recycling of components/assets (Z REMEDIATE)
7) Synchronizing remedy actions, production planning and logistics (Z-SYNCHRONISE)
8) Preserving the safety, health, and comfort of the workers (Z-SAFETY)
Each of the developed strategies will be triggered based on detecting and assessing the impact of system level events that cause lower quality, generate defects and increase the costs.
Z-bre4k has been possible thanks to 17 EU-based partners (*) representing both industry and academia, having ample experience in cutting-edge technologies and active presence in the EU manufacturing. The Z-Bre4k impact to the European manufacturing industry is focused on automotive and machinery sectors.
The ability of Z-Bre4k to optimize the manufacturing processes according to certain target quality levels and/or customer satisfaction in the innovation key to fulfil the industrial requirements and brings us to promoting a sustainable industrial growth by facilitating a strategic shift in Europe from cost-based manufacturing to an approach based on resource efficiency and the creation of high added value products and ICT-enabled intelligent and high performance manufacturing in an integrated system.
Z-Bre4k continues being a tangible example of the Innovalia Group commitment with innovation and technological development.
(*) Z-Bre4K partners:
ASOCIACION DE INVESTIGACION METALURGICA DEL NOROESTE – Spain
ATLANTIS ENGINEERING AE-Greece
BRUNEL UNIVERSITY LONDON-United Kingdom
CORE INNOVATION AND TECHNOLOGY OE-Greece
ASOCIACION DE EMPRESAS TECNOLOGICAS INNOVALIA-Spain
FRAUNHOFER GESELLSCHAFT ZUR FOERDERUNG DER ANGEWANDTEN FORSCHUNG E.V.-Germany
Centro di Ricerca e Innovazione tecnologica srl-Italy
SACMI COOPERATIVA MECCANICI IMOLA SOCIETA COOPERATIVA-Italy
TRIMEK SA- Spain
AUTOTECH ENGINEERING, AIE-Spain
INOVAMAIS – SERVICOS DE CONSULTADORIA EM INOVACAO TECNOLOGICA S.A.-Portugal
HOLONIX SRL-SPIN OFF DEL POLITECNICO DI MILANO-Italy
ECOLE POLYTECHNIQUE FEDERALE DE LAUSANNE-Switzerland
PHILIPS CONSUMER LIFESTYLE B.V.-Netherlands
INTERUNIVERSITAIR MICRO-ELECTRONICA CENTRUM-Belgium
CDS LAVORAZIONE MATERIE PLASTICHE SRL-Italy
FUNDACION AIC AUTOMOTIVE INTELLIGENCE CENTER FUNDA