Closed-loop lifecycle toolcuts material use

EU-funded project employs product-embedded information device

Preventive maintenance is a principle long established in engineering; rather than wait for a part to wear out, you replace it before it shows signs of failure. But discarding parts that are still working well is wasteful. Wouldn’t it be better if parts were renewed according to their actual wear and tear rather than a conservative guess?

The idea behind closed-loop product lifecycle management is to gather data on the condition and performance of a product throughout its life and use that information to predict its remaining lifetime and to improve the design. In Europe, the concept is being developed through PROMISE (http://www.promise-plm.com/), an EU-funded project bringing together 25 partners in nine countries. It has focused initially on heavy machinery for transport and manufacturing. The key to PROMISE is the “product-embedded information device,” or PEID, an electronic package that gathers information about the state of the components in a product and the environment it operates in.

PROMISE will extend the idea of remanufacturing products from used parts, a practice already established in the automotive business. One of the partners, Caterpillar, is already doing this for their earth-moving vehicles. “Although remanufacturing could result in their selling fewer new units, the remanufactured machine is as good, if not better, than the original,” says Lion Benjamins, the project’s marketing manager.

“Actual profit margins can be much greater because they’re using less raw materials, energy, and resources than if they were making a new product. We believe that with the PROMISE methodology remanufacturing will stretch into other industries and will have a huge impact on environmental issues.”

FIAT Research Centre is developing two applications, both of which make use of the PROMISE technology connected to enterprise management systems. One will monitor passenger vehicles and their components during the whole lifecycle to help attain the EU objective of having 96% of a car’s weight recyclable by 2015. The other, for commercial vehicles, will offer a new service to fleet owners. “By fully understanding the actual wear on each vehicle, owners will be able to optimize the availability, and thus the productivity, of the fleet,” Benjamins explained.

Jim Harrison