Implementation of autonomous maintenance techniques in a manufacturing cell of a agricultural machinery manufacturer

Abstract

The purpose of this article was to describe a case of autonomous maintenance implementation in a pilot area of a metal mechanical company. The research method was the single case study in a production cell with three machining centers in  agricultural machinery manufacturer. The secondary objectives of the article were: describe the scenario in which the application occurred; describe procedures and results; and analyze the benefits obtained, showing results before and after implementation. The main results of the application were the increase in the mean times between failures, the reduction in mean time to repair, the reduction of waste and rework in the cell, and the reduction of maintenance costs. After the improvements, there was significant increase in the overall efficiency of the cell, from 78% to 88.3%, which can be considered world-class performance. Other relevant gains were: work in process reduction, set-up time reduction, and physical occupied area reduction.