Automatic maintenance estimation in a plant environment

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10410145-B2
Application number	US-80350707-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	May 15, 2007
Priority date	May 15, 2007
Publication date	Sep 10, 2019
Grant date	Sep 10, 2019

Abstract

A maintenance system for a process plant collects and uses historical data about maintenance orders. The data identifies the maintenance items for completing an order, such as the labor, materials, and maintenance tasks required. The data is historical data developed from actual completed maintenance orders. The system uses archived historical data and estimates various maintenance information, such as estimated cost for completing the maintenance order, and estimated start and completion times. The estimated data may be based on averaged data as a result. This estimated data along with the other maintenance order information may be sent to a scheduler for identifying a priority to the maintenance order and scheduling it accordingly.

First claim

What we claim is:

1. A method of automatically scheduling maintenance orders within a process plant comprising a plurality of assets, the method comprising:
generating, in a maintenance planning computer, a maintenance order in response to a maintenance alert for one of the plurality of assets;
generating, in the maintenance planning computer, estimated maintenance information for the maintenance order, the estimated maintenance information indicating an estimated time or an estimated cost associated with the maintenance order, where the estimated time or the estimated cost varies depending upon maintenance information for at least one other maintenance order corresponding to a different asset, the estimated maintenance information being stored as a data table accessible by the maintenance planning computer, the data table including a field for cross-referenced maintenance orders;
receiving data from at least one asset, executing models from among a plurality of computer-implementable models stored at the maintenance planning computer, and generating for the at least one asset, a health index, a performance index, a usability index, or a variability index, from the received data and based on one or more of the plurality of computer-implementable models;
scheduling, in the maintenance planning computer, the maintenance order using a multi-variable model from among the executed models, the multi-variable model being based on the generated health index, performance index, usability index, or variability index, where the maintenance order is scheduled among one or more other maintenance orders, the scheduling resulting in a maintenance schedule that includes the maintenance order; and
in response to detection of a delay in an active maintenance order, determining if that delay affects the scheduling of the maintenance order of any of the one or more other maintenance orders, and, if so, re-scheduling the affected maintenance order and any of the affected one or more other maintenance orders, wherein determining if that delays affects the scheduling includes determining if there are any cross-referenced maintenance orders stored in the data table, and wherein re-schedule includes determining whether to re-order the affected maintenance order and determining whether to instead delay the affected maintenance order and the cross-referenced maintenance orders,
wherein generating the maintenance order in response to the alert further comprises (i) collecting historical data of at least one previous maintenance order corresponding to the maintenance alert; (ii) determining the estimated maintenance information based, in part, on the historical data compiled from past maintenance orders; and (iii) if no historical data is available then obtaining other historical data compiled from past maintenance orders on a comparable asset via a remote monitoring facility and through a communication network,
wherein the maintenance planning computer is configured to receive the data in response to the executed models and wherein at least some of the received data is formatted in a descriptive language, the method further comprising the maintenance planning computer mapping the received data in the descriptive language from one schema to another schema in accordance with the executed models.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising generating an estimated completion time as the estimated time for the maintenance order, the estimated maintenance information containing the estimated completion time.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising generating an estimated start time as the estimated time for the maintenance order, the estimated maintenance information containing the estimated start time.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising generating the estimated cost for the maintenance order, the estimation maintenance information containing the estimated cost.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the maintenance order is given a higher priority or a lower priority over at least one of the plurality of other maintenance orders based on the estimated maintenance information.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the historical data comprises maintenance task information, labor information, or materials information for the at least one previous maintenance order.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the historical data comprises an average completion time for the at least one previous maintenance order.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the historical data comprises an average cost for the at least one previous maintenance order.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein the at least one previous maintenance order was completed in response to the maintenance alert for at least one other of the plurality of assets.

10. The method of claim 1 , further comprising after completion of the maintenance order, modifying the historical data with actual maintenance task, actual labor, and actual materials information for the maintenance order.

11. The method of claim 1 , further comprising communicating the maintenance schedule to maintenance personnel.

12. The method of claim 1 , further comprising modifying the maintenance schedule in response to a change in the estimated maintenance information.

13. The method of claim 1 , wherein receiving data comprises receiving data pertaining to the status of one of a two-wire device, a three-wire device, a four-wire device, a wireless device, a device having a processor, a variable speed driver, a controller, a multiplexer, rotating equipment, an actuator, power generation equipment, power distribution equipment, a transmitter, a sensor, a control system, a transceiver, a valve, a positioner, a switch, electrical equipment, a server, a hand held device, a pump, an I/O system, a smart field device, a non-smart field device, a highway addressable remote transducer protocol compliant protocol device, an International Electrotechnical Commission 61158 compliant protocol device, a process field bus compliant protocol device actuator sensor interface compliant protocol device, a controller-area network compliant protocol device, a TCP/IP protocol device, an Ethernet device, an internet-based device, and a network communication device.

14. A method of automatically scheduling maintenance orders within a process plant, the method comprising:
generating, in the maintenance planning computer, a maintenance order in response to a maintenance alert for an asset in the process plant, the maintenance order comprising maintenance items for completing the maintenance order;
receiving, in the maintenance planning computer, actual data on the maintenance items, wherein the actual data on the maintenance items is historical data collected from maintenance items of a completed maintenance order;
receiving, in the maintenance planning computer, estimated maintenance information on the maintenance items, where the estimated maintenance information varies depending upon maintenance information from at least one other maintenance order corresponding to a different asset, the estimated maintenance information being stored as a data table accessible by the maintenance planning computer, the data table including a field for cross-referenced maintenance orders;
comparing, in the maintenance planning computer, the actual data and the estimated maintenance information to generate estimated maintenance information for the maintenance order, the estimated maintenance information indicating an estimated time or an estimated cost associated with the maintenance order;
executing models from a plurality of computer-implementable models stored at the maintenance planning com

Assignees

• Dillon Steven R
• Hokeness Scott N
• Fisher Rosemount Systems Inc

Inventors

• Dillon Steven R
• Hokeness Scott N

Classifications

• G06Q10/06311

  Scheduling, planning or task assignment for a person or group · CPC title

• G05B23/0283

  Predictive maintenance, e.g. involving the monitoring of a system and, based on the monitoring results, taking decisions on the maintenance schedule of the monitored system; Estimating remaining useful life [RUL] (preventive maintenance, i.e. planning maintenance according to the available resources without monitoring the system G06Q10/06) · CPC title

• G06Q10/06375

  Prediction of business process outcome or impact based on a proposed change · CPC title

• G06Q10/06 Primary

  Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling · CPC title

• G05B19/41865 Primary

  characterised by job scheduling, process planning, material flow · CPC title