From Endress+Hauser, 24/7 Digital, Plant-Wide Health Monitoring for Rockwell Systems Optimizes Workflows and Processes

November 5, 2024

Endress+Hauser’s Asset Health Monitoring Solution–Rockwell Edition, now available for installation, provides operators with a centralized, digital overview of plant-wide device health to avoid unscheduled shutdowns and accelerate troubleshooting.

It not only presents early visibility of problematic devices but distinguishes itself by adding likely causes and remedies to such a report so problems can be fixed faster and often remotely, optimizing workflows and maintenance scheduling. Trips to the field are minimized. The software adds remote device configuration, advanced diagnostics and preventive maintenance capabilities to any existing or planned Rockwell Automation control system.

By digitalizing device monitoring and recovery and allowing operators unrivalled flexibility in how that data is presented, the Asset Health Monitoring Solution–Rockwell Edition enables operators to find the money-saving, labour-optimizing and safety-enhancing sweet spot in their plant maintenance approach.

It displays the continuous, real-time NAMUR status of each HART remote IO instrument, viewable on a monitor in relevant departments, or by authorized personnel from anywhere on stationary clients or using an Endress+Hauser Field Xpert mobile client.

These NAMUR status signals are either all’s well, or report one of four levels of concern: Failure, Maintenance Required, Function Check, and Out of Specification. The devices can be anywhere on a remote IO network, indoors or out, at a single or multiple locations, and can be any vendor’s HART instrument, not just Endress+Hauser’s.

Scale-able up to 10,000 devices, this Asset Health Monitoring Solution–Rockwell Edition is an on-premise solution that is IIoT- and cloud-ready, so future-ready for when any plant transitions to fully digitalized operations. The software is suitable for greenfield or brownfield operations. In either case, it deploys on top of the Rockwell control system without interrupting or delaying the start-up of operations or changing the programming/system configuration. Users are fully protected; this solution is fully tested and supported by the Endress+Hauser/Rockwell Automation alliance.

Unlike many other asset management products, the Asset Health Monitoring Solution–Rockwell Edition does not have to conform to the plant’s control system architecture but can be implemented according to the plant’s process areas. It’s adapted to the needs of the specific industry, for example water/wastewater, food & beverage, metals, mining, oil&gas or chemical, and provides each department with the perspective it requires from continuous device monitoring.

Plant operators get the opportunity to integrate preventive maintenance into their plant upkeep procedures. Reliability engineers have easy access to the health status of their instruments. Maintenance engineers gain an overview of all devices they can filter by status or search by tag; it takes only one click to see what needs their attention in their part of the plant. Instrument engineers do get a one-fits-all tool that really matters: a single configuration manager for all connected instruments. Sitting at their terminal, they can connect to any HART device, fix many issues and configure any instrument remotely.

The software provides dashboards with filter options, such as listing only problematic instruments with their status, deficiency and remedy, or operators can design their own dashboards. Such knowledge facilitates prioritization and planning of work orders. Troubleshooting is up to 50% faster, as is the response time for routine maintenance of devices with high maintenance requirements. If a failure occurs or seems imminent, maintenance fully grasps the nature of the issue. If intervention in the field is required, staff have a good grasp of the problem, likely solution and tools and parts needed before a technician is dispatched, so the issue can be resolved with just one site visit in the minimum time necessary.

These benefits are greatest where plants transition to Asset Health Monitoring Solution from a run-to-fail approach. HART diagnostics that could have alerted the operator to an issue are no longer stranded on the instrument, but displayed, centrally, in real-time. Being thus forewarned of a problem at an early stage avoids sudden failures or worse, unscheduled process interruptions. Problems can be dealt with remotely or during normal site visits, rather than having to be investigated blindly, on an emergency basis, possibly at far-away or hard-to-reach locations or in bad weather or other unsafe conditions. Servicing the instrument before an issue becomes catastrophic often extends its service life.

For plants that employ an aggressive preventive maintenance program with arbitrary device replacement timetables, adopting Asset Health Monitoring Solution can avoid premature retirement of those instruments, with significant cost and labour savings. Fewer field visits to meters and analyzers are undertaken.

Heartbeat Verification checks on Endress+Hauser instruments can be conducted via the same software, providing a higher level of documented fitness data for maintenance and compliance purposes.

Regardless of the plant’s maintenance philosophy, the data generated by Asset Health Monitoring Solutions–Rockwell Edition simplifies and accelerates compliance record-keeping and filing. It can display historical health states for trend analysis. Asset Health Monitoring Solutions-Rockwell Edition is available as a perpetual licence, with support agreements on offer to assure users their software is kept up-to-date and compatible with the latest installed operating system.

For more information, visit the Endress+Hauser website HERE.