Indonesian gold miner Indo Muro Kencana (IMK) has experienced exciting productivity improvements since connecting the country’s largest ever fleet of machines to Volvo ActiveCare in late 2021 – the remote monitoring and proactive maintenance service from Volvo Construction Equipment.
VolvoCE IndonesiasIMK’s 52 articulated haulers and seven crawler excavators are fitted with sensors that convey real-time information relating to their production, fuel consumption, health, and even operator skill to a portal in the cloud. Some data points, such as location, speed and load, are also communicated from machine to machine to help the operators complete work safely and efficiently.
The dashboards and reports then enable the plant and site manager to identify areas for productivity and efficiency improvements, implement adjustments, and set new targets for further progress. This could involve tweaking the number and capacity of machines on site to reduce idling time, finding more direct driving routes, or introducing training for certain operators.
Nine months on, the data has helped IMK increase productivity across its three sites by approximately a third, noted Volvo, while reducing fuel consumption for the benefit of the environment and the company’s bottom line.
Another major benefit has been the positive impact on the convenience, effectiveness, and cost of managing machine servicing and repairs. With ActiveCare, an artificial intelligence tool monitors all error codes and alarms transmitted from the machines to the cloud. The algorithm sorts through the data, prioritizing the alerts according to urgency and severity, and attributing probable causes.
“Now [that] IMK has seen the benefits, we hope that other companies across Southeast Asia will join them in connecting their construction equipment in the fourth industrial revolution,” said the OEM.
Image source: Volvo Construction Equipment