Technology company Siemens has been supporting Sachsenmilch Leppersdorf GmbH in Germany – one of the most modern milk processing plants in Europe – on its path toward developing a cutting-edge predictive maintenance system.
Siemens’AI-powered solution, Senseye Predictive Maintenance, helps Sachsenmilch ensure continuous operation 365 days a year following strict quality standards.
Sachsenmilch produces a variety of products from milk, butter, yogurt, cheese, and dairy derivatives for baby food to bioethanol in its state-of-the-art and almost fully automated facilities. Every day 4.7 million liters of fresh milk are delivered for processing, the equivalent of 170 truckloads. It’s essential for the company’s equipment to operate 24/7 and for the production facilities to be nearly 100 percent available.
Modern interconnected machines generate vast amounts of data
The production environment at Sachsenmilch in Leppersdorf features modern interconnected machines that generate large volumes of data – an ideal setting for apilot project using Senseye Predictive Maintenance, the advanced predictive maintenance solution.
Senseye Predictive Maintenance utilizes AI algorithms to identify both immediate and future machine issues, which allows proactive maintenance to be performed and prevents downtime. This capability has proven to be extremely valuable in Sachsenmilch’s heterogeneous production environment during the pilot project.
One of the biggest challenges was analyzing relevant plant data like temperature, vibration levels, and frequencies to detect anomalies early on and draw the right conclusions. The implementation process involved a careful analysis of specific failure scenarios and the integration of existing data from the control system. New vibration sensors and the Siplus CMS 1200 measurement system for vibration monitoring were also installed.
Siemens supported the maintenance team at Sachsenmilch with technical andproject management expertise. “What we like about this project is that Siemens has know-how on both the technological and the technical sides as well as in project management,” said Roland Ziepel, Technical Manager and head of project management at Sachsenmilch in Leppersdorf. After being trained and the solution’s implementation, the Sachsenmilch team was able to independently continue and successfully complete the pilot.
Reduced downtime: Pump replacement pays off in the pilot project
The pilot with Senseye Predictive Maintenance has already achieved significant costsavings by reducing unplanned downtime.
“We can confirm that the pilot project with Senseye Predictive Maintenance has already paid off. Detecting a faulty pump at anearly stage saved us a lot of expense – in the low six figures,” Ziepel said.
“We’re pleased that with Senseye Predictive Maintenance, we were able to successfully support Sachsenmilch in integrating a preventive maintenance strategy in its existing processes. This promotes efficiency and competitiveness in increasingly complex industries. And the continuing development of our Maintenance Copilot Senseye is another significant step toward transforming maintenance operations,” said Margherita Adragna, CEO of Customer Services at Siemens Digital Industries.
Sachsenmilch and Siemens plan their next project
Building on this success, Sachsenmilch plans to further integrate Senseye Predictive Maintenance with their SAP Plant Maintenance System, with the goal of automatically transferring maintenance notifications from the Siemens solution to SAP Plant Maintenance to improve maintenance planning.
In addition, recommendations for data-driven maintenance provided by the Maintenance Copilot Senseye should also be increasingly utilized to help maintenance teams with their work. This is one of the ways that Siemens supports its customers in their innovative and integrated approach to maintenance in order to ensure their long-term operational success.