From the Maximo Support Desk - Idea For Using A Single Meter Reading To Generate Work Orders For Assets On A Production Line

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"I can't have my technician visiting all the related assets and taking meter readings to get the PM Work Orders to generate... it's gotta be easier than that."

The quote above is from a client who was trying to figure out how to service multiple assets that operate on an assembly line.  Additionally, these assets were associated with multiple Locations, because the plant was divided into congruent sections for other maintenance reasons, such as electrical and temperature requirements.  The last major requirement was that he wanted all the maintenance to occur at the same time, as soon as the entire runtime of the assembly line reaches 5 hours.  Oh, and he only wants one meter reading taken by a single operator; he does not want the operator physically visiting each asset and taking a meter reading just to allow PMs to generate the Work Orders.  There are usually many solid options and variations for getting things done with Maximo, and I'm sharing this case as evidence.  Here is what we did in this customer's case...

Scenario:  A production line, which is comprised of several assets in multiple locations, needs to have PM Work Orders generated for all of its associated assets when the entire runtime of the production line reaches 5 hours.  For logistical reasons, a single user needs to enter a single meter reading which represents the entire line, to instigate the PM Work Order generation process to service every component on the production line.

Solution: Create a virtual asset to represent the entire production line, and the user will enter a meter reading against this virtual asset.  The PM Work Order Generation Cron Task runs on a regular schedule, so whenever this virtual asset gets a meter reading in excess of 5 hours this triggers the PM Work Order generation for all of the assets which are part of the production line.  To achieve this, a PM is created for the virtual asset and a Route with Asset stops is used on the PM.  Each Asset stop will have the appropriate Job Plan associated.  The result is that one meter reading is entered and the individual Job Plans will generate Work Orders for several individual assets.

Notes & Limitations:  All of the Assets and Locations must be within the same Site.  Also implied is that all of the Job Plans in the hierarchy must be associated to Assets and Locations that are all within the same Site.

Implementation Bullet Points:

1.  Create an Asset record (ex. "PRODLINE") that will represent the production line, and associate a continuous meter to this asset, such as RUNHOURS;  this will be the Asset on which the User enters the Meter Reading.  This may or may not be a physical Asset - it is the mechanism to instigate the PM Work Orders on all the other assets on the line.

2. Create a Route which contains all of the Assets on the production line; if a single asset requires more than one Job Plan to be executed (as was in the PM), then it must be added to Route twice - once for each Job Plan that will get executed;
 -Use the option for "When this Route is applied to a Work Order, the Route Stops will become:" - Child Work  Orders; (this might be easier when different technicians perform the service) individual Work Orders for each Asset

2. Create a PM for the virtual Asset and associate the RUNHOURS meter; (remember, this is the Asset on which the User will enter meter readings to start the PM Work Order Generation process) on the Frequency tab use the Meter Based Frequency tab to set the RUNHOURS meter Frequency value to 5; check both boxes for:
  -Generate Work Order Based on Meter Readings? (Do Not Estimate)
  -Generate Work Order When Meter Frequency is Reached?
  Associate the Route to the PM
  -you will need to modify the existing PMs for the assets so that they do not run separately for these assets, or in  addition to this chain of events

3. Use the Cron Task Setup application to set up, or schedule the an existing instance of PMWoGenCrontask to run on an appropriate interval so as to generate the Work Orders in a timely manner.  Once the user enters a meter reading for the asset (representing the entire chain of assets), then the PM will be eligible to be picked up by the Cron Task to generate the Work Orders.

Hopefully this will give you an idea of how PMs, Job Plans, Routes, and Meter Readings can be used in a flexible manner to satisfy your site's logistics and business processes.

Tom Richardson is an IBM Maximo Support Engineer and frequent contributor to the Asset Management Blog community.  For a complete index of links to his articles, visit
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