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Milk delivered from dairy farms to Juustoportti must be processed quickly so that it cannot go spoiled. In a critical operating environment, machinery must operate reliably 24/7, and spare parts must be quickly and easily available. The Konecranes Agilon material handling system gathered spare parts in a single location, brought digitalization to the maintenance warehouse, and improved the availability of production machines. It also allowed employees to focus on more productive tasks and made room for a growing production.
In just over 30 years, Juustoportti has grown from a small dairy farm into a family-owned business that employs up to 300 people. In addition to dairy and cheese production operations, the company has a number of service stations, and Kasvisgalleria, a Kuopio-based food product manufacturer.
In recent years, the company has grown rapidly and invested in new production machinery. While the investment rate has been high considering the company’s size, maintenance resources have grown more slowly. Currently, maintenance employs 13 people.
The biggest challenge was spare parts management, having them in one place, and finding them quickly.
“Previously, spare parts for production equipment were here and there in small storerooms around the company. Some were catalogued in an Excel file, some in notebooks, and some purely in certain employees’ memories,” says production director Janne Vilén.
The dairy’s operating environment is critical, as incoming milk must be quickly processed into products. No extended stoppages due to machine failures can be afforded, which puts maintenance and repair activities under pressure in terms of competence and the easy availability of spare parts.
The dairy’s operating environment is critical, as incoming milk must be quickly processed into products.
“The biggest challenge was spare parts management, having them in one place, and finding them quickly. The maintenance unit had weekly shortages of parts, and we spent too much time on finding spare parts. We searched everywhere for them, placed calls to find them, and even assigned couriers to deliver them rapidly.”
Spare parts in a single place – Agilon
The solution was the Agilon material handling system
The solution was the Agilon material handling system, which was installed in Juustoportti’s maintenance facilities and where the majority of necessary spare parts were added centrally. The system, originally 30 meters long and six meters tall, has grown twice in size. The company is planning to use the Agilon Mobile user interface for the management of spare parts of more than 25 kg located in an external warehouse.
No extended stoppages due to machine failures can be afforded, which puts maintenance and repair activities under pressure in terms of competence and the easy availability of spare parts.
“Konecranes offered excellent support during the project’s specification phase, and they are still supporting us during operations. All we had to do was define the space we have available, and the sizes of the boxes and the volume of the parts we would place in Agilon. Konecranes took care of dimensioning and capacity calculations. The project was incredibly painless and easy. We only needed to provide an Internet connection and a regular industrial socket,” says Vilén.
In addition to Juustoportti’s maintenance, the system is used by subcontractors who can obtain spare parts or supplies using their personal identifiers.
The system was delivered and installed on schedule, and the training provided by Konecranes helped operators get started.
“We built hype for the development of Agilon, as we processed the system on several occasions with mechanics and supervisors, and watched videos of its operations. We also visited the Agilon production plant in Tampere and one location where Agilon is in operation.” In addition to Juustoportti’s maintenance, the system is used by subcontractors who can obtain spare parts or supplies using their personal identifiers. In total, the system has some 60 users.
Higher reliability for production lines through automation
We don’t have it” and “I can’t find it” are now things of the past, as balances are always accurate.
Agilon brought digitalization to Juustoportti in warehouse management. Spare parts balances are now monitored automatically, with alerts being sent directly to the inbox of the person responsible for spare parts orders. “We don’t have it” and “I can’t find it” are now things of the past, as balances are always accurate. The plan is to send orders automatically to suppliers, and to integrate Agilon with the enterprise resource planning system.
The system was delivered and installed on schedule, and the training provided by Konecranes helped operators get started. Juustoportti maintenance employees in the image.
Agilon has met, and even exceeded, its expectations
“Production stoppages resulting from missing parts have at least halved, and the reliability of production lines has increased through the improved availability of spare parts. Spare parts can now be found quickly and balances are accurate, which are crucial factors in minimizing the duration of production breaks. What is more, Agilon makes it easy to collect spare parts packages for preventive maintenance. It saves time for productive work in many ways,” says Vilén.
In addition to time savings, Agilon has saved a significant amount of floor space and released it for growing production.
In addition to time savings, Agilon has saved a significant amount of floor space and released it for growing production.
As another useful feature, the production manager mentions the monitoring of spare parts transactions and consumption: every pick-up and drop-off, and their timestamp, is saved in the system’s memory. Agilon processes an average of 650 transactions a week.
I don’t know what more we could hope for. It seems that the system can do everything we want it to do.
“The search function is excellent. Mechanics have written nicknames for spare parts in additional information fields to make it even easier for Agilon to find spare parts. The user interface is clear and easy to use. I don’t know what more we could hope for. It seems that the system can do everything we want it to do. And, there are still many properties we have not even tried yet.”
"Agilon has met, and even exceeded, its expectations. It seems that the system can do everything we want it to do", says Juustoportti Food Production Director and motorcycle-enthusiast Janne Vilén.
More information contact:
Jarkko Hemmi, Agilon Sales Manager, Northern Finland,
In a critical dairy operating environment, machines must operate reliably 24/7, and in the event of failure, spare parts must be easily and quickly available. Agilon brought the spare parts together in one place and digitalisation to the maintenance warehouse, improving the usability of production machinery. Welcome to watch the webinar. Our guest is Janne Vilén, Production Director at Juustoportti Food Oy.
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