Condition monitoring only pays off when a warning reaches the right person early enough to plan the repair. In a food plant that means sensors that survive sanitation, baselines that can tell a washdown from a fault, and alerts that land in the work order system instead of an inbox. This 12-week plan shows what happens each week, from server and network to a monitored pilot line and 24x7 remote monitoring. Walk through it for your own site in a rollout planning call.
A 12-Week Plan From First Sensor to Live Condition Alerts
iFactory Turnkey CBM Deployment runs in three blocks: server, network and data in weeks 1–4, model training on a pilot line in weeks 5–8, then go-live, training and 24x7 remote monitoring in weeks 9–12. Every alert opens a work order with the evidence attached.
Choose Pilot Assets on Three Tests
Start small. One pilot line is far easier to baseline and prove than a whole plant. If you already rank assets with a criticality matrix, start from the top class and apply two more tests, because monitoring only helps where a failure gives warning and that warning lasts longer than the gap between checks. Talk your shortlist through with our reliability team.
Reliability guidance suggests checking at a half to a third of the P-F interval, or a quarter to a fifth for critical assets, so there are at least two chances to catch a fault. Continuous sensors meet this easily. Monthly routes often don't.
Match Each Sensor to the Failure It Can See
No single sensor covers every fault. Vibration finds imbalance, misalignment and looseness. Ultrasound often hears lubrication problems and early bearing friction first. Motor current shows rotor and load problems, and temperature confirms heat from friction or poor connections. Most food plant pilots combine two or three sensor types on each asset. Review sensor mixes with our CBM engineers.
Sensors and Mounts That Survive Sanitation
Sanitation is the hardest test a sensor faces in a food plant. The IP69K test sprays 80°C water at 80–100 bar from 10–15 cm, close to a real high-pressure washdown. The mount matters as much as the housing, because a sensor in the food zone must not trap soil or become a foreign body. Check your zones with our support team.
Wireless or Wired: Decide Asset by Asset
Wireless sensors are quick to fit and avoid new cable runs through washdown walls. But most battery units take readings at intervals rather than continuously, and signal can be weak in metal-clad rooms. Wired sensors stream all the time and suit fast or high-value machines. Most pilots use both. Map coverage with our network engineers.
- Fast to install, with no new conduit in wet areas
- Readings in snapshots, spaced to suit the battery
- Mesh protocols such as WirelessHART (IEC 62591) or ISA100
- Battery changes go on the PM schedule
- Continuous data for fast or high-value machines
- Powered from the cabinet, so no batteries to plan
- Cable runs need hygienic routing and sealed glands
- Best for fillers, homogenisers and large compressors
Ask Your Pilot Line How It Is Running
During the pilot, maintenance leads can ask iFactory about any monitored asset in plain words. Answers come from live readings and the baseline, with the trend behind every alert.
Twelve Weeks, One Pilot Line, Week by Week
Each week ends with a check that someone signs off. The plan assumes one pilot line. A larger first scope adds fitting time in weeks 2–4 and more baselining in weeks 5–6. Fit it to your calendar in a scoping review.
Baseline by Line State, Not by Calendar
A filler gearbox vibrates differently at high speed than at low speed, and very differently during a hot washdown. If the baseline mixes these states, alerts either fire all the time or never come. iFactory reads the line state from the PLC and builds one baseline per state, with sanitation masked. The figures below are illustrative. See state baselines in a live walkthrough.
Four Alert Levels, Each With One Action
Thresholds work best in layers. ISO 20816 zone limits set an absolute ceiling for vibration. A rise against the asset's own baseline catches change long before that ceiling, and the AI anomaly score catches patterns across several sensors. Each level maps to one action, so nobody has to guess. Agree your levels with our support team.
For group 2 machines (15–300 kW) on rigid foundations, the zone boundaries sit at 1.4, 2.8 and 4.5 mm/s RMS. Your machine group and foundation decide the right numbers.
How an Alert Becomes a Work Order
An alert nobody owns is just noise. In the pilot, every Plan or Act alert goes to the planner's queue with the evidence attached, and the work order is raised in your CMMS through its interface. Technicians close it with what they found, which teaches the model. Test the loop in a work order demo.
Pilot Success Criteria You Can Measure
Agree the pass marks in week 1, before anyone sees data. The targets below are illustrations of measures that work well. Set your own from your current figures. Get a criteria worksheet from our reliability team.
One Sheet per Monitored Asset
Fill in one sheet for every pilot asset before sensors are ordered. It keeps maintenance, sanitation and IT working from the same facts. Ask for a blank copy from our rollout team.
Three Pilot Alerts and What Followed
These are illustrations of typical pilot alerts, not case studies. Your own procedures decide the response. Walk through your scenarios with our support team.
Size the Case With Your Own Downtime Figures
The value comes from failures that turn into planned repairs. This worksheet uses assumed inputs to show the arithmetic only. Swap in your own CMMS history and cost per hour, and build your version with our CBM team.
Add parts and overtime avoided only if your records show them, then set the total against sensor, install and subscription costs from your quote.
Server, Sensors and Rollout in One Package
iFactory delivers condition monitoring as Turnkey CBM Deployment. A pre-configured NVIDIA AI server ships racked and ready with the CBM models loaded, so readings are processed on site. You rack it, plug in power and Ethernet, and the AI is live. Request a scoped plan from our support team.
- Pre-configured NVIDIA AI server, racked and ready
- Washdown-rated vibration, ultrasound, current and temperature sensors
- Wireless gateways and wired cabinet links
- Baselines per line state, with sanitation masked
- Alert levels and work order links to your CMMS
- Role training for technicians, planners and supervisors
- 24x7 remote monitoring of models, sensors and server
Server racked, network segment approved, sensors fitted and data checked.
Baselines built, models trained, shadow alerts reviewed on the pilot line.
Alerts live, teams trained, remote monitoring running around the clock.
Condition Monitoring Built Around the Sanitation Schedule
iFactory is designed for the wet, shift-driven routine of a food plant, where alerts must respect washdowns and turn into planned work. See it on a pilot line in a short demo.
What Plant Managers Ask About a CBM Rollout
Move One Line From Breakdowns to Planned Repairs
Fit washdown-ready sensors, build baselines per line state and send every alert to the planner as a work order. Delivered turnkey and live in 6 to 12 weeks.
