Factory operating control
Make Bottling Line Downtime Comparable and Actionable
Downtime data becomes useful when every stop has a consistent time boundary, affected line area, observable event, state and responsible follow-up. Codes should describe what was observed before they imply a technical cause. Planned work, material waits, quality holds and utility losses must remain visible.
01 · Buyer or factory inputs
Information the decision needs
- Common stop events and current operator language
- Available machine-state and counter data
- Planned-stop and schedule definitions
- Quality, material, utility and maintenance records
- Shift observations and escalation rules
- Decision needs for daily and weekly reviews
02 · Operating objective
What completion should achieve
Create a stable loss record that teams can reconcile with saleable output, use to prioritize investigation and update without rewriting history.
03 · Required controls
Turn the objective into controlled work
- 01
Define start, end and duration rules for each stop record
- 02
Use observable event codes before root-cause codes
- 03
Separate planned stops, availability loss, speed loss, rejects and quality holds
- 04
Synchronize machine data with operator and material records
- 05
Review unknown and miscoded stops with the people who observed them
- 06
Assign repeated or high-impact losses to an investigation with an owner and due date
04 · Factory interfaces
What connects to this decision
- Machine states to operator observations
- Stop duration to production counts
- Maintenance work orders to recurring events
- Material lots to handling or quality stops
- Daily review to improvement action register
05 · Evidence to collect
Records that make review possible
- Controlled downtime-code dictionary
- Time-stamped stop and line-state records
- Reconciliation with production and reject counts
- Unknown-code review and correction log
- Prioritized loss actions with before-and-after evidence
06 · Common failure modes
Do not confuse a pattern with a confirmed cause
1A catch-all code hides most losses
2Codes name an assumed cause the operator could not verify
3Short repeated stops are excluded
4Data is ranked without checking time synchronization or missing records
07 · Responsibility boundary
Name who confirms each part
| Role | Possible responsibility in this stage |
|---|---|
| Operations owner | Defines the operating condition, assigns the record and confirms that actions fit the production plan. |
| Quality owner | Defines product-status, sampling, release and escalation controls within the factory system. |
| Maintenance owner | Confirms safe technical work, equipment condition, evidence and restart requirements. |
| Supplier / Allot Tech | Reviews the documented interface or symptom and coordinates project-specific questions within the agreed scope. |
08 · Completion criteria
Evidence that the stage can advance
- Codes and time rules are understood by users
- Planned and unplanned losses remain separate
- Unknowns are visible and reviewed
- Loss totals reconcile with the same production period
- Actions link back to the supporting stop records
Decision support
Questions operating teams ask
How many downtime codes should a factory use?
Use enough to support real decisions without making operator selection unreliable. Start with observable categories and refine from evidence.
Should microstops be recorded?
Yes when they materially affect output; automated state capture or sampled observation may be more reliable than manual entry.
Editorial responsibility: Allot Tech (Suzhou) Co., Ltd. · Last updated .