The Scenario

No war is waged without tanks, so they form an important part of any war strategy. The importance of they being combat ready 24×7 cannot be overstated. The client is an armoured vehicle and allied component manufacturer cum service hub. It also undertakes periodical service of tanks and allied components such as canons. Because these can range in size, the type of service ranges from minor to major. Which means tanks can be present at the service point ranging from a few hours to a few days.

The Challenge

At any given moment, the service station can accommodate no more than 50 vehicles. Absent a system and because of the sprawling nature of the station, it was impossible to determine whether or not any bay was free and whether the station was achieving its optimal capacity utilization. It was difficult to tell what type of service was required or for how long the tanks were expected to stay in the station, thus making it difficult to book new tanks for service. This all translated into long registration waiting or worse yet missed service schedules.

Solution

The solution exploits the potential of Bluetooth. Each tank was fitted with a Bluetooth beacon and each bay with a gateway reader. Both the beacon and gateway communicate with a software application. When a tank arrives, the software registers its details and assigns a beacon.

The gateway acquires the signals from the beacon and relays details such as time, service, and bay ID relevant to the particular tank to the webapp, which monitors all the communication between the tank beacon and the gateway reader.

Since the availability of slots for new bookings is always known, the station is able to optimize its total capacity.

Result

The software includes a comprehensive dashboard that ensures that:

• The Station is able to utilize all bays efficiently
• Pinpoint where a tank is being serviced
• Forecast the duration of service required
• Determine the type of service being done for reporting purposes

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