About Meters

A meter is a device used to monitor equipment health and performance through physical factors, such as hours of operation, number of units, or miles accumulated. These recordings can be used to trigger work orders or preventive maintenance. 

Meters and PMs

Preventive Maintenance

Preventive maintenance is a proactive type of maintenance that is designed to prevent equipment failures and enhance its efficiency and lifespan. By using a regular preventive maintenance schedule, you can minimize asset downtime (and decrease work order costs) as you work to prevent and better prepare for unexpected failures.

Meters & PMs

PMs and meters are closely related as preventive maintenance schedules are often based on assets' performance data, which is measured by these meters. For example, if a meter is tied to an asset such as an air compressor once a given number of run hours has elapsed certain preventive maintenance should be performed an example would be to change the filters or oil. 

In other cases, a meter may record the number of pieces that pass through an Asset. Once a given target is reached preventive maintenance jobs may be triggered.

Finally, in other cases, preventive maintenance may be done on the meter. In this situation, a preventive maintenance job would regularly inspect and calibrate the meter to ensure it is working properly.

Meter based PM Generation is used with any meter that has an accumulating counter, like an hour meter, cycle counter, unit counter or odometer. It is not meant for gauge readings as they do not accumulate. This requires two pieces the Meter and the PM you set the Meter up first then the PM which is going to use the meter. The PM is triggered automatically once you meet the threshold trigger set in the PM. An example would be if you have the PM set for a Meter Interval of 500 hours every time you reading total reached 500 hours the PM would automatically generate a Work Order. 

Example if the meter started at 0 hours and 400 hours was the last reading and this reading was 600 hours the total hours exceeded the 500 hour interval and the PM would generate a work order.

For more help with PMs or meter based maintenance, see About Preventive Maintenance or Meter Based Maintenance.

Meter Records

It is important to keep your meter records up to date, especially if you have PM jobs that are based off of that meter. 

Below is a step by step on how you can make the most of your meter readings:

1. First, you should have an existing meter (Creating a Meter) and an existing PM job that is triggered by that meter (Creating a PM Job)
2. Then, you should create a schedule for that PM, which will include important details about how SOMAX interprets your meter readings and generates work orders from them (Creating a PM Schedule)
3. Make sure to start recording meter readings regularly. Once your reading reaches or exceeds the meter interval of a PM schedule, SOMAX will automatically generate a work order (Recording a Meter Reading).
4. You can also reset a meter see, Resetting a Meter