By obtaining Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approval to use drones, asset-intensive companies, such as BP and San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E), are exploring drones as the answer to certain maintenance applications. Interloc Solutions, an IBM premier business partner focused on Maximo consulting and mobile solutions, believes this is the optimal time to put drone applications into practice with Maximo.
To that end, Interloc has brought together its extensive Maximo and mobile expertise with its industry asset maintenance knowledge and developed a purpose-built drone inspection for Maximo application. This application uses Maximo and the Interloc mobile informer solution with the technology features of the DJI Phantom 2 unmanned aircraft.
The unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) provides three-axis camera stabilization, on-screen real-time flight parameters and an integrated GPS autopilot system. The mobile informer is native to Maximo and to iOS, Android and Windows devices, including tablets, phones, wearables and drones. The applications work both online and off-line, with no middleware needed.
Mobile informer’s simple, purpose- built drone inspection for Maximo application allows inspectors to stay safely on the ground, yet see exactly what the UAV sees directly from their mobile device. The drone inspection for Maximo application also provides inspectors with the video camera feed from the UAV, allowing them to take a picture of a specific asset by tapping on the screen and creating work orders by tapping on the image needing attention. The work order will contain the image of the asset and provide its GPS coordinates, allowing for concise and detailed inspections. And, because the mobile informer application is native to Maximo, all inspection data is pushed directly to Maximo in real time.
This simple, purpose-built drone inspection for Maximo application has many business uses. From wind turbines to bridges, buildings and transmission lines to cell phone towers and aerial land surveys, inspections become a whole lot easier, less costly and safer. No longer do inspectors need to use or incur the cost of traditional discovery methods, such as scaffolding erection, sky climbers, or rappelling. The combination of Maximo, mobile informer and drones provides inspectors the ability to not only perform visual inspections with pinpoint accuracy and high definition clarity, but also creates work orders that are directly within Maximo.
About the Author
Stacey Miller is Director of Marketing for
Interloc Solutions.
www.interlocsolutions.com/mobileinformer
