Production device on-line maintenance system and method

A system for online maintenance of a manufacturing apparatus, comprising a user's production line, a maintenance apparatus, a support terminal, and a user's terminal, each connected to each other via a network;

• said user's production line comprising a gateway, a manufacturing apparatus, and a data accumulator, the latter two being connected to the gateway;
• said maintenance apparatus comprising a gateway server, a server, and a diagnostic device, the latter two being connected to the gateway server, with the diagnostic device including a means for eliminating abnormalities;
• said data accumulator comprising a data-gathering unit for accumulating operation data concerning the manufacturing apparatus, and a data-evaluation unit for determining whether there is an urgency with regard to the accumulated data;
• said server further comprising a mail server and a database, and if the data-evaluation unit determines that the operation data includes data showing an abnormality and that there is an urgency, the data-evaluation unit sends an urgency-information email message to the mail server, and if the data-evaluation unit determines that there is no urgency with regard to the operation data, the data-evaluation unit batch-processes the operation data and sends the processed data to the server;
• and the mail server sends the received urgency-information email message to the diagnostic device, to the support terminal, and to the user's terminal, and the database stores the batch-processed operation data and the diagnostic results of the diagnosis performed by the diagnostic device based on the operation data;
• said diagnostic device further comprising an urgency-processing unit, and a data-diagnosis unit, wherein when the urgency-processing unit receives from the manufacturing apparatus an urgency-information email message, the urgency-processing unit acquires the operation data relating to the urgency-information email message from the manufacturing apparatus, and diagnoses the operation data;
• when the urgency-processing unit has confirmed that there is an abnormality in the data, the urgency-processing unit determines whether the abnormality can be eliminated, and if the urgency-processing unit determines that the abnormality can be eliminated automatically, the urgency-processing unit sends to the manufacturing apparatus the information required for eliminating the abnormality, and continues to acquire the operation data concerning the manufacturing apparatus;
• when the urgency-processing unit confirms that the remedy has been effected and that the operation data has returned to normal, the urgency-processing unit sends a remedy-complete notification email message to the support terminal and to the user's terminal;
• if the urgency-processing unit determines that the abnormality cannot be eliminated automatically, the urgency-processing unit sends to the support terminal and to the user's terminal a notification email message stating that the abnormality cannot be eliminated;
• and wherein the data-diagnosis unit acquires the operation data from the database of the server to diagnose the manufacturing apparatus, and outputs the diagnostic results to be stored in the database of the server.