SpecTec’s AMOS keeps aging fleets going

We spoke to Adam Dennett, CEO of SpecTec, as the company celebrates its 40^th. anniversary to hear about the origins and innovations he has seen during his time. He described the benefits of introducing what was then AMOS Dos in 1985. “We were actually the first company to digitalise planned maintenance in the world, which is a awesome feat,” he said, alluding to the first mover advantage that is a boon for any business.

He mentions catching up with Atle Valland, who developed the original Asset Management Operating System (AMOS), in May of this year and reminiscing on a product that some would say revolutionised the management of maritime assets.

Pre-digital days

Before the introduction of AMOS, planning maintenance of a vessel was a manual and seemingly an arduous process. Dennett describes how physical tasks card would be placed on the wall of the bridge or engineering representing a piece of equipment or a maintenance job detailing when repairs were due. He adds: “When you look at the number of components on a vessel, [this] is a huge, complex task.”

Dennett describes how many people talk about predictive maintenance being a “new thing” but says it was present in his company’s first iteration of AMOS back in 1985. It had conditional based maintenance in the platform, which means being able to log the running hours of a component. This gives fleet operators a myriad of benefits, for instance being able to foresee issues with vessels in time for dry docking or replacing parts with sister ships in a fleet.

“What the planned maintenance system does is brings all the data central, so all the readings, all the monitors that are on certain kits, components that can link into the system, if you bring that data centrally, and then you obviously start to make decisions,” says Dennett.

One of the key benefits of AMOS is being to keep fleets operational for longer and in some cases can keep vessels compliant with regulations although this does have limitations.

“For certain compliance issues for instance the IMO, will start looking at fuel types and similar issues, we can’t help there from a software perspective in terms of getting you compliant,” explains Dennett but for compliance updates that deal with software, AMOS can keep vessels compliant retrospectively by upgrading the system.

Other benefits of AMOS

Dennett describes how one of his clients was able to get a discounted insurance premium by having AMOS installed across their fleet, which in times of slim margins and increasing regulatory scrutiny potentially increasing running costs sounds a compelling case for its use.

By having AMOS installed on a newbuild, you’ve automatically extended the vessel’s operating life argues Dennett. He likens it to having the full service history of a car, “because to optimize the life of that vessel, you need it [AMOS] from the start” to know what’s happened during its lifetime.

The system can also aid older vessels by sourcing parts needed for repairs. “We see ourselves as a bridge to sourcing and obviously having the right part numbers, which obviously we ensure they do, we can help by having the right data,” Dennett explains.

Finding the part needed for the repair might be easy enough but how to ensure that it gets to the vessel in need of repair is another matter. SpecTec can track fleets’ routes to drop off parts so that they are available at a port that may be on the stricken vessel’s route anyway. There may be some limitations here depending on your ship ownership, ship management capacity but being able to plan a port drop off and pick up could save valuable operational costs.

Having a part is one thing but making sure the crew member fitting or replacing it is qualified to do so is another. “We track crew certifications within our quality system so they can ensure that if a part was repaired by x member of crew, did they have the right certifications to be able to repair that part or replace it?” explains Dennett.

Dennett sums up AMOS with: “We talk about total cost of ownership to an operator, and we believe that we can reduce that total cost of ownership by putting a planned maintenance system aboard. And that’s all around extending the life of an asset, maximizing the benefit and the return on it.”