Manufacturing Expert System Development Guidelines in a Medical Device Manufacturing Company

Abstract

Abstract - The medical device manufacturing company as well as other regulated industries can only perform manufacturing activities in a strictly controlled environment working area controlled by complex systems that combines pumps, chillers, valves, several types of sensors devices, etc. The tightly integration of those individual components including proper equipment maintenance requires workforce personnel with knowledge in several technical areas of expertise. Recent advancement in computational system capabilities have allowed to develop very complex software programs capable of storing a huge amount of information and later analyze the information to identify patterns, relationships or repetitive events. An expert system is a software solution that has been implemented in different fields like; medicine, law and accounting, to reduce the time to perform troubleshooting and diagnostic. This article presents development guidelines to implement an expert system capable of reducing the business downtime caused by failures in the air handling and chilled water system. Key Terms - Air Handling and Chilled Water System (AHU/CWS), Expert Systems, Inference Engine, Rules.