Learning and development for Special Purpose Machine Builders: passing on what only two people know
A special purpose machine is built once, so lessons are easily lost. Learning and development here means getting the designer's intent and the fitter's fixes into other heads before the machine ships.
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Share your requirementsWhy learning and development matters in special purpose machine builders
In a builder of one-off machines, learning happens by accident. The senior fitter who solved a tricky alignment on the last machine is busy on the next, and the junior who watched him learns half of it. The PLC engineer who wrote the logic keeps it in his laptop. When the commissioning engineer is sent out, he carries what he happens to know. Each machine is new, so mistakes repeat in new clothes.
Useful development is built into the project itself. A junior is paired with a senior on a named section of a real machine. At trial run, the team spends an hour writing down what went wrong and why. The PLC engineer walks a second engineer through the logic before dispatch. None of this needs a classroom. It needs the owner to protect the time.
How to set it up
1. Pick the knowledge you cannot afford to lose
List the three or four things only one person understands, such as a control logic style, a fitting trick or a customer's specific process. These are your first learning targets.
2. Pair a junior with a senior on a real section
Assign one section of the current machine to a pair, with the senior explaining as they go. Give the junior something to own, such as a sub-assembly, so he learns by doing and not watching.
3. Hold a short review after each trial run
Gather designer, fitter, wireman and PLC engineer for an hour. Write down three things that went wrong, three that went well and what to change on the next machine. Keep it on one page.
4. Hand over the PLC and drawings to a second person
Before dispatch, a second engineer reads the logic and the final drawings with the author and asks questions. See our learning and development design for ways to structure this.
5. Track who can do what
Keep a simple grid of skills against names: wiring, PLC, alignment, commissioning. Gaps with only one name are your risk, and the grid shows where to pair next.
Check these first
Before changing anything, find out what is true today. These take an afternoon and use your own records.
- List the skills in your shop where only one person can do the work.
- Check whether the last machine had a written lessons page after the trial run.
- Ask a junior fitter what he learned on the last machine and from whom.
- See whether any PLC program exists only on one person's laptop.
GullyHR can do this with you. Read how we approach learning and development in general, or share your requirements and we will tell you where to start.
Questions owners ask
Use the project as the training. Pair people on real sections and keep a one-hour review at trial. That costs little time and teaches more than a separate course would.
Sometimes, for a skill the shop lacks, such as a new controller family. But pick one person, ask him to teach two colleagues on return, and write what was learned. Otherwise the course helps one man only.
You cannot stop all of it. You can reduce the loss by pairing, by written lessons and by keeping drawings and programs in shared storage. Do it while the person is still happy, not at his notice.