Keep Your Machines Running

Equipment management in OpenSpindle is a system for tracking each machine's utilization, scheduling preventative maintenance, logging repairs, storing manuals and documents, and assigning service vendors per asset. Everything related to a machine lives in one place so your team always knows the machine's history, current status, and who to call when something needs attention.

Yes. You set preventative maintenance schedules based on calendar dates, accumulated run hours, or cycle counts, and OpenSpindle sends reminders when tasks like lubrication, bit changes, spindle inspection, calibration, or vacuum service are due. The reminder goes out before the service window closes rather than after the machine has already started showing wear.

For each machine you can store utilization data, maintenance logs, repair history, OEM manuals, wiring diagrams, setup sheets, photos, notes, and assigned service vendors or internal owners. The full picture of a machine's life is available to anyone on your team who needs it, not just the person who has been maintaining it for the last five years.

By tracking utilization, scheduling preventative maintenance windows, and keeping complete repair and vendor records in one place, OpenSpindle helps you catch issues earlier, plan service during natural production lulls, and resolve breakdowns faster when they do happen. Unplanned downtime typically costs 3 to 5 times more than planned maintenance of the same work.

Yes. The utilization dashboard shows which machines are currently cutting, idle, or down so you can load balance work across your floor and identify underused or overloaded equipment. Over time the utilization history informs decisions about whether to add a second shift, invest in a second machine, or retire an asset that is not earning its keep.

Machine availability from the equipment module feeds directly into the scheduling view. Before you commit a job to a machine, you can see whether that machine has scheduled maintenance, is already at capacity, or has recent reliability issues that should factor into the date you promise. You stop scheduling around assumptions and start scheduling against real equipment data.

Yes. Each machine has its own vendor and contact assignments. Your CNC router might have a preferred spindle service technician, the lathe might have a different service provider, and the dust collection system might have its own maintenance contractor. When something fails, anyone on your team can pull up the machine record and find the right contact immediately without searching through emails or asking the one person who knows.

By combining utilization data with the revenue allocated to jobs run on that machine in the reporting module, you can see which machines generate strong returns and which are underperforming relative to their maintenance cost and floor space. This turns a gut-feel decision about whether to buy a new machine or rebuild an old one into a data-backed analysis.

Yes. Through the vendor management integration, purchase orders, service invoices, and repair receipts can be linked to specific machines. Over time this builds a complete cost history for each asset that is useful for insurance purposes, resale valuation, capital planning, and understanding the true cost of ownership per piece of equipment.

Most shops create a basic record for each machine in under ten minutes per asset: machine name, type, serial number, assigned owner or vendor, and a starting maintenance schedule. You can attach existing manuals as PDFs and add past repair notes over time as the situation comes up. You do not need a complete historical record on day one for the system to start delivering value.