Adaptive, adaptable. What’s the difference?

If you want the ultimate in shaft alignment technology, the difference is huge. It’s the difference between maximizing production time and team efficiency or squandering time and money.  It’s the difference between minimizing downtime or watching the clock tick as the maintenance team tries to apply an “adaptable” solution to a complicated situation.

Above all, it’s the advantage a company gains when it uses alignment systems that minimize human error while delivering new levels of accuracy and speed.

That’s the promise of Adaptive (not adaptable) Alignment. Delivering on this promise means capitalizing on the core innovations of single-laser technology and Active Situational Intelligence. We own patents for these and other fundamental Adaptive Alignment components.

Here’s a quick refresher course on what makes Adaptive Alignment genuinely adaptive.

• Single-laser technology. A system with just one laser and one sensor speeds set up and eliminates the frustration and risk of inaccuracies that occur when working with two lasers firing in opposite directions. It also enables the faster completion of alignment tasks and results in higher precision.
• Active Situational Intelligence (ASI). This analytics software equips maintenance teams with real-time, actionable insights. Yes, usable intelligence while the measurements are taking place, not after the fact. ASI dynamically reacts to everything involved in the alignment process. It uses predictive intelligence to enable technicians to evaluate different possible courses of action before embarking on the time-consuming task of moving a machine.

This is what maintenance teams need: innovative Adaptive Alignment products that automatically adapt to the asset, to the specific situation, and also to the needs of the team—all in real time.

The big difference between Adaptive Alignment products and an “adaptable” solution is in who does the adapting. For years, maintenance technicians have had to adapt to the limitations of various other laser alignment systems. These limitations include, for example:

• Only available in dual laser configurations
• Can’t provide users with instantaneous visual feedback on measurement quality during the rotation
• Have no optimization for working with uncoupled shafts during installation
• Can’t automatically detect and eliminate coupling backlash.

The list goes on. You quickly wonder how applicable the word “adaptable” is to these systems.

PRUFTECHNIK, on the other hand, is the first to deliver true Adaptive Alignment. We chose “adaptive” because it means “serving or able to adapt; showing or contributing to adaptation.” And this clearly describes what we have done: we’ve incorporated the adaptive capabilities into all our alignment products as an inherent feature.

PRUFTECHNIK Adaptive Alignment products have built-in intelligence that adapts to the maintenance team needs automatically and in real time. We created this functionality as a direct response to issues customers historically told us they were having on their machines.

If you’d like to see what a real Adaptive Alignment system can do, get in touch with us for a demo. We’re the only company that can show you one.

Learn more about the powerful Adaptive Alignment concept and feature set are built into PRUFTECHNIK systems at our website, where you can download the Adaptive Alignment white paper or request to speak to a specialist.