Maintenance Scheduling

[KTurner]

I've just tried searching for some software to help with maintenance schedules on different things (house, cars, tractor, lawnmower, generator, etc) but I'm having no luck. Lots of enterprise level and car-only options, but couldn't find anything that looked like a good general purpose solution.

Anyone have any software, or non-software, solutions for maintenance tracking that they really like?

Keith

 

[MossRoad]

I've just tried searching for some software to help with maintenance schedules on different things (house, cars, tractor, lawnmower, generator, etc) but I'm having no luck. Lots of enterprise level and car-only options, but couldn't find anything that looked like a good general purpose solution.

Anyone have any software, or non-software, solutions for maintenance tracking that they really like?

Keith

Yes. A calendar and pencil! :laughing:

Seriously....

My tractor requires maintenance at 8 and 50 hr intervals. Really easy to do. 8 hrs is just grease and check bolts, so I do it at 5 instead. 5s are easy to remember. 50's show up really easy.

Cars are every 3000, so we have a window sticker for that. Rotate the tires every 10,000. I just remember it.

House is spring and fall, so, well, spring and fall.

Flower sprinklers are on timers.

Swimming pool is daily dip strip test just to be sure, but I could go weekly as things rarely change. Pump is on timer. Saltwater chlorine generator is on timer. Once a month I check my salt concentration. Backwash the filter only if the pressure reading is double my spring start up reading.

I have more problems scheduling the kids' activities than maintenance. :laughing:

 

[dave1949]

I use the calendar and pencil approach for anything that isn't obvious.

I suppose you could use the calendar/appointment function in a PDA, but there is no automated feedback from the tracked device to the PDA as far as hours operated.

I like avoid turning myself into a data entry clerk.

For the tractor, I keep a sheet of paper in the three ring binder with the op manuals. Whenever I do periodic maintenance or a fix, I note the date, hours and what I did. I can open that binder up and see the work history quicker than I could any other way.

When I use a filter, I save the label in the 'tractor' drawer of the tool chest. If I am going to buy a new filter, for example, I stuff the label in my billfold.

I don't worry about batteries, updates or software glitches.
Dave.

 

[tanglefoot]

Dave,
I want to respond to something you mentioned in your post about stuffing a note in your billfold. I was born in 1949, and I grew up hearing the item referred to as a billfold. But the younger generation ( all 3 of my sons) call it a wallet. Did I miss that memo? Has the nomenclature changed and left me behind?
Butch

 

[dave1949]

Dave,
I want to respond to something you mentioned in your post about stuffing a note in your billfold. I was born in 1949, and I grew up hearing the item referred to as a billfold. But the younger generation ( all 3 of my sons) call it a wallet. Did I miss that memo? Has the nomenclature changed and left me behind?
Butch

Ha, good one. I looked at some online dictionaries. One described 'billfold' as a US and Canadian word for 'wallet'.

Billfold is sounding sort of antiquated when I think about it. Folding money is becoming scarce in my wallet :laughing: Plastic for this and that seems to be the major contents anymore and I only carry two bank debit cards and no credit cards. I have several 'customer loyalty' cards for local stores. They send me more birthday cards than my kids do at least.
Dave.

 

[czechsonofagun]

I bought an index card box for my reloading data and it really works for me. I am a computer and database guy by profession, but I just did not feel like messing with computer every time I need a piece of information and such.

Anyway, there is a plenty of space in that box - so it eventually developed in the overall shop databank with information on tractor maintenance and vineyard planting, pruning and spraying. Generally all information i have to keep track of ends up on a index card behind a propperly named divider.

 

[lakngulf]

I've just tried searching for some software to help with maintenance schedules on different things (house, cars, tractor, lawnmower, generator, etc) but I'm having no luck. Lots of enterprise level and car-only options, but couldn't find anything that looked like a good general purpose solution.

Anyone have any software, or non-software, solutions for maintenance tracking that they really like?

Keith

I have thought about writing such a program to maybe keep be a bit organized with maintenance and such. I have written a program in Visual C# that keeps up with inquiries for our condo rental, and follows the renter through the process, giving me a tickler each time another milestone is reached in the process.

Send me a personal email with some thoughts on the the program. I envision that we have a master table of the items to be serviced---tractor, lawn mower 1, lawn mower 2, tiller, etc......and a schedule could be set. It would have to be on a date schedule instead of tractor hours, unless we were consistent enough to always enter the number of hours on the equipment.

Anyway, a tickler could highlight what needed to be done, we could enter a transaction when completed, and that would forward the tickler on down the road. In each master record, say for the tiller, we would have a time-frame (like every six months). The master record could also have spark plug type, oil type, and anything special about the equipment.

Give me your thoughts.

 

[thatguy]

The high tech approach would be to create an excel spread sheet with the hours for each type of service/maintenance listed.. Make it so you can enter the current hours on the tractor and then if the hour equal or greater than the service hrs format the service hours cell so it turns RED to show that service is needed..

Brian