Real Tools. Real Sites. Real Results
Case Study: Underground Hydraulics Maintenance Room
– How LYIT Prevented Downtime in an Underground Mine Site
Discover how Last Yard Inventory Tracking (LYIT) helped an underground mining site improve parts availability, reduce machine downtime, and save over $150,000 in just 4 months. This case study outlines the challenges, the LYIT solution, and the measurable impact on operations.
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Critical Restocks Triggered Before Stockout
The Challenge
Out-of-stock issues in the Hydraulic Room
Before implementing LYIT, the hydraulic room at this mining operation regularly ran into issues with low stock levels and unexpected part shortages. The unavailability of critical parts resulted in:
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Extended machine breakdowns
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Workshop repairs being delayed or paused
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Emergency warehouse trips taking up to 3 hours round-trip
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Higher risk of LV/HV interaction incidents
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Stressful, reactive maintenance for workshop staff
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Services overrun into the next shift
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No visibility to pre-order emergency stock when the central warehouse was also low
The lack of real-time inventory monitoring meant maintainers didn’t know when stock was trending towards zero, until it was too late.
Critical hydraulic parts were running out without warning: leading to delayed repairs, costly downtime, emergency warehouse trips, and service overruns.
The Solution
LYIT Setup in the Underground Workshop
The team installed LYIT to monitor 184 hydraulic parts in the underground workshop. The system provided:
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Daily stock tracking at the point of use
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Trend detection for low stock items
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Proactive restock prompts
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Insights into part usage patterns
This setup gave the Workshop Parts Coordinators advanced warning of potential parts unavailability and eliminated the guesswork involved in restocking critical parts.
LYIT tracked usage trends and flagged low stock levels early: allowing timely restocks of the most-used parts before operations were impacted.
Results
Snapshot: 4 Months of Real-World Impact
This snapshot looks at the top 10 most-used hydraulic parts over a 4-month period, and the results speak for themselves.
LYIT provided real-time visibility that allowed the team to act early, triggering 26 restocks before parts reached critical low levels or ran out completely.
These weren’t accidental, each restock was the result of LYIT’s daily alerts and low stock tracking.
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26 early restocks recorded for the top 10 parts
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5 directly helped prevent costly machine downtime by ensuring parts were on hand
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The other 21 helped jobs run on time and without unnecessary stress
A conservative estimate suggests over $159,000 in downtime and labour savings, from just 10 parts, in just 4 months.
Cost Savings from LYIT Implementation
Without LYIT’s early detection, these stock levels would have continued trending downward – leading to full stockouts, emergency part retrievals, or extended machine downtime. Instead, LYIT enabled timely restocking, directly preventing costly disruptions.
- Each machine breakdown prevented was estimated to save 3 hours of downtime, a conservative figure based on typical response and recovery time – equating to $30,000 per event.
- Each emergency central warehouse trip avoided, saved 3 hours of labour, or $375 per trip, again conservatively estimated based on average travel and retrieval time from the Underground Workshop to the surface warehouse.
$ (AUD) Estimated Savings in 4 Months
LYIT Triggered Restocks
Parts Tracked with LYIT in One Room
Repairs Completed Without Delay
⚠️ Importantly, these results are based solely on the top 10 most frequently used hydraulic parts.
This means the $159,750 in estimated savings is a conservative figure, representing only a portion of LYIT’s total potential impact.
Similar patterns likely occurred across the 158 other parts that were not included in this focused analysis, suggesting even greater savings across the full inventory.
The implementation of LYIT in the hydraulic room delivered measurable impact in just four months:
Improving parts availability, avoiding costly stockouts, and streamlining workshop operations.
With real-time visibility and proactive alerts, the system helped the site stay ahead of problems rather than reacting to them.
By preventing delays, minimising downtime, and supporting efficient workflows, LYIT proved to be a valuable addition to the site’s inventory strategy. And this success came from monitoring just a small portion of the overall inventory – highlighting significant potential for wider implementation.
Want to see how LYIT could work at your site?
If you’re looking to reduce downtime, avoid emergency part runs, and give your team the tools they need when they need them, LYIT is a proven solution.
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