Everything You Need to Know About Our Solutions and Services

Have questions about our process, services, or technologies? Explore our FAQs to find clear, concise answers to common inquiries and learn how we can support your business.

What industries does Rugged Solutions serve?

Rugged Solutions primarily serves the automotive manufacturing industry. But our experience is in manufacturing and warehousing. In general, this process can apply to you if you are similar.

All software is licensed to your company and open for your use or modification. You can do what you want with the software, or Rugged Solutions can provide maintenance and continuation services.

Rugged Solutions is blessed to serve you for as long as you want or need. We engineer systems to be maintained and in operation for long periods of time – in some cases, 20+ years. After 20 years, technology has typically moved on…

Rugged Solutions primarily serves Michigan and the surrounding states of Wisconsin, Minnesota, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio. However, with remote technology, there is no reason Rugged Solutions can’t serve you anywhere in the United States. We have many customers in TN, NY, UT, CA, SC, etc.

Rugged Solutions serves a variety of clients. We have produced prototyping solutions for startup companies that operate lean and mean and Fortune 50 companies with massive budgets.

Rugged Solutions serves a variety of clients. We have produced prototyping solutions for startup companies that operate lean and mean and Fortune 50 companies with massive budgets.

Is the price for CORE fix, or could it vary?

There are no hidden costs, if travel to your location is a factor, then there is an additional cost required that we communicate to you before commencing.

There are variations we can do. If you have an assistant who can help or make introductions or if you can trust us to interview your staff and watch the process, that can work in some cases.

In general, it is important to find the pain points and understand:

  1. Why are they painful?
  2. Why are they necessary?
  3. Who does them, and how?
  4. Asking questions to understand how / if it can be automated or simplified.

You shall receive clear, honest communication. Typically 3-5 opportunities are identified for actionable changes. We always target ROI’s < 2 years and many even less. This ALWAYS translates into fast paybacks, streamlined operations, and reduced pain. This is our goal.

The Core Process Agenda

These are specific plans for you. We will review these plans with you and decide on the next steps together. All information is provided to you for the next steps.

Specific data collection systems implemented?

We use open-source software or your preferred solution provider. Rugged Solutions is Ignition certified. We also have numerous no-cost methods to retrieve data from Allen Bradley, Siemens, GE, etc., or custom process controllers. We always recommend the no-cost solutions because they have no licensing costs, and we have identified some that work very well. In other cases, you may have or want to implement an Ignition system or another system. We can work with most SCADA systems.

We store data in a database instance. Open-source databases are used. We like PostgreSQL, but others are possible, like MySQL/MariaDB, Firebase, Snowflake, Mongo, etc. Report builders like Microsoft’s PowerBI, Excel, Grafana, etc., can access any of these. Again, we prioritize open source. It’s an ethos.

Great question!

We always keep revisioned documentation of training for systems. In most cases, it is easiest and best for all parties to use a video with voice-over that demonstrates the software in an actual use case. The video is easy for operators to watch and review and clearly answers the how and where questions that operators have. We typically spend 2-4 hours training operators, watching them operate, or answering their questions. Then these operators become the trainers. A written, secured manual of security information, setup information, project documentation, etc, is kept.

Surprisingly less than you might think.

Cloud storage: The short answer is <$2500/yr for cloud storage and computing. This is application specific.

Local storage: Depends on your IT group and their requirements or what they can provide.

We can collect data in other ways—your ERP system or other methods can record barcodes, photos, and events. We avoid manually logging data – it isn’t reliable and adds extra processes. There are methods we can use to automate data collection.

We always look to open source. Many great open-source tools exist, such as Grafana, Metabase, and LibreOffice. We can also connect Tableau or other query tools that connect to databases.

There are many options, and we can likely make it work if it can connect to a database.

What types of integrations can Rugged Solutions perform?

This step can look like many things. Rugged Solutions is integrates machines, electronics, and computing systems.

Rugged Solutions can integrate information from your ERP, PLC, sensors, or robots. We can make new dashboards or interfaces to help with scheduling or process.

We have re-written entire assembly lines – the entire PLC – to make the process reliable and improve cycle times in a couple of cases where the OEM did not satisfy the end user.

We have made custom machines and electronics for specialized processes, as well as integrated special sensors like inclinometers or color photospectrometers.