The Hidden Factory
The short, frequent stops your operators never log - quantified. See the units, euros and OEE points your reports can't see. Numbers update as you type.
Your line
One machine or line. Estimate the micro-stops if you don't measure them - most plants undercount.
Operating schedule
Reality check
Your numbers appear here.
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The free OEE Tracker logs each shift and instantly shows your OEE, your downtime Pareto and how you compare to your industry, then keeps your history and builds your trend for you.
Open the free OEE TrackerYou can't fix what you can't see.
Micro-stops are too short and too frequent to log by hand - so they stay invisible and keep bleeding. Fabrico reads every stop from the machine and uses computer vision to show the true cause, automatically. That's how the hidden factory becomes a fix list.
See how Fabrico finds the true causeWhat is the hidden factory?
The hidden factory is the capacity you lose to small, frequent stoppages - micro-stops under about five minutes - and the speed losses around them. Because each one is too short to bother logging, they never reach your OEE or downtime reports. But they add up: 10 stops an hour at 30 seconds each is 5 minutes lost every hour - over 8% of your capacity, invisible.
The math
Annual hidden loss = micro-stops/hr × duration × operating hours/yr, converted to lost units at your ideal rate, then to euros at your margin. The "hidden OEE points" are the share of each hour these stops consume - the performance the machine had but never delivered.
Why don't these show up in our OEE?
OEE only subtracts the downtime you record. Micro-stops are cleared by the operator in seconds and almost never logged individually, so the lost time shows up (if at all) as a vague "performance" gap - not as identified, fixable downtime. Check your OEE here.
Are these numbers realistic?
Micro-stops commonly cause 5-20% performance loss on packaging, filling, assembly and converting lines. The defaults here are deliberately moderate - most plants undercount both the frequency and the duration.
How do you actually find the causes?
You need automatic stop detection (from the PLC) plus a way to see what happened - which is where machine vision comes in. That's exactly what Fabrico does.
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