Integrated and computerized machinery is commonly found in Industrial Production Equipment, Commercial and Office Equipment, Modern Building Systems, Large Modern Construction Equipment, Large Modern Vehicles -- in short it is found nearly everywhere. Integrated or computerized machinery includes substantial complexity in its connections, in its integration of different engineering disciplines and subsystems. This integration may be required by the very nature of the equipment, and may have nothing to do with computers. The richness of the integration is particularly obvious when the system goes beyond electrical control and monitoring to include computerization and software. The benefits to performance and economy will continue to incentivize further penetration of integration and particularly computerization in machinery systems in all sectors. It is to the point in 2015 that nearly all modern equipment over $50,000 to $200,000 will include at least one, if not many, integrated, computerized functions. As this complexity increases, the potential for complexity in loss increases. The problem with integrated and computerized machinery is that causes in one area can lead to effects in another. When it comes to finding the cause, a forensic engineer with a broad multidisciplinary training and systems experience is the best choice.
The client's problem: with integrated and computerized equipment, who can they trust to find out what happened and explain it? The manufacturer? At best, manufacturers still believe in their systems and may be inclined to think some other factor was the cause. Root Cause Forensic Science and Engineering digs out the scene, yes, but we also have the multi-disciplinary training and systems-level experience to dig into the design, the interaction between subsystems and components, the connections, right down to the coding if needed. We have the multi-disciplinary experience to ask the right questions to find the root cause faster. Our record is a multi-million dollar industrial plant loss, back-solved from a massive structural failure to a mechanical system to computer control, to a process problem, to a system design flaw in 30 minutes — that is faster than an episode of CSI! While this was an exceptional case, our multi-disciplinary training and experience will get us further along in the investigation, faster, from the first call. Integrated and computerized equipment is our specialty.