Equipment

Definition

The Technical Object "Equipment" in SAP is a physical, individual object that must be maintained independently. It can be installed in a technical system or be part of a technical system. You can manage all kinds of equipment such as, for example, machines, production equipment, transport equipment, testing equipment, tools or PCs.

Since many of these physical objects are managed as "Assets" in Asset Management, the term "Equipment" is chosen for objects defined from a technical perspective, in order to avoid confusion with other material assets.

You define and manage each piece of equipment separately in the Plant Maintenance (PM) System and can set up an individual maintenance history for each.

Structure

SAP manages the master files for equipments at the customer level. This means that their numbers are valid for the entire corporate group. The equipment master file contains different types of data:

• General data that generally does not change over time. This includes the purchase value of the equipment, its dimensions and its year of manufacture.
• Time-dependent, variable maintenance, location and sales data such as maintenance planner group, responsible work centre, maintenance plant or cost centre. With time-dependent data you can look at equipment dynamically (over time). If your system is set up correctly, it automatically creates a new time segment for specific master file changes that describe the period of use of the equipment.
• Serial number data. This is data that you specify when you want to manage your equipment not only as individual objects but also from an inventory management perspective. This data includes material data as well as stock and customer information.
• Configuration data. This is data that describes which individual components of a standard product the equipment consists of.
• Partner data. This is data that describes a particular responsibility for equipment, such as supplier, buyer or responsible employee.
• The following functions are also available: measuring points, counters, measurement documents, permits, multilingual texts, classification, document management and address management.

Relevant SAP transaction codes:

• IE01 - Create equipment
  (SAP Menu > Logistics > Maintenance of installations > Management of technical objects > Equipment > IE01)
• IE02 - Change equipment
  (SAP Menu > Logistics > Plant Maintenance > Technical Objects Management > Equipment > IE02)
• IE03 - Display equipment
  (SAP Menu > Logistics > Factory Maintenance > Technical Objects Management > Equipment > IE03)
• IH03 - Display technical structure of Equipment
  (SAP Menu > Logistics > Plant Maintenance > Technical Objects Management > Equipment > IH03)