Asset Tracking (Barcode, NFC, RFID, GPS)

No fries

No fries

Well-Known Member
Joined
Mar 31, 2005
Location
Fort Mill
I am looking for a "system" of tracking equipment.
Our company has over 100 power tools, scaffold and other various equipment on 60+ jobs at a time. It gets moved from job to job and office to job back to the office. We currently use a white board and Excel sheet to write down what goes where and when. However with all the employees it still gets forgotten, moved by others and on a job that we didn't know it was there. Of course stolen or just taken home. We are losing thousands of dollars of equipment each year.

So my proposed solution (currently researching) is some type of system that we can log (or automagicaly logs) when and where it is moved and even possibly who moves it. I was thinking the less expensive equipment like scaffolding use a bar-code scanner or QR, power tools a little more expensive RFID or NFC where it could "Ping" a phone and GPS for Lifts that are worth even more. Looking for something simple to use, could be used on any smart phone so we don't have to buy some type of reader or scanner. There are companies out there that offer but most are about $2-10K to set up and $4K per year to maintain. I know it can be done but I don't have the time or knowledge to set it up. We would be willing to pay a yearly/Monthly fee but were were thinking maybe $2,500 or less.

Anybody have experience with this or something similar. By the time we get stickers or tags for all the equipment we would be over 1,0000 items and they have to be small and durable being it is construction equipment.
 
Yes that is kind of what we are looking for, prefer smaller and less expensive but same idea. at $25 each it would add up fast, but would be a good trial run for a few things maybe.
 
Looking into arduino based stuff.

Plenty of IOT “internet of things” explanations on YouTube.

Check Banggood and amazon for hardware.

You can do a cellular board with SIM card and a small microprocessor to send location data to a database.

Can get updates to phone/email.

YouTube is the best for explaining all this.

Can start for free (outside of hardware and cellular plan) then move upward depending on data usage.

You can also print your own QR codes and use app to read them.

Also doing your own custom app is relatively cheap/free.

Obviously the more you do yourself, the cheaper it is up front but it is more labor intensive.
 
At work we've tested a 4G modem about the size of a quarter that could give GPS coordinates, but they're ~$100 each & the subscription to manage all the devices is $15 per device per year.
 
Mac5005 said:
Looking into arduino based stuff.

Plenty of IOT “internet of things” explanations on YouTube.

Check Banggood and amazon for hardware.

You can do a cellular board with SIM card and a small microprocessor to send location data to a database.

Can get updates to phone/email.

YouTube is the best for explaining all this.

Can start for free (outside of hardware and cellular plan) then move upward depending on data usage.

You can also print your own QR codes and use app to read them.

Also doing your own custom app is relatively cheap/free.

Obviously the more you do yourself, the cheaper it is up front but it is more labor intensive.
Click to expand...
I figured it could be done but I dont have the time to learn it and implement it while managing the jobs I have. We are a "small" family owned business where everyone has multiple tasks that are already more than an 8hr day on a regular basis. I've considered paying a friend of mine, college son to create it for us. I'm sure it isn't difficult if that is something that is a hobby or the line of business one is in.

Sent from my SM-G973U using Tapatalk
 
By "tracking"? do you really need to know exactly WHERE they are, or just that they are, or are not, within X proximity of a central device?
Where things get difficult and expensive is in a device reporting back what its location is. GPS receivers are cheap, but that signal only goes one way. In order for a deice to "call home" and report it's location, you not only need a cell/data transceiver (assuming it could be out of wifi/BT range) but also a centralized server to receive that data and collect it... not to mention rechargeable batteries for said transceiver to work.

That's where most of the asset tracking companies make their money - they host the service that the devices are calling into, so that you can get it. It costs them money to do that monthly so you get to pay that + their time etc.

But if you are ok with a portable server device that can say, "I can see devices A,B,C, F, and Y right now" then it's actually a pretty easy and cheap problem.
 
Tracking is a loose term more like a log. I know GPS is too much, especially each individual value. Ideally, it would ping a smart phone (everyone has one) app, maybe pick up the location from the phone dump it to a data base. (Similar to the tiles I've heard on XM radio for phones, which are to large and more than we want to spend on all the equipment.

Everything just gets moved so much and people don't inform others of it. For instance Jimmy takes a scaffold from job X to Y and leaves it there. No one knows, and it stays on Y even after we are done until maybe another contractor on the job decides to remove it. Framing Hilti guns $1,200 we loan them to subs occasionally, we tell them don't leave it on the job because it'll get stolen but then they take it home, if it wasn't logged no one knows where it is.

If I/we make it easier to "track" or log, active or passive, what is where it may help with the loss of equipment if we knew where it was last, who had it and when.

I understand they are providing a service and we are willing to pay, I am looking for the most ecomical option that will serve our needs. Be it an individual that sets it up, once and has minimal cost for tweaking or new tags etc, or a service.
 
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