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Get the big picture with our smallest tracker, ABAX MINI

Ever heard about ABAX MINI? The name itself is deceiving - ABAX MINI proves to have huge positive impact on businesses. It tracks power tools and equipment and provides total control of your company assets.

Anna Edwards·6 min read
Get the big picture with our smallest tracker, ABAX MINI

Don’t you just hate it when…

Don’t you just hate it when power tools disappear from the company vehicles? And when your employees use valuable time to search for tools, instead of actually work? Well, we at ABAX do. That’s why we developed ABAX MINI. 

it’s a cost-effective, intelligent product that let you keep track of power tools and equipment at all times. ABAX tool tracking is reliable, waterproof and remarkable discrete (IP67). In addition, its easily mounted onto almost any type of tools or equipment. Keep on reading, and get a brilliant insight to more ABAX MINI advantages.

From borrowed to disappeared in a heart beat

Many companies lack a system for handling power tools. Often, management doesn’t know which employee uses the tool, nor where all the tools actually are. A recent feedback from ABAX customers shows that most managers have experienced power tools “disappearing" from time to time. In most cases, it’s not stolen. Its misplaced. 

Sometimes, employees borrow company power tools to their home projects. When no one asks to bring the tools back, it unfortunately may stay home forever. With extended usage of temporary employees, the borrowing of tools increases. ABAX MINI helps you with that issue as well. 

The unit allows you to not only create a system that shows which tools belongs to different departments. It also gives management the possibility to add an extra information field on the unit that says which employee a specific tool has been assigned to.

Refound stolen equipment with ABAX MINI

A success story from our favourite carpenter

This story from our local favourite carpenter really says it all: Our friend needed a better overview of which tools where at the storage building, and which tools where in the cars of the carpenters working in the field. Due to the fact that several of the power tools were very expensive, most of them were normally stored in the storage building. 

But as soon as one of the carpenters brought a piece to their vehicle, the boss had a hard time tracking its whereabout. Every time one of the employees needed a tool, they called the office manager to ask if that specific tool was available in the storage building. The manager had to leave his office and his daily administrative tasks, walk over to the storage building and then search for the tool requested. 

If the requested tool was not to be found in the storage building, the manager had to put on his Sherlock-hat, and a time-consuming hunt started. Is it stolen? Is it lost or misplaced? Who used it last, and when? Every week, the manager used hours to resolve these kinds of mysteries. Needless to say, the searches weren’t profitable. Very often, the manager didn’t manage to track down the tool neither.

Happy ending

The carpenter had 15 vehicles, all equipped with ABAX Triplog. The carpenter then installed 2 stationary ABAX5 in his storage building and installed ABAX MINI on all equipment in the storage building. From then on, when someone needed a preferred tool, they could open their ABAX app and check where that specific tool was located. 

If it was in someone’s vehicle, the name of the vehicle was shown as “Last driven by”. And if the power tool was in the storage building, the name of the storage building stationary units was shown as “Last seen by”. Today, no tools are misplaced or taken home by employees. The office manager has retired his Sherlock-hat for good, and the company has become more efficient and profitable.
 

Rain, snow or sunny? ABAX tests its products all year around

The ABAX MINI is the smallest hardware in the ABAX-family. It has the latest and greatest power saving technology for a battery lifetime of minimum 3 years. ABAX always test our hardware before and after launch, and our hardworking team of engineers love to locate spectacular test destinations. As a result, one of our ABAX MINI units is mounted on the crash barriers at the ingoing traffic into Norway’s oldest city, Tønsberg. 

This particular ABAX MINI was activated 09.06.2018. There has been no maintenance or change of battery ever since. The 1 of April 2020, our ABAX MINI had worked through snow, rain and sun for 662 days and it has given us 30 483 positionings. That equals 46 positionings a day and 2 positionings per hour. By the way, the unit still has 75% of the battery capacity remaining.

Want to know more about how ABAX MINI works?

The ABAX MINI broadcast a heartbeat in both the 433MHz radio frequency and the BLe range, ca every 60 second. All ABAX units within range are able to listen to those heartbeats and will immediately respond by sending the current position.

As the ABAX unit measures the strength of the heartbeat signal, it calculates how far away from a machine or vehicle the ABAX MINI is located. If the ABAX unit receives the heartbeat that belongs to your company, it will show in detail in the interface or mobile app. If not, it will show in the ABAX Global network. That means that it`s almost 300 000 ABAX units out there ready for receiving heartbeats from MINI’s which gives us a huge network of receivers for ABAX MINI.

  • Due to the efficient power saving software, the unit can keep on sending out heartbeats for at least 3 years 

  • Our own tests show that the battery most likely last for 5-6 years 

Why we use both MHz and Bluetooth

Do you wonder why ABAX uses both 433MHz and BLe (Bluetooth)? Most of us are familiar with Bluetooth. But we also know that inside a building, it could have limitations due to brick walls. In such environments, 433MHz works better. At a construction site, the 433Mhz will be able to “bounce” all the way to one of the machines or cars that has an ABAX unit installed. In average we say 35 meters, but in open air the ABAX MINI`s heartbeat signal will be available within 100 Meter.

Size doesn’t matter when it comes to ABAX MINI

ABAX MINI is small (40x31x14 mm) and weighs less than 25 grams, and therefore it is perfect for even the smallest power tools. Bluetooth technology combined with the ABAX Global Network will give you the last location of the tool with a 35-meter range. After including the hardware in our interface, you will locate the position of the tool on the Google integrated map on your laptop or mobile.

Are you a customer that has ABAX 4 or 5 installed in your company cars? Then you are ready to track your smaller tools with ABAX MINI’s as often as you need. You can in fact receive signals even though the company car is far away. The ABAX MINI will leave a trace through other customers that has ABAX hardware installed. ABAX Global Network consist of almost 300 000 ABAX units. 

The ABAX MINI can be mounted anywhere. Choose between brackets or magnetic jacket and stick or screw the unit on the tool you need to track.

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