Before you go head long into this, please consider following.
in my opinion, this is an overengineered solution which will never work. The way to go is incremental changes. Start small with one or two machines, see how it goes. Experiment with various set ups and software. If it goes fine, expand. Keep the old running and progressively migrate to the new.
True. But doing the detailed analysis first would definitely help. The implementation can be in phases. But then some people believe in reducing the number of cigarettes in phases till null whereas some believe in abstaining totally from day one. :-)