Production Routings

Introduction to Production Routings

Production Routings, or just Routings, specify the steps that are used to manufacture your product. Thus, a “Routing” is an ordered list of tasks required for a manufacturing process that is used for making a product. The same Routing can be assigned to more than one product if the same process is used to make each of them.

Routings versus Routing Tasks

In contrast to Routings, the “routing task” is a discrete step, or set of related activities that make up a step, in the manufacturing process. The same routing task can be used in several Routings whenever that exact step is needed. Refer to Routing Tasks for more information.

“Routings” and “routing tasks” are created separately, and then they are associated together in the Routing by adding each routing task to a list defined in the Routing. Routings are then associated with finished products by adding the finished products to a list defined in the Routing. (Routing tasks can be associated with sub-products if this is relevant.)

The Sequence of Steps in a Routing

When you define your Routings, you will add all the routing tasks to the list contained in the routing, and you must assign each routing task a sequence number that indicated the precise order in which the routing tasks must be performed during the manufacturing process. The sequence numbers you use can be any numbers you like (such as 1, 2, 3, or such as 10, 15, 20) so long as their numerical order corresponds rigorously to the order of the routing tasks that is required for correct production processing. It might be best to skip some numbers between each entry so that an addition can be edited into the sequence by inserting it between the current entries (such as 10, 15, 17, 20).

Multiple Routings and Choosing the Best One

Once you have completed a Routing, it is associated with the products where it can be used. A product may be manufactured by using different processes, such as when it is made in more than one factory, and those factory processes are not exactly the same. Thus, this product may have one Routing that is used in each different factory where it is being produced. Another example is when a production run for the product is very small (say 5 units) versus when it is much larger (say 200 units) and different Routings should be selected for better efficiency. Note that when a production run of the product is created, only one of the possible routings is used to make the product in any given production run.

In summary then,there is no limit to how many Routings a product can have (but only one of them is used in any production run), or how many products a Routing could be associated with.

To assist the opentaps system in choosing the correct Routing to use in a particular production run, the "minimum quantity" and "maximum quantity" Routing fields are used. To determine whether a particular Routing is suitable for producing the product in the required quantity, the production run quantity is compared to these Routing fields, in each available Routing for the product. If no routing with minimum and maximum quantity is found for the product, then the routing without minimum or maxmimum quantity is assumed to be the default routing and it is used.

Alternate Routings and Alternate BOMs

When alternate Routings are specified for some production situations, it may be desirable or necessary to specify alternate bills of material as well. The alternate BOM can be specified as a separate document, or the alternative BOM can be incorporated into one BOM that includes both the standard and the alternate BOM content in one document. For more information on this dual BOM content approach refer to Using Alternate Bom

Using Production Routings

To access the Production Routing functions from the Main Navigation screen,
Click: [Purchasing] Icon > [Manufacturing] Tab > and either [New Routing] button or
                                                            [Find Routing] button 
depending upon the need to create a new Routing or to edit an existing Routing.

Find Routing Screen

The "Routing" screen opens once [Find Routing] has been clicked, offering three ways to locate an existing Routing.

• Click [Lookup] without entering anything to get a complete listing of all Routins in the system. If there are not too many, this is a convenient way to find a Routing.
• Enter part or all of the Routing ID which will be a system assigned number in most cases. Then Click [Lookup] to get a subset of the total list of Routings.
• Enter part of all of the Routing Name, and select either "Begins With" or "Contains" to signify what you entered, then click [Lookup] to get a subset of the total list of Routings based upon your name entry.

New Routing Screen

To start defining a new Routing, fill in the "New Routing" box with the following data entries:

• Routing Name -- name the Routing with a recognizable name indicating the product or the use case for this Routing.
• Description -- further describe the Routing making it easier to recognize
• Quantity To Produce -- if the Routing produces some specific quantity of product, put the quantity to produce in this space.

Click: [Create] button to save the initial data for this new Routing.
After you save the new data, the "Edit Routing" screen opens and you can proceed as follows.

Edit Routing Screen

The "Edit Routing" screen allows you to do the following with the Routing data:

• Change the basic information about the Routing, such as the name, description, or quantity produced by the Routing,
• Enter or edit the Routing Task Associations -- this is the list of all tasks to be followed within this Routing, in the exact sequence specified in order to produce the specified quantity of product.
• Enter or edit the Product Links -- this is the list of any products which are produced by this Routing when it is specified in a Production Run for the listed Products.

Routing Task Associations

Add to the list or delete Routing Tasks that are used in this production Routing. Edit one of the Routing Tasks in the list by clicking on its ID/Name in the first column of the table.

Add a Routing Task -- Two Ways to Add a Task

• Enter the ID of an existing Routing Task to add, plus its sequence number for use within this particular Routing, and any applicability dates for use of this Task (start using the Task on the From Date, and stop using the Task after the Thru Date). Then, Click: [Add a existing Routing Task] button. This adds the specified Routing Task as is to the Routing.
• Alternately, Enter the ID of an existing Routing Task to add with a new ID and Name, plus its sequence number for use within this particular Routing, and any applicability dates for use of this Task (start using the Task on the From Date, and stop using the Task after the Thru Date). Then, Click: [Copy a outing Task and Add it] button. This adds the specified Routing Task with a new ID and Name to the Routing.

If you copy a Routing Task and need to change its Name after copying it, Click: on the ID/Name entry in the task list (after you have copied it) and change the name in the Edit Routing Task screen that opens. Save the change.

The Routing to Product Links

This box provides for adding product links from the Routing to another product, deleting entries in the list, or editing the current entries in the list. Entries for each product in this list of links between the Routing and the products include these:

• Product ID -- the Product ID that this Routing can build
• From Date -- when this Routing becomes effective for manufacturing this product
• Thru Date -- when this Routing expires for use with this product
• Quantity -- the quantity of product that is produced when this Routing is executed
• Min Quantity -- the minimum quantity of production for which this Routing is intended
• Max Quantity -- the maximum quantity of production for which this Routing is intended
• Estimated cost -- a Standard Cost estimate for ????? <<---- is this for the product?