BOM for hardware

[Neville Bastian]

I wonder if anyone else feels there is a need for a bill of materials for things.
For example if you use Blum metal sided drawers they can be made up of three items. The runner, the drawer front bracket, then the gallery rail. There could on some drawers be a side extender.
When you print the materials required for the job or expect this to be included in a quote it is missing.

The other area which would be handy is say you drill 5 holes as a pattern for adjustable shelf you should be able to attach hardware to that such as one adjustable shelf bracket. Or 4 holes on base for a plastic adjustable leg that base and leg can be applied in hardware to come on your hardware list.

Maybe I haven't explained this properly so feel free to jump in.

Thanks Neville

[Rick Palechuk]

Neville,

That can already be done in the buy list. Add the components you want to the hardware list, then add these to the Cabinet Buy List. These items will now be associated to the cabinet. It also allows exporting to Excel.

[Neville Bastian]

Thanks for the reply Rick. I think you have to do that manually? Can you associate a drill pattern with hardware? Can it be more than one hardware as some companies on plastic feet for example have one item number for the base and another item number for the leg as they come in different heights
I was hoping this was automatic like the way you have a drawer runner with a drawer runner drill pattern.
If you have to add this in manually it will be a slow process.

I hope I am wrong on this Rick.

Regards

Neville

[Kerry Fullington]

Neville,

You only have to add things once. I re-worked all my libraries with for Version 6 and now I have a Bill of Materials that includes everything I need for a cabinet down to the screws, shelf pins and shelf pin grommets.

You really need to take the time to set up your hardware with the correct manufacturer, and vendors. If you purchase a product from more than one place set them all up with correct pricing and the correct product image.

If you do this then it is very easy to add hardware items at the cabinet or job level.

When they get the bug for export to Excel fixed then you will also be able to get quick info for Purchase Orders. I am setting up my PO's in Excel so that I can print them directly from there.

The hardware needs of different shops as well as the methods to use them are so vast that no software is going to be able to add all the items automatically.Take the time to set up your Define Hardware section in the software. It works great and is probably the best thing to happen in Version 6.



Kerry

[Gary Campbell]

Kerry...
Your explanation is helping me add to features in our exports. Thanks for that. I want to aske the same question that Neville did, but in a different syntax.

Can we add items such as shelf pins to a shelf? (for lack of better term, associated?)

If a shelf is added or deleted will the quantities change?

Can you "associate" a hinge plate with a hinge? So that when hinge quantity changes, does the plate count changes also?

I also use levelers that have a number of required parts. Legs of 4 different lengths, 2 styles of clips and a couple other options that all need to be either ordered or pulled to be packed with the cabinet. We also have wide closet modules that require adding a center leg or set. Are any these what could, or in my mind should, be parametric inputs, manual or totally reliant on a user manually entering the quantities?

I have an Excel sheet that calculates every bit of hardware, including assembly, system screws,etal based on input from the cut list using sheet, edgeband, door & draw sizes etc. that only requires less than 2 minutes input for a 10 sheet job. It also outputs all calculations to a hardware order form (PO). There is no reason the double enter, unless the eCabs output could also be made parametric.

Thank you for taking the time to educate me.

[Kerry Fullington]

Gary,

No it is not parametric.
It is manual.
The hardware in Version 6 is such a vast improvement over what it has been in the past I am excited about it.
For me it is just great to be able to show all the hardware.

Kerry

[Gary Campbell]

Kerry...
Thanks for the clarification. For me, this was never an issue until the volume of wholesale work from other shops increased to its present level. Each of these have their own requirements. We very seldom cut the same cabinet twice, but do use a fairly efficent seed system to get boxes into a batch. I wasnt able to make the hardware "count" work the way I wished, so I went in the Excel direction. Thanks again.

[Neville Bastian]

Thanks Gary and Kerry. That is exciting on getting even the screws to come through. I'm at a stage where I want to be able to give the hardware out in a carry basket and have a locked storeroom like Scrooge McDuck. I'm sick of running out of things because the guy who uses the last set of drawer runners forgets to tell someone to reorder. Or you have a kitchen with 20 sets of drawers that cleans out your inventory.
Once the job gets given out to the machinist he then has the job to acquire the hardware and put with the job just cut. Then I have one guy who can be trained to reorder stock when it gets low.

The other reason is I have had a guy who milked me with hardware and gap filler when building 4 houses in a row. I knew what he was doing but not to the extent he was doing it. I want that control back and the knee jerk action taken away when stock is nil.

With the spreadsheet you are doing for purchase ordering. Any chance of seeing what you finish up with?
Email is Neville at classiccabinetry dot biz. Hope that slows down those trolls. A man can only use so much viagra.

Regards

Neville

[Kerry Fullington]

Neville,

I would think that inventory could be added to the current V6 Define Hardware. I have another Optimization program that does just what you want. With it , you must enter how much inventory you have on hand and the program subtracts items as you use them. For those of us that don't inventory items you simply tell the software you have 10,000 of an item and you don't run out very fast.

I am excited because this new Define Hardware section is the first step toward getting accurate job costs. This info can not only get costs for materials but can be used to calculate labor costs also. (if I can convince Thermwood I have the solution )

Kerry

[Neville Bastian]

Hi Kerry,
Great to get that ironed out. With labour I am hoping it can be a bit more customised in the future. I tend to have the times broken into machine or process areas such as minutes per cabinet. We have area's such as Data time to process,CNC/panel saw cutting and drilling, Edgebanding and sorting,Assembly, door manufacturing & fitting,Counter top manufacturing, Door finishing,Loading and delivery, On site installing, Cleaning and non chargeable. Plus redo and maintenance.
I think everyone has there own condensed or expanded versions of mine. If fexability can be achieved with Ecabinets easily then you could get a real life report on how long this job should take that could be obtained by office personal. That's then can be checked against time cards that are either manually filled in or a computerised system like we use.
Keep the pressure up as it certainly makes sense to me that we track our estimated costs easily via Ecabinets.
Regards

Neville