New Drawing / Part No. Entry
You have several options when it comes to entering a drawing no.
Option 1
If the Customer has supplied the Drawing / Part No. then use this reference including any issue no’s. If there is no issue enter a –
Option 2
Auto-generate a drawing no. If we leave the drawing and issue no. fields empty when entering a new quotation or Job order the software will generate a drawing no for you. This is made up of a prefix and the register no. The prefix can be whatever you want and is normally the initials of the company e.g. CW A typical drawing would look like CW-2316 with an issue of - This option can save time where most items quoted are different in some way. Using the description search option you can easily locate previous items and then use option 4 below.
Option 3
The customer does not supply a drawing no – use existing in-house drawing/standard plus the size. E.g. If you are making an item to BS1768 and the size is ¼” dia. x 6” long then the drawing no would be BS1768 1/4 X 6
We can also add the thread type e.g. BS1768 1/4 UNF x 6
The description could then be input as 1/4 X 6 Hex Bolt. The material used can be added to the description or input into the item notes.
Option 4
Use the Copy option in the Register module. From the main menu select Register. Search and locate a similar drawing / part no. From the bottom menu select Copy Drawing. Change the drawing / part no to reflect standard and or size. Enter an issue no and change description. Select Save and the system will offer you the option to copy over the plans. Select Yes and the new drawing will have identical plans to the one just copied. Use the process, material etc. tabs to change the details as necessary.
Changing plan details in either the Register, Jobs or Quotation modules will be reflected in any of the other modules. With this in mind you may wish to use the Register module to initially setup a drawing / part no which will then make it available in the other modules.
Working with Redant Plans
Redant has the ability to manufacture the same Drawing / Part No in different ways. We do this using Plans. Currently there is no limit to the number of plans for a drawing / part no.
The first thing to remember when creating a new drawing / part no is that the default plan no. will always be 1. The plan no. being used by a drawing / part no can be seen on the right hand side of the quotation and job screens and under the defaults tab in the register module.
Against each plan no. you will see a description which should always tell the user what the plan no. relates to. For example, if plan 1 was used to make the drawing / part no out of 314 Stainless then the description against material plan 1 could be 314 SS or 314 Stainless.
These Plan descriptions are input when selecting either the Process, Material, Subcontract or Miscellaneous tabs in the relevant module. The description field is next to the plan no just above the input grid.
It is good practice to enter a description into this field when a drawing / part no is first created. This will show other users at a glance what plan is being used. Please note, the plan description needs entering for all 4 sections (process/material/subcontract and miscellaneous) and can be different for each section. The best advice we can give is to make all the Plan Descriptions the same for the same plan no. This way you will be able to visibly see if you are using the process plan for the wrong material. They can however be different but you must make sure you are for example not estimating machining times for aluminium against say stainless as these will be different.
Creating a New Plan
When Redant creates a new drawing/part no then plan 1 is automatically created so there is no additional user input required.
There are two ways to setup a new plan.
In either process, material, subcontract or miscellaneous tabs, enter a new plan no into the plan no field shown above the entry grid. You can see a list of existing plans by using the drop down arrow in the plan no field. If you type in an existing plan no then that plan if any is displayed in the grid. If you enter a new plan no then then this is created and a blank grid is shown. At this point make sure you enter a plan description. You can then proceed to enter the details in the grid for the new plan or use the Copy Plan button to copy an existing plan and then modify the copied plan to suite. See copying a plan below
A more efficient way is to copy an existing plan. Firstly go to a valid plan that you want to copy using the plan no selection dropdown. Select the Copy Plan button on the right above the grid (not the Copy button). Here you have 2 choices. Either select the new plan you have created in option 1 above or select the ‘New Plan’ box and Redant will auto generate the next available plan no. Select OK to proceed. When you now select the plan you copied to it will now have the same details as the one you copied from.
There is also a Copy button on each of the tabs. This button allows you to copy plan from an existing drawing / part no. For example, if you have a drawing no BS1768 1/4 X 6 which is similar to the one you are working on and that drawing has similar plan structure you can copy any of its plans to the drawing you are using. From the copy window select what you want to copy i.e. process, material etc. and then in each selection select the drawing no to copy from. Each plan can come from a different drawing.
You will notice that when you move from tab to tab then the plan no. always resets itself to 1. This is governed by the plan no. you have set on the main Quotation / Job / Register screen. To change the plan for the item you are currently using, select Edit on the bottom menu and change the plan no for each type accordingly. Remember, change all plans so they are the same number. This makes it easier to work with but as mentioned earlier, they can be different but you must exercise more care.
If an existing Drawing / Part No already has a plan, changing any of the processes, material, subcontract and miscellaneous details WILL change all previous records. The golden rule is that unless it is something which is incorrect in some way then create a new plan to reflect the manufacturing differences e.g. use of a different material or subcontract finish etc.