Production Orders

Production orders allow you to keep track of progress against production goals.

The production order subsystem includes the following key entities:

1. Production Orders: production orders establish the parameters of a job.
2. Production Order Team: the production order team is the slate of assets used to achieve the production order goal.
3. Production Job Journals: production order journals maintain the state of the production orders over time.
4. Assets: assets are not a primary entity in the production order subsystem, but rather are a critical part. Changes in state of assets affect the operation of production orders and therefore the production order subsystem must subscribe to the state of the assets included in the production order team to ensure that production order state is properly maintained.

These entities are affected by the following key processes:

1. Create or update production orders: this process begins the flow and interaction in the system. In this process, the user defines a production order or updates the configuration of a production order.
2. Start production: this process occurs when the user commences the production order.
3. Stop production: there are two variants of this process – temporary and permanent. A temporary production stop may happen due to asset or raw material availability, while a permanent stop production may occur due to changes in business needs.
4. Complete production: this process occurs when the goals of the production order are satisfied.
5. Change asset state: this process occurs when an asset state changes; these changes may occur due to maintenance, work orders, or other issues. The state change of the asset has an impact on the production order state.
6. Reconfigure production order team: this process occurs when an individual adds or removes assets from the production order configuration.

Business Rules

Production Orders and the Client Hierarchy

Production Orders are aligned to PLANTS in the system. A production order cannot be aligned to an ENTERPRISE or CLIENT level.

Assets and Production Orders

An asset can only be in one “IN PRODUCTION” production order at a time. Specifically:

• An asset can be removed by the user at any time from a production order team.

• An asset may be included in several production orders at once – for example, in any number of draft, cancelled, or completed production orders.

All types of assets can be included in a production order. There is no limitation on asset class or type. Naturally this creates a possibility for illogical configurations, for example where a mold is included in a production order without a corresponding machine; however this is not really relevant. As long as a monitored asset such as a tool, a die, etc., the production order data aggregation and integration with the KPIs and asset dashboards will function as expected.

Users can use the capability of the system to “block” assets from being “double booked” since the system will prevent the same asset from being included in more than 1 “in production” production order simultaneously.

State Model

Starting or Resuming Production

The production job can only enter the “in production” state by user action.

The system must consider the oversubscription of assets to production teams when starting jobs. Consider the following table.

If the asset is…

Included in other “IN PRODUCTION” production orders NOT included in other “IN PRODUCTION” jobs

… then …

NOTIFY THE USER

Do not change the state.

Return to the edit screen. START THE JOB

Change the state to IN PRODUCTION.

Return to production order list.

Pausing Production

The production job can only enter the “production paused” state by user action.

Canceling Production

The production job can be cancelled at any time by user action.

Determining Completeness

A production job can be moved to “complete” state:

• If the end user manually sets the state

Asset State Changes During Production Order Job Execution

When an asset state changes during the execution of a production job, the system should update the state of the production order according to the following rules:

• If the state of the production order is “IN PRODUCTION,”
  • if all assets in the team are DOWN then change the state of the production order to “PRODUCTION PAUSED.”
• If the state of the production order is “PRODUCTION PAUSED,”
  • If the state was entered due to asset state change as opposed to user interaction, then:
    • If any asset in a team is UP then change the state of the production order to “IN PRODUCTION.”
  • If the state was entered due to user interaction, then:
    • Take no action.

Stated another way, if the production order was put into “PRODUCTION PAUSED” by user interaction, then asset state changes cannot change the state of the production order OUT of “PRODUCTION PAUSED.”

The same logic should apply if the asset is removed from the system.

Counting Production Hours

The system will only count production hours when the production job is in the “IN PRODUCTION,” state. The system needs to count production hours even when the “IN PRODUCTION” states are not contiguous, for example if there is a production pause event.

For example, if a production job commences at 8am on day 1, and proceeds for 12 hours, at which point the job moves to “PRODUCTION PAUSED” for 2 hours. After 2 hours, production resumes and the job moves back to “IN PRODUCTION” state for 4 hours. After 4 hours, the production job moves to “COMPLETE” state. The total production time for this job is 16 hours.

Completing a Production Order

When a user elects to complete a production order, the system will capture the actual production information from the user prior to marking the order complete. The system should attempt to predetermine the values for the actual production quantity, actual finish date, and actual production hours using the information from the machines in the team that are assigned to the production order.

Deleting a Production Order

A production order can be deleted from the system in any status. Deleting a production order removes all records of the production order from the system.

User Permissions

The “edit production order” permission is required to change any aspect of a Production Order – order configuration, the asset teaming, or the state of the order.