Scheduling Setup

The job shop scheduler relies on a few prerequisites to function efficiently.

To use the job shop scheduler:

  • Every work center must be part of a plan group
  • At least one bottleneck machine must be defined on the shop floor
  • All operations for the bottleneck machine must be defined at the machine capacity group level
  • Machine time-outs must be defined

The plan group determines the range of the scheduler.

Note: If the scheduler is enabled for a site, plan groups are mandatory and every work center in the applicable site must be part of a plan group.

All production orders within a site are either part of the same supply chain, use the same materials or the same machines. To generate a feasible production plan all production orders within the site must be scheduled in one run.

One of the primary objectives of the scheduler is to take the available capacity of a possible bottleneck machine into account. A bottleneck in the production process when a machine with limited capacity is a vital part of the production process.

Scheduling bottleneck machines minimizes their impact on the production process. To schedule machines, they must be modeled with a machine number and part of a machine capacity group. You can specify that a machine capacity group contains bottleneck machines, which is take into consideration during scheduling.

InLN machine operations are generated automatically when the production order has operations for a machine capacity group with machines.

You can use machine time-out to define machine unavailability due to maintenance, breakdown, or replacement. The time-out is superimposed on the availability of the calendar used by the work center to which the machine belongs.

  1. To enable job shop scheduler, you must select the Production Scheduler parameter in the Implemented Software Components (tccom0100s000) session.
  2. To enable job shop scheduler for a specificsite you must activate Job Shop Scheduler in two steps by first setting the Production Scheduler parameter in the Production Settings by Site (timfc0180m000) session to In Preparation.
    1. Once the production scheduler parameter is set to In Preparation for the selected site, it will be possible to define plan groups for the site in the Work Center Plan Groups (tisch0140m000) session.
      Note: The plan group must have the Scheduler Controlled check box selected to indicate that it is Scheduler controlled.
    2. Use the Work Centers by Plan Group (tirou0101m400) session to assign work centers to plan groups.
      Note: You must manually define the plan group if the production order has a routing without operations.
    3. When all work centers are part of a plan group, you can set the Production Scheduler parameter in theProduction Settings by Site (timfc0180m000) session to Active.
      Note: You can only set the Production Scheduler parameter status to Active if all work centers of a routing are within the same plan group. Once the Job Shop Scheduler is active, all production orders and routings are assigned to the corresponding plan group automatically.