We are changing our resource groups to properly reflect the way our work flows through the plant. Currently we have a CNC operation that is assigned 7 machines that all are the same but 3 are in one location in the plant and focus on X style of parts and 4 are in another location on the floor and focus on Y style. Since Epicor only sees them as Group Z of 7 machines it does not realize that it can not assign all 7 of the machines to do the same thing.
I have created a new resource group for X and Y as well as new operations to match. If I move the resources themselves into the proper group of X and Y.
When I make the change does anyone know what will happen? Does Epicor freak out that the Resource group now has no resources since there will be jobs and operations assigned to them? Is there an easy way to make this change without disrupting anything in production?
Couple of things to consider, but it sounds like you’re on your way.
With new groups RG-X and RG-Y, when you move the 7 resources into their groups, the current job operations that call for the old resource group will no longer have resources to utilize and the scheduler will break down.
in addition, the current MOM’s for all of your MFG’s parts that include the old resource group AND all of the current jobs that utilize that old resource group will need to be updated before new jobs are created. this can be done with DMT but it’ll take some work. It may be able to be done a different way - there is a post on here somewhere about an updateable dashboard for changing resource groups in Jobs.
I would start the DMT journey asap, and I would also create some placeholder resources to be put in the old resource group after you move the others to the new groups. Use something that clearly calls out the correct resource to use - something like “Use_Machine_X3” as the resource name. You’ll need to discuss all this with production folks, but that way the shop floor folks know what is going on.
When we did something similar, we had to bite the bullet and only update jobs that had no activity. If a job was open and had any activity, then we just left it alone and let it run its course through the old ops/resources. We updated all of our part masters (MOMs) to use the new resources so that nay new jobs would have the correct information. DMT was a huge help in this, as I was able to do a few weeks worth of testing trial-and-error in Pilot before committing to the full update in Live.
I have nothing to add except for a possible work around, @MikeGross & @NateS already answered your question.
If you want to avoid the above, I would create new Resources instead of moving the existing ones. It could be something as simple as adding a -1 to the end of the IDs of the current ones. This way you won’t break any open jobs or schedules and you can also update all of the methods.
I think you are right. This might be the most simple solution. Just shift everything new over to these resources and resource group and phase out the old ones.
Do you have the Advanced Planning & Scheduling module? I just changed the RG at the Capability level and everything seems to be working. Found this thread after to see if anyone did something similar and ran into issues…
