Configurator Question for sub-assemblies

Kinetic ERP
1

We had a request to structure a configurator like the below:
Top Configured Part
-Phase 1 Place holder (Can be a static part instead of Place holder)
-Component 1 Place holder
-Component 2 Place holder
-Component 3 Place holder
-Phase 2 Place holder (Can be a static part instead of Place holder)
-Component 1 Place holder
-Phase 3 Place holder (Can be a static part instead of Place holder)
-Component 1 Place holder
-Component 2 Place holder
-Phase 4 Place holder (Can be a static part instead of Place holder)
-Component 1 Place holder
-Component 2 Place holder
-Component 3 Place holder
-Component 4 Place holder

We want the Top part to be the configured part, with 1 page that the user will make the selections on. Each Phase we want to be always kept, (can be assigned any part number needed). Each Component under each phase will have the keep when rules based on the selection from the page on the top configurator.

Attempt 1: When we first tried setting this up, when we went to the Rule entry, only the phase parts were showing up and it would not allow us to add rules to the components.(phase place holders were not expanding to show component place holders). (phase placeholders were set as plan and view as assembly in top part bill, and each component placeholder set as plan and view as assembly in each phase place holder bill).

Attempt 2: We tried pairing each phase place holder with the top level configurator, and then we were allowed to go into each phase and set rules on the components, however when running the configurator it would display 5 pages that were identical.

Attempt 3: We went back to the settings from attempt 1 above and changed the phase place holders as Pull as assembly and view as assembly. This allowed us to open the top level under rule entry and be able to expand each phase to set rules on the components. When we tested this, it displayed 1 screen to configure, but then on save it kept the place holder phases and all placeholder components (did not replace with part numbers from rule).

Is there a way to set this up where it will show the end user 1 page to configure, then on save, prompt for 1 part number for top level and create the bill containing all 4 phases with the component parts listed beneath based on the selection?

2

Marc, I don’t think this is working for you because you are trying to create a real part with a method. If parent part was a “part-on-the fly” make direct on your quote/order/job etc., (ref. Config Entry/Part Creation options). Then your phase parts must be subassemblies (again part on the fly, pull as assembly, etc) but then your components could be real parts of course.

The configurator can’t change the method your phase fixed parts, if I am understanding correctly. Perhaps you need a subconfigurator at each phase part that creates a unique phase number. Usually subconfigurators bring up a separate input page for each but there might be a way use global variables and some page settings to bypass the subconfigurator pages.

I am pretty sure I have done this in Vantage 8, E9 and E10 but have not had the need to build such a configurator in Kinetic yet so maybe Epicor has clamped down on some of the tricks we previously employed. Let me know and hopefully we can figure something out for you.

3

We ran into the deadline for completing the setup so we are not able to further investigate our original setup. We ended up creating sub configurators for each phase (asmb) and moving all the inputs to those sub configurators.

We are leaving the top level blank as I found somewhere stating that the page will be skipped if blank or everything is hidden. The user would then fill in the details on the sub pages.

We thought about using the top level as the input only, but that is a lot of setup with global variables to pass to each sub page.

Thank you for your input on the issue!