Running two products at the same time on different lines

[Former Member]

Hi Gurus -

I have a scenario where, when product A is run on Line 1, product B HAS TO run on Line 2. We CIF PVs into APO as PPMs and we run the standard lot heuristic to create planned orders for product A. When there is a demand for product A and planned order is created for it on Line 1, we also want a planned order to be created for Product B on Line 2. No other product can run on line 2 other than Product B when A runs on Line 1.

What's the best way to handle this? Appreciate your feedback!

Regards

Varun

[Former Member]

Hi Varun,.

As Rajesh told there is SAP note to define external relationship Note number is 601990. You can study to note and decide this may help you.

You can define start-start relationship between two different orders.

Regards,

Santosh

[Former Member]

Hi Varun,

I'm not sure about your exact requirement, but in one of my past project we had similar situation. It was a tableware manufacturer where they sell Water Jugs & 6 glass tumblers together. When production happens, they require Jugs & glass tumblers to be produced simultaneously, so that end of the line they will pack jugs & tumblers together.

Now the final product is FG1 with BOM as jugs & 6 glasses. We modelled jugs on separate lines & glasses on another line. Both converge together in packaging line as the FG product. Depending on the throughput of each line, PPDS decides which line to produce jugs & which one to produce glasses i.e., resource1 can produce 6 glasses in 5 mins and resource 2 can produce 1 jug in 5 mins. The rate is determined based on custom table definition which will be calibrated by production team.

If you have both product A & B as FG, then probably think of adding another dummy level (like packaging) or you can explore more about Co-products if the inputs are same for both product A & B

Thanks,

Rajesh

[Former Member]

Hi Rajesh -

Thanks for your reply! The products I mentioned unfortunately are finished goods(packaging) and there is no further processing. I tried co-products but the factories will not like it if the BOM for product A has a negative Qty for product B since technically these are not co or by products.

Regards

Varun

[Former Member]

Hi Varun,

I should have asked this earlier itself.

-> Did you try using Mode linkage?

-> There is a SAP note for considering external relationship.. not sure about the note number. you can search in the forum or SMP.

-> In DS strategy profile there is an option for considering Cross-Order relationships. Did you try that?

Let me know your thoughts

Thanks,

Rajesh

[Former Member]

Hi Varun,

-Can you explore using Multi resource with capacity as 2 instead of using line1 and line2 seperately. By assigning same setup group to routing of  product A and B and marking synchronize activity in a multi resource will improve the planning. Still requrement may not be met completely. If we model like this system will check whether forcast requirement for product B lies within start and end time of product A and if meets this condition start date of planned order of B will be synchronized with A. Still you use certain DS functionalities/optimizer to get results as per requirement.

I am seeing this constraint in isolation there may be other requirement which will not allow to model it as multiresource hence it needs to be checked considering all constraints

- Other option you need to check with buisness whether we can predefine schedule for product A and B Using Block Planning.

Can you let us know whether there certain other products which can be produced on line1 and 2 apart from A and B

[Former Member]

Hi Santosh - Thanks for the reply. Unfortunately I cannot use multi-resources as we need the system to populate the setup/changeover times based on the setup matrix. If I start using multi resources, setup matrices cannot be used. Also, based on the business nature(volatile demands, flexible production schedules, high volume skus), cannot use block planning because of the master data involved and also the time spent by schedulers trying to maintain blocks.

Regards

Varun