There are a lot of configurations you need to consider to ensure that the 2-step and 4-step processes do not overlap with one another. Let’s look at the different configurations you need to consider, along with the steps to set each one up. The main configurations are specified in bullet points below.

Warehouse

The setting on the warehouse will only allow for one Manufacturing route to be active at a time. This is because activating either of these routes refreshes the database and archives/unarchives the necessary records in locations, routes and operation types.

• To set up multi-manufacturing routes, we are going to set the warehouse to a 2-step manufacturing route.

This means that by default the warehouse will follow 2-step manufacturing. We are going to manually create the 4 step routes in the coming steps. 

Locations

Since we have set the default warehouse route to 2-step, we need to ensure that all the locations for the 4-step route are not archived.

• Unarchive the ‘WH/Post-Production’ location.
• Create a new location called ‘Pallet’ with the parent location as ‘WH’. This is to account for the additional location in the 4-step route, as stated in the use-case.
  
  
  
  

Operation Types

By default, you will always find 1 operation type for Manufacturing and depending on the number of steps, you can find a Pick and Pack operation type as well. Since the warehouse is set to 2-step manufacturing, the operation types will have ‘Pick Components’ active. To manually set up the 4-step route, we need to create new operation types and modify the existing ones to accommodate the new route.

• Rename the existing ‘Manufacturing’ route to ‘Manufacturing (2-step)’. This is just to differentiate the 2 different manufacturing operations and will also help demarcate the routes better.
• Create a new Manufacturing operation type called ‘Manufacturing (4-step)’. Make sure you create a new sequence prefix for this operation type to separate it from the other manufacturing operation. The source location will be set to ‘WH/Pre-Production’ and the destination location will be set to ‘WH/Post-Production’.
  
  
  
  
• The ‘Pick Components’ route will be untouched; we are not going to change any configurations. This is because the picking operation remains the same irrespective of a 2-step or a 4-step route.
• Create a new operation called ‘Put finished product in Pallet’. This operation type is going to create the transfer for moving the product from Post-Production to WH/Pallet. The source location will be ‘WH/Post-Production’ and the destination location will be ‘WH/Pallet’.
  
  
  
  
• Create a new operation called “Store finished product to Stock”. This operation serves to move the finished product from Pallet to Stock. The source location will be ‘WH/Pallet’ and the destination location will be ‘WH/Stock’.
  
  
  
  

Routes

Routes are going to be the crux of implementing this business workflow. The routes will trigger the required operation types and create the necessary transfers to move products from one location to another. Let’s look at the necessary routes and configurations on them.

• Rename the standard manufacture route to ‘Manufacture (2-step).
• Duplicate the manufacture route and rename it to ‘Manufacture (4-step). Add the following rules to the route.
• • ‘Manufacture’ action with destination location set to ‘WH/Post-Production’. The operation type used here will be the ‘Manufacturing (4-step)’ type.
  • ‘Pull from’ rule from ‘WH/Post-Production’ to ‘WH/Pallet’. The operation type will be set to ‘Put finished product in Pallet’.
  • ‘Pull from’ rule from ‘WH/Pallet to ‘WH/Stock’. The operation type will be set to ‘Store finished product to Stock’.
    
    
    
    
• The ‘Pick components and then Manufacture’ route will be untouched. The rules and configurations remain the same as out-of-the-box. This will be the default route for the warehouse.
• Create a new route called ‘Pick components, Manufacture, put in pallet and then store products’. This will be the 4-step manufacturing route. This route will not be set to the warehouse, so make sure you uncheck the warehouse checkbox. This is because a warehouse cannot have 2 default routes and we can only set one of them as a default. You can turn on the products checkbox to allow us to set this on products if needed. Add the following rules.
• • ‘Pull from’ rule from ‘WH/Stock’ to ‘WH/Pre-Production’. The operation type is ‘Pick Components’.
  • ‘Pull from’ rule from ‘WH/Pre-Production’ to ‘WH/Production’. The operation type is ‘Manufacturing (4-step)’.
  • ‘Push to’ rule from ‘WH/Post-Production’ to ‘WH/Pallet’. The operation type is ‘Put finished product in Pallet’.
  • ‘Push to’ rule from ‘WH/Pallet’ to ‘WH/Stock’. The operation type will be set to ‘Store finished product to Stock’.
    
    
    

Product settings for 2-step manufacturing

If a product follows 2-step manufacturing, the following are configurations you need to set to ensure that the 2-step manufacturing route is triggered.

• Routes on the product should be set to Manufacture (2-step). We do not need to set the picking route here since the warehouse will follow that by default.
• In the Bill of Material for this product, ensure that you select the operation as ‘Warehouse: Manufacturing (2-step)’. This will ensure the right operation type is triggered.

Product settings for 4-step manufacturing

If a product follows 4-step manufacturing, the following are configurations you need to set to ensure that the 4-step manufacturing route is triggered.

• Routes on the product should be set to Manufacture (4-step) and the 'Pick components, manufacture, put in pallet and then store products' route. This will ensure that it does not follow the default 2-step route of the warehouse but instead the custom 4-step route.
• BOM for this product should be set to ‘Warehouse: Manufacturing (4-step)’.

Product settings for the components

The components on either of the BOMs will be set to Buy if it is purchased from vendors. Alternatively, you can also set a component to either 2-step or 4-step manufacturing if it is a sub-assembly. Depending on what route you want the component to take, you can set the desired manufacturing route.

Workflow

Let’s take a look at what happens when we create MOs for each of these products.

MO for 2-step manufacturing

When a manufacturing order is confirmed for a product following the 2-step route, you will notice that only 1 transfer is created and attached to the MO. This transfer is the picking.

Once you pick the components, they go from Stock to Pre-Production and eventually from Pre-Production into the Production location. Finished products are put back into Stock.

MO for 4-step manufacturing

When MOs are created for a product that follows 4-step manufacturing, you will see 3 transfers attached to the MO.

The following are the transfers.

• Picking components: Stock to Pre-Production.
• Putting components in Pallet: Post-Production to Pallet.
• Store finished good to stock: Pallet to Stock.

You can process these transfers in order to ensure that the finished product gets put back into stock after going through the necessary number of steps.

In this way, we can ensure that the same warehouse can be set up with multi-step manufacturing processes, giving users the flexibility to pick the required route based on products and bill of materials. This opens up the manufacturing app to incorporate complex workflows and handle multi-step manufacturing operations.