The company I work for is trying something new with our item numbering layout. We need to start certain categories of items in the 100 levels and other items in the 200 levels. We have Solidworks 2013 but will shortly be upgrading to 2015 or 2016. The problem is I can't get the BOM to just skip numbers. I figured I could do an easy enough work around by adding 99 rows between each different item category and hiding them.. But I can only figure out how to add one column or row at a time (in this case I would like to add multiple rows at once). Does any one have a solution for this issue? I can't imagine this is the first time someone has run into this.
Thank you all,
P.S. Changing the increment level in the BOM properties will not help this situation.
Hello,
A few questions first:
Q1) (to see if I'm understanding correctly) Are you wanting to "add" the category base number to each item?
So the first "100" item would be Item No "100", then "101", etc.? and the first "200" item would be "201"?
2) How will you (& SW) know which category a part/assembly belongs to?
Will it be from a custom property added to every SW file?
Q3) Will every BOM item be a 100 or 200 item?
Will there always be 99, or less, distinct items for each category?
This system breaks down above 99 items (& at 98 for below 100: it's 1 thru 99 in this range)
Q4) Will there be any non-100/200 items?
Will they be relegated in the "regular" 1-99 range?
Will there always be 98, or less, distinct items for this "non" category?
Diatribe, second:
I've been through several secret sauce coding scenarios and I've never seen much added value in any of them.
Basically, it's because of inherent (and DNA hard-coded) limitations in their design that will eventually become a cliff that needs kludging to get around.
The limited "feedback" they do provided can generally be garnered from other data.
Suggestions, finally:
1) Add a custom property, say "Category", to every part and assembly file, setting the value of this property accordingly: 100, 200, blank, etc.
2) In your BOM, insert a new column and have it point to this custom property.
Original Post (OP) direction:
3) Create an equation column in the BOM and have it add the Item No and Category columns and subtract 1 (one) to be base zero (100 first) instead of the regular based one (1 first)..
(If this is possible, I'm not in front of SW at the moment, so SW might squawk if it doesn't think these are numerical columns.)
Also, for this equation: If some items won't be categorized (Q4 above), then you'll need to add an If statement in there to check for blank categories (if "Category"="") and adjust the logic for these accordingly.
Title this new column something appropriate for it will replace the regular Item No column.
4) Hide the Item No and Category columns.
5) Move the new Item No column to the far left.
6) Sort the BOM by the new Item No column.
7) Save this BOM as a template.
8) All balloons must be altered to point to the new Item No column (if this is possible, I'm not in front of SW at the moment)
Diatribe direction (no coding, just the BOM collecting by Category, which, as an attribute, can be better served by creating it's own field in an ERP/PDM system):
3) Move the Category column to the right of Item No (the regular one).
4) Set the BOM properties to allow the renumbering of item numbers.
5) Sort the BOM on the Category column. (Items are renumbered within categories, but there's no addition and no 98/99 item limits).
6) Save this BOM as a template.
7) Optional: Use split-circular balloons (with regular Item No above) and set the lower value to display the Category property value (save this balloon as a favorite for reuse).
The Diatribe direction displays and sorts the BOM by Category (and you can supplement this with Category balloons) without the need to encode what are basically part attribute data.
Plus, as categories are added (and they will propagate like bunnies on Viagra), you've not painted yourself into a corner by hard coding anything.
And it's an easy edit, when (not if) a part needs to have its category value altered (this will happen with increasing frequency, as categories are added, they will become more and more overlapping, duplicated and obtuse).
The best case for Diatribe direction is when enough people are sick of it, it's easy to dismantle: delete the Category column from the BOM and redo the balloons,
My apologies for the sermon and I hope this helps.
Cheers,
Kevin
Edit:
The "98" & "99" range references are actually "99" (1-99 inclusive) & "100" (100-199 inclusive).