Configure a line layout to automatically determine the bottleneck entity

To ensure that the automatic determination of a line’s bottleneck entity can be performed properly, the line and the line’s entities must be configured as described below.

Note: If the production rate for an entity cannot be determined, then the line’s performance rate and bottleneck entity cannot be determined. Examples of this condition is an entity on which no job is running, there is no upstream job source for the rate, and a default rate has not been defined for the entity.

Step 1: Specify the required line configuration settings

Each of the following line configuration settings must have entries:

• Standard Item

• Batch Size

• Production Unit of Measure

These values are used to determine a common unit of measure for the item being produced by the line.

For more information, see Line configuration settings.

Step 2: Ensure the line does not have a manually define bottleneck

If an entity in the line has been designated as the bottleneck, you must remove this designation. See Manually define the bottleneck entity in a line layout.

Step 3: Specify that each line in the layout can be the bottleneck

Each of the entities in the line must be specified as potentially being a bottleneck.

Note: A default standard item must be configured for any entity that can be the bottleneck. See Configure the OEE data default settings for an entity.

To specify that an entity can potentially be a bottleneck:

1. In the line’s Layout tab, click the entity.

   A menu appears.

2. In the menu, click Can be the Bottleneck.

   

   That entity can now potentially be the bottleneck entity.

   

To remove the designation that the entity can be the bottleneck designation:

• In the entity menu, click Cannot Be the Bottleneck.

Step 4: Assign the required capabilities to each entity in the layout

All of the entities in the line must have the following capabilities:

• Can Schedule Jobs

• Can Run Jobs

• Can Capture Utilization

• Can Track OEE (because the entity’s default production rate is specified in its OEE settings)

See Configure basic information and capabilities for an entity.

Step 5: Specify the required OEE settings to each entity in the layout

Each of the entities in the line must have entries for the following settings:

• Default Production Rate

• Default Batch Size

• Default Standard Item

These values are used to determine the entity’s production rate if it is not currently running a job and there are no jobs for this entity in any upstream work orders.

See Configure the OEE data default settings for an entity.

Step 6: Specify that entities are enabled for each production utilization reason

If an entity is disabled and it is the only entity in that line position, then a production rate for it will not be determined. Therefore, the line’s production rate and bottleneck entity cannot be determined. For this reason, make sure that, for utilization reasons that will be used when the entity is producing items, the Is entity enabled when this reason applies? check box is selected. See Configuring utilization reasons.