Basic Data

Resources are the backbone of your manufacturing operation, and therefore your Merlin system.

Much of the information below is self-evident, but complete comprehension of this section is vital to the smooth running of your system.

Time spent ensuring you understand everything on this page will be repaid with dividends later on.

Resources are your materials stock, assemblies, subassemblies and manufacturing process items.  They are all maintained on your Resource Record Cards:

Much of the information on the Resource Record Card is generated by Merlin.  Virtually all of the information you need to provide is on the Levels Tab (above) and the Buying Tab (below), and even so, much of what you see (such as the Stock Balance figures) is system generated.  The record illustrated (above and below) is in  Edit Mode, and the fields in white are those where you provide the data when you first create the record.

It also has the NOTES EXIST! flag showing, to indicated that there are comments entered on the Notes Tab.

The recommended search procedure (as with other Merlin screens) is to locate the record you require on the list tab (Resources, in this case), and click it to open the record.  However, a search button is provided on the Merlin Navigator panel as an alternative.  On the Resources screen, in response to a click of this button, you will be asked if you wish to search for a Default Supplier's Part Number, useful if you can't relate it to your own part no.  If you click Yes, the dropdown presented will list Suppliers' Part Nos. in alphabetic sequence.  If you click No, you will be presented with a list of your own Part Nos.

Most of the required input for each new item is obvious, such as Part No., Description, etc.,
but the following are of note:-

You should create Resource Records Cards for each of  your physical materials, and also for non-physical cost carrying items that will appear on your BoMs.  The prime example of this would be manufacturing and labour processes.  In order that Merlin knows that is it dealing with a non-physical item, you must check the Shop Floor Process (SFP) box.

Minimum Stock Level represents the re-order point for use in stock control.  It can be left at zero. (See Buying / Run Main Buy).

Maximum Stock Level is the reciprocal figure, the level to which stock control will replenish this item.  It can be left at zero. (See Buying / Run Main Buy).

The Min Purchase field sets the minimum quantity of this item that Merlin will purchase, but allows any quantity above this figure. If set to, for example, 1000 and a purchase requirement is for, let's say, 750,  Merlin will buy 1,000.  However, if the requirement is for 1,001 or more Merlin will buy that exact quantity. (See Buying / Run Main Buy).

Auto Issue Item is checked for materials that you wish Merlin to auto-issue to any production job in which the item in question appears on the BoM.  This is checked by default, and should be unchecked if appropriate.

Examples of where this might be appropriate are with items such as glue, or solder, which cannot be accurately quantified.

Send to Bonded Stock will transfer some or all of your materials stock to Bonded Stock, which completely removes the value of these materials from your active stockholding.  This can be used to control "dead stock", or materials owned by a third party, such as a customer.

If a record does not exist in Bonded Stock for this item, it will be created automatically.

The Bonded Stock field shows how many are currently held in this area.

Unit of Measure in Use, and Unit of Measure to Buy are fairly clear, and are used in conjunction with USE Units in ONE BUY UNIT.

Please Note:  This feature is included for the sake of flexibility, to allow an additional level of very fine control over precious materials, and for backward compatibility with earlier versions of Merlin.  You may never need to use it.  Should you choose to, the protocol is as follows:

Where a material is purchased in one unit of measure (say litres) but you want to handle it in stock in a smaller unit (say ml.) you can enter the values here and set the Use Units in One Buy Unit to 1000. This enables Merlin to give you the option of using either value in many reports.  The native stock unit will always be the smaller of the two.  These field defaults to ITEM and 1 when no unit of measure applies.

The Category field allows you to assign materials to a group (e.g. CAPacitors, BOXes) for reporting purposes.  The default entry is the first three characters of the Part No., so you might find it helpful to apply a meaningful prefix to part numbers.  You can change the Category entry  using up to 5 characters.

Bay Location indicates the primary location for this item.  Additional locations can be recorded in Notes.

Manufacturer and Manufacturer's Part No. speak for themselves.

Buying Data

The Buying tab contains some vital data for procurement of materials:

You must provide at least one Supplier Code (and up to three) for each record card, which you can key-in if you know them, or select from the drop-down combo.

It is strongly recommended that your favoured supplier is entered into the S1 position. (See Design / Assembly Costing.)

Important Note:  Assemblies, subassemblies and manufacturing processes, labour etc., (in other words, all in-house items) must have the suppler code set to HOUSE.

You also need to provide the Suppliers Part No. and the Pack Cost for each supplier entered.  In Merlin, the "pack" is the unit you purchase; either the individual item, or a pack containing a multiple quantity, as determined by what your supplier's Part No. refers to.  (See more information below.)

To the right you will notice some fields for Break 1 & Pack Cost, and Break 2 & Pack Cost.
These are no doubt self-evident, but to be clear, if the item shown goes down in price if, say, 5,000 were bought at once, and again if 10,000 were purchased, then Break 1 would be 5000 and Break 1 Pack Cost would be the cost as appropriate, and Break 2 would be 10000 and Break 2 Pack Cost likewise as appropriate.  Merlin will then calculate they purchase price according to the quantity being bought.

It is important to be clear here as to whether your supplier's price is for the individual item, or for some pack quantity (whether pre-packed or not).

Then come fields for the Lead Days (time in days to deliver), Quantity in One Pack, and
Pack Purchase Multiple for each of the suppliers specified above.

Next comes the Pack Description field.  An entry here (any text, though it should be meaningful to humans) tells Merlin that the Part No. refers to a quantity greater than 1, whether pre-packed or not.  This is crucially significant when Purchase Orders are generated.

For detailed analysis of this crucial subject, please see Purchase Pack Quantities below.

Default Supplier is where you select which of the suppliers entered above is to be used as your preferred source for this item.

Next Order Supplier, as it suggests, enables you to set an alternative supplier for this item, for the next purchase only.  The next purchase order raised by Merlin will use the supplier selected in this field, and then the setting will automatically revert to the DEFAULT SUPPLIER.

Please Note:  In both of these supplier options, you can select only from the suppliers specified in S1, S2 and S3 above.

Days to Next Delivery enables you to over-ride the default Lead Days setting for the next Purchase Order only.  It will then revert to the default for the selected supplier.

Stop Purchases, if checked, will prevent all auto-purchase of this item.  Proposed purchase listings will include Stopped items, but they will be flagged as stopped, and will not be included in the purchase run.  Typically, use this as a temporary means of inhibiting purchase whilst fixing a problem, and uncheck the box when the problem is resolved.

The Allow Schedules check box will be visible only if the currently selected supplier supports scheduled deliveries or call-offs.  This property is set for each supplier in
The Market / Business Contacts.  Check the box (if appropriate) where you want Merlin's
MRP Engine to schedule deliveries as required, and/or you wish manually to be able to schedule deliveries or call-offs.  Please see also Buying / Delivery Schedules and
Buying / Run MRP.

History

The History tab provides useful information about the use and purchasing of stock items, and also has some field for data entry:

The Selling Pack and Price Break fields work on exactly the same principle as the
Supplier Code data on the Buying tab, but here it refers to the selling of this item, either as a finished assembly or a spare part.

The data should be entered for assemblies, and any stock items which are sold separately.

Batch Info / Comment is for information only, and can be used as required.

Other Tabs

Notes enables you to enter any amount of data or information about the selected item.

Movements lists every stock movement for the selected item, as far back as this information is stored.  This will depend upon your policy for deleting "old" records.
Clicking the Print Button will generate a Stock Movement Summary (analysed month by month) for the item currently on-screen, with options to View or Print the report.
(See Admin / Set Parameters.)

Shop List lists every item that is on your Shopping List.  You can select an item by clicking on it. (Please see Buying / Shopping List).

BoMs lists every Bill of Materials in which the viewed item is a component.

Stopped lists all items which have been Stopped as described above.  Clicking an item in the list will select it.

Additionally, the Status panel on the lower right of the screen will contain buttons (as appropriate the the record being viewed), Used In Jobs  to show running jobs in which this item is used, and/or Work In Progress (items in production) where the record is for an assembly.

Purchase Pack Quantities

Quantity in One Pack is clear enough, but has a vital role to play in conjunction with
Pack Description, and the following should be studied carefully.  Also, please note that for HOUSE items (assemblies/subassemblies) this field changes to Production Batch Qty.  Further information about this appears further down this section.

If we use good old-fashioned floppy discs (which we can all visualise) as an example of a "material" you might purchase, and assume that you can buy these loose in any quantity you like (in other words, your supplier's part number is for a single disc), then the Quantity in One Pack is 1, and Pack Description must be left empty.  In this case, Merlin will always purchase the exact quantity of discs required.  Pack Cost is for 1 disc.

Let us now suppose that all of the above is correct except that you must buy a minimum of 10 discs in any one purchase, but any number you like above that quantity.  In this case, set the above items in exactly the same way, but enter 10 in the MIN Purchase field.  Now Merlin will purchase a minimum of ten when a requirement for less than ten exists, or the exact number if the requirement is greater than ten.

Now we'll change the scenario a bit.  We'll say you can buy only in multiples (bags) of ten.  If your supplier's part number is still for the single floppy disc, Quantity in One Pack must be set to 10, Pack Description must be left empty and MIN Purchase set to 0.  Pack Cost is for 1 disc.  Now Merlin will always purchase the nearest multiple above the current requirement, so if 9 are needed, Merlin will buy 10x Floppy Disc.  If 11 are needed, Merlin will buy 20x Floppy Disc and so on.

Finally, we'll say that (as is more likely in this example) your supplier provides floppy discs in boxes of 10, and his part number is for the pack.  Everything is done precisely as in the preceding example except that Pack Description  must contain a some descriptive text, which would typically be something like Box 10x Floppy Discs.
Pack Cost is now for the pack of 10 discs.  Using the figures above, Merlin will now buy 1x Box of 10 Floppy Discs, 2x Box of 10 Floppy Discs and so on.  It is the presence of the
Pack Description that triggers this behaviour.  The content of the text is immaterial to the process, except that it is used to describe the pack.

We'll look at another example using the same principles. Let us say you buy cable by the metre, the stock unit is 1 metre (you can use fractions of a metre on any BoM), and there are 50 metres on the roll.  Quantity in One Pack is 50, and Pack Description will be something like 50 metre Spool XYZ Cable.

And to conclude, your supplier might specify that you must buy the spools of cable, or the boxes of floppy discs or whatever in multiples of 5 spools or ten boxes (packs), or some such.  In these cases Pack Purchase Multiple must be set to 5 or 10 or whatever is appropriate.
Merlin will now adjust the purchase quantities as appropriate.

Production Batch Quantity.

If the Resource Record Card you are currently viewing is for a HOUSE item, which is to say an assembly or subassembly made in-house, the Quantity in One Pack field becomes Production Batch Qty.  The purpose of this is to tell the MRP engine (Manufacturing / Shop Floor Control / Run MRP and Buying / Run MRP) that this item can be built only in multiples of the batch.  This can be used if, say, a material component can be purchased only in batch quantities and you wish to work to those batches, or it is more economical to work with certain batch sizes, or you wish to create surplus stock holdings of the assembly, or whatever other reason you may have.

The MRP Engine will then generate all Works Orders for this item in multiples of the batch.  If shortages are being fixed for an item with a batch quantity, and only 1 of those items is required, the Works Order and AutoGenerated job will still be for the batch quantity.

Filter Stock Records

This is a powerful feature that lets you  view just the stock items you want.

Preset filter buttons change the displayed record set to include only Materials, Assemblies or Processes.  To clear a filter, click Show All.

When you click the Custom Filter button, a dialog appears in which you type a key word or phrase that you are looking for in the materials description field.  This may be something like "capacitor", or "cable", or "bottle" - anything that will narrow down the selection to the item(s) you are looking for.  (Perhaps you are trying to locate a part who's number you do not know.)

All items that contain the word or phrase somewhere within the description field will be selected.   If you click the Resources tab before you begin, you will see the list change to show only items that meet the criteria.  When you see a record you want, click on it and it will be selected.  You can then use the other tabs to edit this record, if you wish.

You can set a new filter without first clearing the current one, and you can clear the filter by clicking the Show all button, which will make the entire Resource file visible again.

Do not use plurals unless necessary.  Entering WASHER will find all items containing the words "washer" and "washers".  Entering WASHERS will not find "washer".

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