How manufacturing works in Rocket ERP

The Manufacturing module turns raw materials into finished products and keeps stock and the books in step at every stage. You describe what a product is made of and how it is made once, then run work orders against that definition. The system moves the materials, receives the output and calculates the real cost of every unit.

The building blocks

• Bill of materials (BOM). The components and quantities one batch of a product needs, plus any by-products and expected scrap. See Create a bill of materials.

• Routing. The sequence of operations that makes the product, with setup and run times and the labor and overhead rates of each step. See Create and approve a routing.

• Work center. The machine, labor station or subcontractor where an operation runs. See Set up work centers.

• Work order. An instruction to make a quantity of one product with an approved BOM and an approved routing. See Create a work order.

• Production plan. A statement of demand that generates work orders in batches. See Plan production.

The production flow

1. An administrator completes the manufacturing settings for the branch: the raw material, work-in-progress, finished goods and scrap warehouses, and the GL accounts.

2. Engineering prepares and approves the BOM and the routing.

3. Production creates a work order and releases it. Release checks that the materials are in stock and can reserve them.

4. The storekeeper issues the materials. They move from the raw material warehouse to the work-in-progress warehouse.

5. Operators start the order and report output per operation, from the work order or from the shop floor dashboard.

6. The supervisor completes the order. Finished goods enter the finished goods warehouse at their actual cost, and the product's average cost is updated.

Quality inspections and quality holds can stop an order at any point, and the variance report compares the estimated cost with the actual cost once orders are finished.

The manufacturing dashboard

Open Manufacturing › Manufacturing Dashboard for a live view of production in your branch.

• The tiles at the top count work orders by status: Total, Planned, Released, In progress, Completed and Cancelled.

• Pending BOM approvals shows how many bills of materials are still drafts. A product cannot go into production until its BOM is approved.

• Work center utilization lists each work center with its load, and flags the ones marked as a Bottleneck.

• Top products lists the products completed in the Last 30 days, with the quantity and the number of orders.

• Recent work orders shows the latest orders with their status and Planned qty.

Common questions

Do I need routings for every product? Yes. A work order needs both an approved BOM and an approved routing for the same product. The routing is what carries labor and overhead into the product cost.

Who can see the module? Access follows your user group's permissions. A user can, for example, read work orders without being allowed to release or complete them.