Adding Equipment

[Cincy11jr]

What is the proper way to enter equipment into the resource pool? I have it
entered as material, but I keep thinking there is a better way to do it. Any
help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Scott

 

[Antonio]

I believe it should be entered as work, not material, so that the equipment
is not overbooked. For more than one piece of equipment of the same kind, you
can adjust the max units.

 

[Steve House]

Antonio is correct, equipment is typically entered as a work resource.
Materials resources are either used up over the performance of a task - fuel
for a bulldozer, for example - or incorporated into the task's deliverable,
for example paint on a wall.

 

[RLau]

I also have a question about this.

This seems like the right thing to do (making the assumption that equipment
is a work resource) but I've found that MSProject actually doesn't understand
equipment properly.

For example, I'll enter one of my prototype bays as a resource into
MSProject. It's a limited resource that I have. However, once I do that,
MSProject begins to think that my prototype bays can actually add work effort
to my projects. So all of a sudden, my tasks magically disappear because my
inanimate bay somehow completed the work for my engineer.

Is there any way around this? Software, plugin, tool or otherwise? I'm
pretty frustrated, trying to get this to all work smoothly.

Antonio is correct, equipment is typically entered as a work resource.
Materials resources are either used up over the performance of a task - fuel
for a bulldozer, for example - or incorporated into the task's deliverable,
for example paint on a wall.

--
Steve House [Project MVP]
MS Project Trainer & Consultant
Visit http://project.mvps.org/faqs.htm for the FAQs

What is the proper way to enter equipment into the resource pool? I have
it
entered as material, but I keep thinking there is a better way to do it.
Any
help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Scott

 

[JulieS]

Hello RLau,

You are correct, to Project a work resource performs work on tasks so
when you add the prototype bays to tasks, the bays create work.
However, in order to see if the prototype bay is in use and check for
overallocations, you need to have the "work" for the bay there. So,
first, I would recommend turning off "effort driven" for the tasks
using the prototype bays. I also suggest setting the maximum units
for the prototype bay to a very low number, like 1%. Then as you
assign the bay to tasks, the amount of work will be very small but you
can still see the utilization and check for overallocations.

I hope this helps. Let us know how you get along.

Julie
Project MVP

Visit http://project.mvps.org/ for the FAQs and additional information
about Microsoft Project

I also have a question about this.

This seems like the right thing to do (making the assumption that
equipment
is a work resource) but I've found that MSProject actually doesn't
understand
equipment properly.

For example, I'll enter one of my prototype bays as a resource into
MSProject. It's a limited resource that I have. However, once I do
that,
MSProject begins to think that my prototype bays can actually add
work effort
to my projects. So all of a sudden, my tasks magically disappear
because my
inanimate bay somehow completed the work for my engineer.

Is there any way around this? Software, plugin, tool or otherwise?
I'm
pretty frustrated, trying to get this to all work smoothly.

Antonio is correct, equipment is typically entered as a work
resource.
Materials resources are either used up over the performance of a
task - fuel
for a bulldozer, for example - or incorporated into the task's
deliverable,
for example paint on a wall.

--
Steve House [Project MVP]
MS Project Trainer & Consultant
Visit http://project.mvps.org/faqs.htm for the FAQs

What is the proper way to enter equipment into the resource pool?
I have
it
entered as material, but I keep thinking there is a better way to
do it.
Any
help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Scott

 

[Steve House]

The tasks shouldn't disappear - if the task is marked effort driven, adding
the bay after the engineer has already been assigned will shorten task
duration inappropriately but the fix for that is simple - mark the task as
non-effort driven before assigning the bay resource. One reason things such
as bays would be work resources is that if you have three bays, you can only
have a maximum of 3 tasks requiring a bay going on at once. A fourth
bay-requiring task needs to be deferred until one of the bays in use is
freed up. Material resources, OTOH, are infinite as far as scheduling is
concerned and as far as MSP know you always have as many on hand as you need
at any moment.
--
Steve House [Project MVP]
MS Project Trainer & Consultant
Visit http://project.mvps.org/faqs.htm for the FAQs

I also have a question about this.

This seems like the right thing to do (making the assumption that
equipment
is a work resource) but I've found that MSProject actually doesn't
understand
equipment properly.

For example, I'll enter one of my prototype bays as a resource into
MSProject. It's a limited resource that I have. However, once I do that,
MSProject begins to think that my prototype bays can actually add work
effort
to my projects. So all of a sudden, my tasks magically disappear because
my
inanimate bay somehow completed the work for my engineer.

Is there any way around this? Software, plugin, tool or otherwise? I'm
pretty frustrated, trying to get this to all work smoothly.

Antonio is correct, equipment is typically entered as a work resource.
Materials resources are either used up over the performance of a task -
fuel
for a bulldozer, for example - or incorporated into the task's
deliverable,
for example paint on a wall.

--
Steve House [Project MVP]
MS Project Trainer & Consultant
Visit http://project.mvps.org/faqs.htm for the FAQs

What is the proper way to enter equipment into the resource pool? I
have
it
entered as material, but I keep thinking there is a better way to do
it.
Any
help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Scott