About Part Definition

Parts can be defined by (Senior) Design Engineers and (Senior) Manufacturing Engineers who can create top-level parts or subtypes of parts.

When a new part is created, a master part is automatically created at the same time and connected to the part with the Part Revision relationship. Unconfigured parts can be revised and all revisions of a particular unconfigured part are connected to the same part master. Each part revision has only one part master at any time.

This page discusses:

See Also
Creating a Part
Part Properties
Editing Part Properties

A CO creates part revisions for unconfigured parts when the CO enters the In Work state and each part revision begins moving through its own lifecycle. Parts can belong to logical groups called part families. You can add or remove parts from a part family.

Once a part is created, you can attach other objects to it such as drawing prints, CAD models, CAD drawings, supporting documents, and specifications.

The Responsible Manufacturing Engineer reviews and approves parts and attached objects, making adjustments to attributes like Target Release Date and Estimated Cost as required.

Release Phases

A part can be in one of two release phases, Development or Production. Development parts are intended only for research, testing, or internal use. A production part either belongs to a product or is a product itself.

Using the Set to Production command on either the part properties or the Bill of Materials categories, you can move a part or BOM from Development to Production. Moving from Production to Development is not allowed. See About Set to Production.

You can create a part of either phase with or without enabling change-required. If you select a work under change action (CA) while creating a production part, change-required is automatically enabled for the part. If you create a production part without change-required enabled, you can enable change management later using the Set Change Required in the part's Properties tab toolbar.

Regardless of when you apply change management to a part, the part is moved to strict mode once the change is associated. Afterward, all modifications to the part must be enforced only through the selected work under CA. No other CA can be applied to the part.

Production parts cannot be promoted from In Work to Frozen state without an associated CA. Therefore, production parts cannot be released without change-required applied to it.

Unconfigured Parts

Engineering BOM Management has traditionally supported fully unconfigured parts and BOMs. This means that every change to a BOM is defined and implemented by creating new part revision objects, which are connected with copied EBOM relationships. Whenever there is a BOM change, the parent assembly part is revised. The new part revision first-level BOM is modified by adding child parts, removing child parts, or editing EBOM attributes such as quantity or component location.

When the new assembly part revision is released, its first level BOM configuration is released. The latest released revision is used. All EBOM expansions display the latest released part revisions connected via EBOM relationships. This method of managing parts and BOMs is known as an unconfigured BOM mode.