Workflow for Generating an EBOM from a Product Configuration

This workflow describes the overall procedure for generating an EBOM from a product configuration.

Before you begin: An existing EBOM (used for copying structure) should already exist.
See Also
Generating Bills of Materials: BOM, EBOM, PBOM
Working with Product Configurations
  1. Define a product line. See Creating a Product Line.
  2. Define variability (variants and option groups), and associated options (variant values and options), at the product line level. See Working with Variants and Options. If the variability is mandatory, select the variant or options group, then click Toggle Mandatory in the page toolbar.
  3. In the context of the product line, create a model and model version (Creating a Model Version).
  4. For the model version, create a part family. On the GBOM page for the model version, use the Create Part Family command. This part family will be used to generate and assign a unique top-level part number for each product configurations for the context model version.
  5. Define the logical feature structure (See step 6 for an alternative method for defining the structure):
    1. From the context of the model version, in the navigation pane, select Logical Structures.
    2. Select the Logical Views tab.
    3. Define the logical feature structure that mirrors the EBOM structure. This can be a multi-level feature structure composed of features representing assemblies and sub-features representing variant components.

      You can define sub-features that can have inclusion rules (include variant A if variant B was selected).

      If you have parts that are always used independent from any features, you should still create a logical feature to represent these parts. For example, the part "User's Guide", should still be defined as a logical feature with a Fixed Part on the GBOM. The concept of a Fixed Part means that the logical feature's GBOM part does not have design variants or a part family (no part inclusion rule) and the part associated to the feature is always selected.

      It is highly recommend that parts are not directly connected to the model version.

  6. As an alternative to building the structure feature-by-feature, use an existing EBOM multi-level assembly as a starting point for the logical feature structure. See Compare EBOM Structures.
    1. On the Logical Features page tab, select Reports > Compare to EBOM.
    2. Search for and select an existing part whose EBOM assembly you want to use.
    3. Select "Name" for the Match Based On and "Find Number" for the Compare By fields. Make sure the Report Output section has "Complete Summary" selected.
    4. Click Done.
    5. Select each item you want to include in the new structure.
    6. Click Sync To Left.

      New logical feature structures are created to mirror the EBOM structure. Click on each item to give it an appropriate Marketing Name and Marketing Text.

  7. For each logical feature:
    1. Select the logical feature.
    2. From the page toolbar, select Reports > GBOM Part Table.
    3. Assign a part family to each feature and sub-feature. This is used to generate a unique part number based on a product configuration.
    4. Assign design variants if you want to define part inclusion rules for each logical feature. For example, select part A if color Red is selected.
  8. Assign variants and option groups to the model version.
  9. Generate the product configuration for this model version. See Creating a Product Configuration.
  10. Resolve issues on the BOM:
    1. On the Properties page for the product configuration, select Actions > Preview EBOM.
    2. If the Part Number columns shows , a part was not selected because either the part is not defined or an inclusion rule did not evaluate to True. Create or add parts for all items.
  11. In the page toolbar click Generate EBOM. See Generating an EBOM.