How to Add Setup Time to a Routing Step in EDGEBIC

To add setup time to a routing step in EDGEBIC by User Solutions you type the changeover hours into the step's Setup Time (hrs) cell and save with Update Standard BOR. Setup is charged once per run. Hours required is charged per unit. Getting the two into the correct fields is the difference between a schedule that plans your changeovers and one that multiplies them by the order quantity.

This is the flat, per-step figure. Changeover times that depend on what ran before are a different mechanism, covered in the EDGEBIC setup matrix explained.

Before You Start

• Separate the one-time work from the repeating work. Fixture changes, program loads, first-article checks and tool swaps are setup. Anything that happens again for every piece is run time.
• Have a real figure, not a padded one. Setup is booked capacity on a real machine, and padding it wastes the same capacity every run.
• Know whether the changeover is constant or depends on the previous product. Constant belongs here, and product-pair dependent belongs in the setup matrix.

Adding the Setup Time

1. Open the BOR tab and select the product's routing. The grid loads in Data Grid mode.
2. Find the step's row and click into the Setup Time (hrs) cell.
3. Type the changeover time in decimal hours. Ninety minutes is 1.5. Twenty minutes is 0.33, or type 20/60 and let the cell do the arithmetic.
4. Check the header while you work. Setup Time = is a live sum across the routing's steps, so it moves as you type. On the reference routing, steps of 0.50, 1.00 and 0.50 give a header of 2.
5. Leave Hours Required as the per-unit cycle time. The two fields sit side by side and they are not interchangeable.
6. Click Update Standard BOR. If the Validation Errors dialog appears, fix the listed rows rather than answering yes to "Do you want to save anyway?".

In Designer mode the same value appears as Setup Time (hours) in the Properties panel when the node is selected, and it saves with Update. Use whichever view you are already in: it is one field, one routing, two views.

It helps to know where the step's setup value sits in the wider picture. A work center can carry its own default setup, and the value you type on the routing step overrides that default for this operation. Above both of those, where you have built a setup matrix, sequence-dependent changeover times for a specific product pair take precedence, because those are the most specific figure of all. So a step setup value is what applies unless a matrix entry covers the exact changeover, and it applies over the machine's generic default. That ordering is why entering setup on the step is the right move for a changeover that is genuinely the same every time, and why the matrix is the right move for one that swings with the previous product.

The other reason to get setup right is quoting. The scheduler includes setup in quote simulations, and setup is where small-quantity work hides its true cost. A ten-unit order of a part with an hour of setup and a six-minute cycle is far more setup than run, so a quote that ignores setup understates it badly. Entering an honest setup figure on the routing is what lets a promise date and a cost estimate reflect the changeover a small order really pays for.

What Changes When You Save

Setup lands on the operation as a flat addition at the start. The reference milling step at 1.0 hour of setup and 0.50 hours a unit plans 51.0 hours for 100 units and 26.0 hours for 50. Notice what that does to small orders: the setup share of a 10-unit order is 1.0 hour out of 6.0, which is why quoting small quantities without setup in the routing understates them badly.

How to Check It Worked

Read Setup Time = in the header strip. It should have moved by exactly the value you typed. If it did not, the save did not take.

Then schedule a test order and compare two quantities. Schedule 10 units and 100 units of the same product and look at the operation's bar length on the Job View Gantt. The difference between the two bars should be the run time only, because setup is identical on both. If the setup portion scales with quantity, the value went into the wrong field.

Sanity check the total against the shop. A routing whose Setup Time = header reads 12 on a three-step product is telling you either that changeovers are genuinely brutal or that someone typed minutes.

Common Mistakes

Typing minutes. The field is decimal hours. Ninety minutes is 1.5, not 90. This is the single most common setup error, and at 90 the operation books more than eleven shift-days of changeover before a single part is made.

Putting setup into Hours Required. It then multiplies by quantity. A 0.5 hour changeover in the wrong field costs 250 hours on a 500-unit order, and the operation swamps the Gantt.

Padding setup to cover the worst changeover. If white to cream takes ten minutes and black to white takes four hours, a single padded number wastes hours on every easy changeover. That is exactly what the setup matrix exists to solve: see how EDGEBIC resolves setup time for which value wins where.

Setting setup on a material row. Component rows book no machine time, so timing cells show N/A on them and setup has nothing to attach to. See adding a material step to a routing for what those rows do carry.

Expecting live jobs to adopt it. Scheduled jobs run on their own frozen routing copy, which keeps shop paperwork valid. Pushing a setup change into a running job is a deliberate per-job action.

Next Steps

The other half of every operation's duration is covered in changing the hours on a routing step. For where setup sits inside the whole recipe, read the bill of routing explained. Browse the rest of the tasks at the EDGEBIC how-to hub, or see the platform at EDGEBIC.