Assembly Maintenance Screen

In the EZ Construction Estimator product, an Assembly is an aggregate of Components and other Assemblies that make up a specific collection. An example of an Assembly would be a roofing square, a drywall wall or installing a sink, etc. EZ Construction Estimator is installed with hundreds of pre-built Assemblies in the database. If an Assembly specific to an industry is not found, simply add a new one. The desktop allows the User to drag items from the Component and Assembly tree onto the Assembly screen and specify the quantity of the item used in the Assembly. If any values are changed on an Assembly, the User can automatically apply the changes to any Assembly or Estimate that is using the changed Assembly.

The Assembly Maintenance is shown below with key attributes identified.

A) Each Assembly is assigned to a Category and Sub Category. Categories and Sub Categories are used to subdivide the hundreds of Assemblies in the Component tree. EZ Construction Estimator is installed with dozens of Categories and Sub Categories already created, however, new ones can be added, if required.

B) A Unit of Measure is assigned to the Assembly as well as Measurement Factors and a Whole Units Only flag. The best way to explain Measurement Factor is to look at a box of nails. If a box contains 500 nails, the Measurement Factor will be 1/500 or .002. In other words, one nail would be .002 of a box. This allows the User to specify using 10 nails, for example, instead of 10/500 or .02 of a box. The Whole Units Only attribute will round up quantities in Estimates. This is used because you cannot purchase half of tub assembly, for example.

C) There are 4 Costs used on Assemblies, Material, Labor, Fixed and One Time. Waste Percentages are also allowed for Material and Labor costs. One Time Costs will look at an entire Estimate and if the same Assembly is used multiple times, the cost will only be applied one time. This can be used for equipment rental costs, for example. The Skip Costs checkbox is used so that the costs can be created but optionally applied, if necessary. Also, this area of the screen includes a total column which automatically adds up all of the costs on Components and Assemblies used, so the correct cost for the Assembly can be determined. If the costs are less than the calculated totals, the total costs will display in red.

D) This area shows what the attributes are for the selected Component or Assembly show in area E.

E) This tree shows what Components and Assemblies make up the Assembly being maintained. To add a Component or Assembly, simply drag the appropriate item from the tree on the desktop into this area. This will automatically display a dialog box where a quantity can be entered and calculated costs can be overridden. To change the quantity, simply double-click on the item to be changed or press the appropriate maintenance button below the tree.