Vulcraft System Startup and the Job Tracking System
The Challenge
Vulcraft Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Nucor Corporation, is the nation's
largest manufacturer of steel joists and steel deck products. Prior to 2000, Vulcraft
operated 6 plants, located in South Carolina, Nebraska, Texas, Alabama, Indiana and
Utah. In 2001, Vulcraft opened its seventh plant in Chemung, New York. As part of the
commissioning of the new plant, Vulcraft required application software to support the
Production Scheduling, Inventory, Fixed Assets, Payroll and Purchasing functions. These
production systems would have to be installed, configured, tested, and implemented
according to an aggressive schedule in order to accommodate commencement of
manufacturing activities at the new plant.
Third Day's Solution
Third Day Solutions had previously supported production scheduling and job costing
systems at the Vulcraft Alabama plant. When Vulcraft New York management decided to
utilize the core software from the Alabama plant for the new plant in New York, Third
Day Solutions provided the technical expertise and support necessary to successfully
implement the software at the New York facility. This project, known as the System
Startup Project, involved the initialization of the AS400 based production system by
moving and customizing Vulcraft Alabama systems to Vulcraft New York environment.
Third Day Solutions (TDS) provided resources to initialize and test these AS400 systems
in support of production manufacturing startup in late 2001.
TDS is continuing to provide analysis and programming support for the Production
Scheduling System. This system includes components for Sales, Scheduling, Operations,
Shipping, and Invoicing. Services include management consulting, analysis,
development, system testing, documentation, and user training. TDS also has completed a
number of major projects to enhance the production system and provides remote as well
as on-site support.
Additional projects designed and developed for Vulcraft financial and production systems
include the following:
- Development of interfaces for information transfer to Vulcraft Great Plains reporting
system. The information included sales and sales tax, inventory, and job completion
data.
- Numerous engineering reports were developed to provide job status information to
the Production Department. These new reports facilitated smooth job flow through
the plant by highlighting those jobs behind schedule and over cost.
- TDS developed a "safe" testing environment so that new programs and projects could
be sufficiently tested by end users before being placed into production. This
additional layer of quality assurance reduced production system problems and
provided users valuable feedback and training prior to implementing changes to their
technical environment.
- TDS, in conjunction with Vulcraft financial personnel, developed a set of tax reports
to enable proper taxes to be collected from customers and paid to the appropriate
taxing entity.
- Developed system enhancements to support the joist production function, by giving
users greater flexibility and more timely information.
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