TimberSmart Sawmill

TimberSmart is an information management system developed for the timber industry by a team with a unique combination of timber industry knowledge, database development skills, project management and management consulting skills.

TimberSmart has been specifically developed for the timber industry. It is not a standard manufacturing package that has been modified or compromised to fit the peculiarities of the timber industry.

The TimberSmart system is future proofed. It has been designed as a base system to which optional modules may be added.

Standard Features

Sawmill Production

• Packs are created from the green mill via tally sheet entry or if text files are available from bin sorters these can be interfaced to TimberSmart to create the packs automatically.
• Packs can be numbered automatically or the operator can enter them.
• Pack labels, with bar codes, can be printed to a variety of label printers. Ie Zebra, DataMax, Monarch and Intermec.
• Purchased packs can have the suppliers pack number recorded.
• Each pack is unique within TimberSmart. It is not deleted at any stage. It is always available for reporting and querying at any time.
• You can track every process that a pack has been through as TimberSmart creates a transaction record for each process the pack goes through. Each physical process in your sawmill can be emulated within TimberSmart. Ie Create at green mill, racking, air dry, kiln dry, treatment, docking, dry milling, splitting runs, despatching etc.
• Standard costing can be achieved using a number of different methods.
• Detailed production reporting. This can be done either at a pack level or summary through nominated process.
• Dry Milling allows for packs to be disposed into a production run and the new packs created. Machining costs are then added to the cost of timber input. These new packs are created with the recovered costs plus machining
• Packs within TimberSmart are given various attributes rather than product codes. This makes it much easier to see your stock, do production planning and perform sawmill processes. These attribute include Grade, Treatment, Dryness, Finish, Width, Thickness and Length. Combinations of these attribute make up unique products, for example Pine F5 Untreated, Kiln Dried, Rougher Headed 90 x 45 – 5.4m.
• Both nominal and actual sizes are held for every product.
• When putting packs through processes like Kiln Drying for example, it is as simple as changing the dryness attribute from GREEN to KILN DRY. A new transaction is written to the database. This allows you to see each change in attribute as the pack moves through the production cycle. And because each transaction is date stamped it is then possible to recreate your stock on hand at any time in the condition as at that date.

Inventory Management

• The heart of inventory management is the Super Enquiry screen. This allows the user to not only see every pack currently in stock but also every pack that has ever been in stock. By selecting the various pack attributes you can filter this information to then give you the detail required for your enquiry. This screen is used extensively for selecting packs for production as well as by the sales team to provide detailed information to customers about stocks on hand. Stock reports can be create from the filtered view and then printed, faxed or emailed. It is even possible to reserve and de-select packs that you don’t want to appear, in these stock reports.

Stocktake

• Exception reports to detail unders and overs
• Pack valuation reports for completed stocktakes
• You can return to a stocktake at any time.
• Because TimberSmart is date driven your business can continue after the stock has been counted while you complete the stocktake. This allows you to add new production and despatch stock without having to close the stocktake first.

Sales Orders

• Customer/delivery details are defaulted from the customer tables
• Picking slips are printed for the order man to pick the packs from.
• Packs can be reserved against customer.
• Automatic or manual sales pricing available.
• Sales Order reporting to show outstanding orders and order items plus other relevant sales order reports

Despatches

• Despatch planning can be used to prepare load plans for the next days despatches.
• The despatch function does not show pricing on the despatch screen or despatch docket.
• Despatch docket customized for your site.
• You can despatch multiple orders on one despatch docket.
• Use a plain paper laser printer to produce the despatch docket. No need for pre-printed stationary.

Invoicing

• Proof List before invoice allows you to see the value of the despatches prior to printing the invoices
• Customized invoices for your site.
• You can add multiple despatches to one invoice.
• Export to the finance package of your choice. ie MYOB, QuickBooks etc
• Use a plain paper laser printer to produce the invoice. No need for pre-printed stationary.
• Reprint or view the invoice at any time.

Reporting

• Reporting groups by Inventory, Production, Orders, Planning, Sales, Stocktake & Historical
• A wide range of reports in each category.
• Full sales reporting by Customer, Product categories, GCS attributes, region etc
• Date driven
• Historical reports can be created for any past period.
• Export all reports to Excel or Word
• Use external data connections from excel to do further analysis of your TimberSmart data. Ie Pivot Tables & Charts
• Uses standard Microsoft data connections available from Excel. No need to purchase any other software.

Optional Modules

Hardwood Log Inventory

• The Hardwood Log Inventory System allows a sawmill or other Log Purchasing business to manage their log supply and inventory. Daily processes such as log receipts, log movements and mill usage information are tracked. Enquiries and reporting are available, as well as data exports to other reporting and analysis tools, for example Microsoft Excel or Crystal Reports. Full tracking of inventory levels and movements is provided so that information may be extracted about individual logs and log receipts, and of all the processes applied to each inventory warehouse. Extensive green mill reporting is available to analysis your log cut and sawn output by sawmill, shift, grade end section etc.

Export Documentation

• Full export documentation is available if required.
• All your export documents can be recreated within TimberSmart via excel.

Interfaces to PLC’s etc

• TimberSmart is able to be connected to bin sorter/stackers and other PLC’s to automatically produce inventory packs. We can customise connections to most sawmill equipment that have some sort of computer based intelligence.

Single process data entry

• If you have a production area that produces a limit range of product ie Palings, then we can provide a data entry point we the operator just clicks a button to produce the next pack of that product. Pack numbering is taken care of and bar coded pack labels are printed automatically.

Hand Held Stocktake.

• Use hand held technology to collect your pack details and then load this information into your stocktake. Reduce the people and time required to do a stocktake and increase its accuracy. Exception reporting to show under and overs of your stocktake. Stocktake by location, grade, dryness, treatment, finish, end section or length.

Security and Audit

• The security module allows the system administrator to control what each user can see and do. It is very simple to setup and maintain and control the actions of users and user groups. This is a required product if you are doing data entry in the sawmill.
• Auditing can be added to record every pack transaction from creation, movements through all processes and despatch. The user name, date and time and type of transaction are recorded. View audit records from Super Enquiry for each pack.

Excel Training

• An Excel training course designed to leverage information directly from your TimberSmart database. Learn how to work with queries and extract information from TimberSmart for Stocks, Production, Orders and Sales.

Load Planning

• Plan loads and manage order picking to maximise your truck loads. Utilise bar-coded pack labels for accurate stock picking. Track freight costs back to the pack level for net delivered price in sales reporting.