Material Resource Usage Illustrated
Dr. Ed Hanna, one of our most senior field people for EPM recently posted a great example of using material resources using Project Server. So, I'm taking Ed's e-mail and converting into this post. I hope you find this very useful.
Here's an example of how you might use Project to track the pouring of the concrete for one section of a dam.
First, create a Resource Sheet entry for the concrete. Click the image below for more detail.
The dam footing work we are tracking will contain 20,000 cu. meters of concrete and will be poured over a ten workday period. The Gantt Chart task to pour this footing looks as follows.
Next, the Resource Usage view shows the planned usage of concrete at 2,000 cu. meters per day. Note: there is no Actual Work as the task has not yet begun.
Once progress begins, the Resource Usage view can be used to report actual usage. In this case, only 1,000 cu. meters of concrete poured on day #1. Consequently, work is off to a slow start.
Here’s the full Resource Usage view showing 3,000 cu. meters of additional concrete poured on day #2. On the left you can see totals. For example, you can see that 20,000 cu. meters of concrete is scheduled to be poured (i.e. Work) and so far 4,000 cu. meters have been poured (i.e. Actual Work). The graph in the lower portion of the display shows Cumulative Scheduled Work (i.e. the cumulative amount of concrete scheduled to be poured).
The display can also be changed to track the cost of the concrete. The graph in the lower portion of the display shows Cumulative Scheduled Cost (i.e. the cumulative cost of concrete scheduled to be poured).
I hope this is helpful. By the way, Hoover Dam contains 3.33M cu. meters of concrete.
