Transportation Resources

Resources play a central role in planning and execution within SAP Transportation Management. Resource data is relevant to the planning of order dates, taking into account working times and the available capacities of the resources. Resources, in conjunction with booking, offer the capacity needed to perform transportation activities on freight units, such as transportation, loading, and unloading activities.

The following resource types exist:

• Vehicle Resource
• Handling Resource
• Calendar Resource
• Transportation Unit Resource

Goods are loaded onto and unloaded from vehicles and transportation units resource and transported around the transportation network. Calendar resources specify operating hours for a location, during which goods maybe dropped off or picked up from this location. Handling resources offers a handling capacity that allows the goods to be loaded or unloaded from vehicle resources.

Vehicles are moving resources that transport goods between locations, for example, trucks, rail-cars, planes, and ships. Each vehicle resource represents a unit load, for example, one trailer of a certain capacity, one container of a certain capacity, or one rail car of a certain capacity. Eight dimensions and unit of measurements can be used to define vehicle capacity, for example, mass, volume–that is, the capacity of a trailer can be specified as 40,000 lb, or 2200 cu ft/s, or 24 pallets. Planning can only take the vehicle capacity into account if these dimensions and unit of measurement correspond to the dimensions and unit of measurements that are defined in a freight unit building rule.

Vehicle group and vehicle types specify attributes such as the physical properties of a certain kind of vehicle.

All vehicles are assigned to a means of transport (transportation method). Means of transport are groups of vehicle resources. The transportation mode is assigned to the means of transport. The transportation mode specifies how the goods are transported, for example, as a sea shipment.

There are two types of vehicle resources: passive and active. Active vehicle resources can travel by themselves. Passive vehicle resources cannot travel by themselves. A truck that has a motor and can travel by itself is an active resource. An empty trailer with no tractor is a passive resource.

The means of transport and factory calendar should be defined before creating a vehicle resource. When creating a vehicle resource, it is recommended that the following information is input:

• A resource name
• A calendar and time zone
• A capacity

The following fields combined together define capacity and volume and are mandatory for creating a resource:

• Factory Calendar
• Continuous Dimension
• Capacity
• Unit of Measure

MTr combinations can be used to model truck and trailer combinations. Multiresources can be used to model an external fleet in one step.

Compartments can be used to indicate a division of the vehicle resource (truck) and also the trailer into smaller units. Capacity constraints can be specified for compartments. Furthermore, they offer the following benefits:

• Flexible and fixed compartments
• Incompatibilities can be used to restrict certain freight units from being transported in certain compartments, for example, because of temperature restrictions

The use of compartments allows you to assign dangerous goods to certain areas of the truck. In addition, the use of compartments improves transportation planning for oil and gas, chemical, retail, and consumer products.

A means of transport combination is an instance of a particular means of transport, or a group of identical instances of means of transport that can provide transportation services. You use this business object to map the capacity and availability of vehicles that you want to use for transportation.

MTr combinations have the following attributes:

• They can be used to model a truck and trailer combination.
• You specify the number of the objects of each MTr within the combination, for example, one truck and two trailers.
• You specify capacities (several UoM): Maximum capacities of the combination.
• Additional (freely definable) attributes can be used for compatibilities and incompatibilities; based on a customizable attribute definition (code + text).
• Coupling/un-coupling durations are defined per passive MTr.

Handling resources are used for handling transportation orders at a location. The handling resource offers handling capacity that allows the goods to be loaded onto and unloaded from a vehicle resource, for example, door, loading ramp, or forklift. Handling resources maintain downtimes, restrictions on simultaneous activities, resource availability, qualification, and equipment requirements.

Availability times can be maintained by defining capacity variants and shift sequences.

Consumed capacity per loading and unloading operation is maintained in the location master data with the assignment of the (means of transport-specific) handling resource. The available capacity is maintained in the resource master data record.

Calendar resources determine the operating hours of locations. Loading and unloading activities can only take place during operating hours. Calendar resources are defined as resources and can be assigned to multiple locations as:

• Inbound operating hours
• Outbound operating hours
• Means-of-transport specific operating hours (inbound)
• Means-of-transport specific operating hours (outbound)

Availability times can be maintained by defining capacity variants and shift sequences.

For an instance of a particular transportation unit, such as a container, you can use the transportation unit resource to map the capacity and availability that you want to use for transportation.

You can choose up to eight dimensions and units of measurement to describe the capacity. Note that the mass and volume are predefined by default. Planning can only take the transportation unit resource capacity into account if these correspond to the dimensions and units of measurement that you define in a freight unit building rule.

The equipment, and equipment group types, specify attributes such as the physical properties of a certain kind of transportation unit resource. By creating a transportation unit resource, you can do the following:

• Use the type as a template to create transportation unit resources, copying the attributes of the type to a new resource.

• Request a special type of transportation unit resource in a forwarding order or in a booking order.

• Master data object to represent individual containers

• Can be created with reference to equipment group type

• Parameters for transportation unit resources include the following:

  • Capacity

  • Minimum number of seals

  • Physical properties

  • Downtimes

  • Grouping attributes

  • Alternative names