A manufacturing elevator cab configurator must turn controlled options and dimensions into a costed, buildable bill of materials. It is not a visual “build a cab” selector. If a BOM line has no identity, quantity, unit, or source, the shop cannot build from it.
Available today
Build It Track It estimating produces a priced BOM from lines a person enters against an approved rate library. Standard lines resolve material cost and labour. A custom line cannot proceed without an attached vendor quote. The estimating record governs the price.
Planned for 2027
CabStudio’s browser-based cab design direction is planned for 2027 and is not available today. Model-driven configuration is the direction of that work, not a commitment.
Published
A visual selector helps an owner or designer compare finishes. A manufacturing configurator has a harder job. It must determine whether the cab is valid, how the shop will make or buy it, and which BOM lines must be priced and released. A polished image is not a manufacturing instruction.
| Question | Visual cab selector | Manufacturing configurator |
|---|---|---|
| Primary user | Owner, architect, salesperson, or homeowner exploring appearance | Estimator, engineer, product owner, purchasing team, or cab shop |
| Primary result | A visual preference, presentation, or request | A validated specification and costed, buildable BOM |
| Required logic | Display choices and basic compatibility | Dependencies, dimensions, code and ratings, sourcing, quantities, units, and revisions |
| Failure test | The selected appearance is unavailable or misleading | The shop cannot buy, fabricate, price, inspect, or trace the resolved result |
A configurator is only as reliable as its maintained rules. It should reject an invalid choice, explain the conflict, or send the exception to a named reviewer. A silent substitution hides work from the estimator and engineer.
Rules must express prerequisites, exclusions, and options that change together. Wall construction may constrain panel layout, ceiling, fixtures, backing, rails, base, and attachment hardware.
Every selectable finish needs an orderable identity, approved substrate and thickness, supplier status, fabrication limits, grain or pattern direction, and an exception path when availability changes.
Clearances, openings, returns, reveals, sills, transoms, ceiling height, wall buildup, tolerances, and field conditions must constrain geometry before quantities are resolved.
Applicable construction, flame and smoke, electrical, accessibility, loading, and other requirements must be represented only where qualified owners maintain them. Jurisdictional questions require review.
Each option must resolve to fabricated parts, purchased items, subcontract work, or reference lines with formulas for counts, lengths, areas, hardware sets, yield, and minimum buys.
Every resolved line needs a controlled description or part identity, quantity, unit, material or finish specification, make-buy status, source rule, and the design revision that produced it.
The output should be checked against a known-good manufacturing record, not merely against model geometry. Use the elevator cab bill of materials template to define the minimum fields before automating them.
The first failure is unwritten knowledge. If one estimator remembers that a ceiling choice requires different framing, or one shop lead knows when an extra bracket is needed, the configuration model is incomplete. Rules encoded in one person’s head cannot be tested, revised, or applied consistently.
The second failure is a silent dependency. One option changes another option, a dimension, hardware set, labour operation, or purchased quantity without showing the user. The visible selection remains plausible while the BOM follows an undocumented branch. Dependencies should be explicit, versioned, and tested in both permitted and prohibited combinations.
The third failure is confusing a finish name with a purchasable material. A colour or visual swatch does not specify supplier, product, grade, thickness, sheet size, grain, coating, minimum buy, approved sample, or current availability. A finish that cannot be ordered should not resolve as an ordinary standard line.
The final failure is validating software logic without validating shop practice. A mathematically consistent list can omit reusable fixtures, backing, fasteners, edge treatment, bought-out assemblies, packaging, or a fabrication operation. Walk a real released job from estimate through drawings, purchasing evidence, fabrication, and revision history. The CAD-to-operations workflow for elevator manufacturing explains why geometry alone is not a purchasing instruction.
Start with the data and release rules, not the rendering interface. You can do this work before choosing a configurator:
Create one governed name and code for each construction, panel family, ceiling, rail, base, accessory, and approved exception. Remove aliases that make the same choice appear different.
Separate appearance labels from orderable material specifications. Record supplier references, status, substrate compatibility, dimensions, grain or pattern rules, and who can approve a substitution.
Define whether each resolved requirement is fabricated, purchased, subcontracted, or reference-only. State the unit, quantity rule, sourcing evidence, and owner of each boundary.
Give drawings, rules, rate items, vendor quotes, and BOMs controlled revisions. Define release authority, effective dates, superseded status, and how changes reach estimating and the shop.
Choose a repeatable cab family, enumerate valid and invalid combinations, compare generated lines with how the shop actually builds, and record every exception before expanding scope.
Pricing needs the same governance. Standard lines can resolve against approved rates only when item, unit, labour basis, currency, and effective basis match. Custom materials need current vendor support. The elevator cab cost estimating guide provides the practical estimating context.
A selection should first resolve a controlled requirement, not a price. The rule identifies the assembly or part, calculates quantity, assigns the purchasing or fabrication unit, applies material and finish, establishes make-or-buy treatment, and cites its rule and design revision. Assemblies can then expand into substrates, face materials, trims, backing, brackets, fasteners, electrical items, or bought-out sets.
Pricing follows after identity and quantity are valid. A standard line can use an approved rate-library item; a custom line needs vendor evidence. Unsupported conditions should remain visible exceptions. A configurator should never invent a cost to make a result appear complete.
Today, Build It Track It estimating produces the priced BOM from person-entered lines against a rate library, with vendors and attached quotes for custom lines. It does not derive a BOM automatically from cab choices, dimensions, drawings, or CAD. It has no DXF or DWG parsing or export, external CAD or ERP integration, or AI features.
Available today are leads and CRM pipeline; a job record with files, contacts, and timeline; site survey assignment with emailed field links; contracts with in-house e-signature and a locked signed PDF; engineering drawing revisions, change orders, and a Final for Record lock; and deposit readiness tracking.
Purchasing and purchase orders, inventory, capacity, scheduling and delivery dates, production scheduling, installation, inspection and final payment, invoicing, and accounting are planned for the Q3 2026 launch. CabStudio is separately planned for 2027. Model-driven configuration is its direction, not a committed feature, and Build It Track It estimating remains the source of the priced BOM.
It is a rules-based system that resolves permitted cab options and dimensions into a validated specification and buildable BOM. Unlike a customer-facing visual selector, it must control dependencies, sourcing, dimensional limits, code and rating constraints, quantity logic, units, and revisions.
A visual selector helps a customer compare appearances or communicate preferences. A manufacturing configurator determines whether choices can be built and bought, then maps them to controlled BOM lines. They are different products: a realistic image is not evidence that the underlying result is valid or orderable.
Each line needs a controlled part identity or description, quantity, unit, material and finish specification where applicable, make-or-buy status, source rule, and design revision. Pricing also needs a matching approved rate-library item or attached vendor evidence for a custom line.
Common causes are rules held in one person’s head, options that silently alter other options, finish names that do not identify orderable material, incomplete make-or-buy boundaries, and generated output never validated against how the shop actually fabricates and purchases a cab.
Standardise option names, repair the finish catalogue, define make-or-buy treatment and quantity units for each option, establish rule and drawing revision discipline, and validate a narrow repeatable product family against real shop practice before expanding the configured scope.
No. Today, a person enters BOM lines in Build It Track It estimating. Standard lines resolve material cost and labour from an approved rate library, while custom lines require an attached vendor quote. That estimating record remains the source of the priced BOM.
No. Build It Track It has no automatic BOM generation from CAD, external CAD or ERP integration, DXF or DWG parsing or export, or AI features. Its current priced BOM is built from lines entered by a person against controlled rates and vendor evidence.
No date or feature commitment exists for model-driven configuration. CabStudio is a browser-based cab design engine planned for 2027 and is not available today; model-driven configuration is the direction of that work, not a commitment. Build It Track It estimating remains the priced BOM source.
See Build It Track It estimating as it works today. We will label the separate 2027 CabStudio direction for what it is: direction, not a commitment.
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