OK folks, bear with me a moment or two...

We have many sheet metal parts composed of a base "flat" part then we have configurations (defined by their respective part numbers) of the different styles. Then we add a "paint" specification which identifies the part pclor for a specific configuration. For example; (simple BOM?)

P/N 42600000 - final product/ painted

          74000000 - made from sheet metal

                123456 - Raw Material

          12345SPEC - Paint Specification

Currently, the engineer is creating the 42600000 as a "part" configuration then attempting to attach the "in process" configuration  (740') - sheet metal no paint. which is made of the raw material (steel sheet). Then the paint specificaiton is added (attached) and becomes the 426' number. Engineering is trying to avoid making all these sub-assemblies and I am not sure if that is a particularly good route.

Add to this, we are using ePDM to develop the BOM's for the assemblies.  Without modeling the "paint" does anyone have some insight as to a best practice for this situation? I came from companies that did model "paint" and "grease" etc...The only other thought I had was to eliminate configuraitons altogether and just make all assemblies (and their config's) stand alone. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Kevin