Map Metra

RateBuild 3: Productivity and shared resources

Part 3 of the RateBuild series. Work out construction rates from labour productivity, plant costing and material supply prices, and keep them as shared resources that update every rate that uses them. Everything shown can also be done by asking the Map Metra connector in Claude or ChatGPT.

How to

  1. 1

    Advance and production rate

    Choose the Advance button on the tiler's line. Advance turns the line into a shared resource.

  2. 2

    Cost rate and saving

    The cost rate stays at seventy two dollars an hour, and an eight hour day turns the daily output into an hourly one. The preview reads one and a half square metres an hour.

  3. 3

    The labourer

    Do the same for the labourer. Give it a clear name, such as tiler's labourer, and the same twelve square metres a day, at fifty dollars an hour.

  4. 4

    Equipment costing

    For the wet saw, set its production rate, then open Equipment costing. Enter the purchase price, its resale value and its working life in hours, then maintenance over that life, blades and wear parts per hour, and the power it draws, with the price of electricity.

  5. 5

    Applying the hourly cost

    RateBuild spreads the purchase price, less resale, over the working hours, and adds maintenance, consumables and power. That gives three dollars twenty five an hour, or twenty six dollars a day.

  6. 6

    Materials and wastage

    For the tiles, enter what you buy. A box holds one point four four square metres, for sixty four dollars eighty.

  7. 7

    Usage rates

    The adhesive comes in twenty kilogram bags at twenty eight dollars, and uses five kilograms per square metre. That is seven dollars a square metre, or seven dollars seventy with ten percent wastage.

  8. 8

    The finished rate

    On the Rate tab, the combined rate is now one hundred and forty three dollars thirty four per square metre, worked out from productivity and supply prices. Save the code.

  9. 9

    The Resources library

    Every shared resource is kept in the Resources library, under the Libraries menu. You can organise them in folders, search them, and use them in any rate code and in the Program.

  10. 10

    Changing a resource

    When a cost changes, edit it once. Here, the tiler goes up to seventy eight dollars an hour.