Assemblies: kits that measure themselves
The items that always go together, saved once
Why this one matters
Nobody prices a bathroom from scratch twice. The same fifteen lines go in every time, in the same order, with the same relationships between them — and most estimators rebuild them anyway, because the alternative is copying an old job and hoping it was right.
An assembly is that set, kept. The next one arrives complete, and every line in it is measured by the same field.
What you will see
- A set of items saved together as a named assembly
- The whole kit arriving on a new job in one go
- One measurement driving every line inside it
- Why only price list items can go in, and what that protects you from
What was said
The narration, word for word, for anyone who would rather read it than watch it — or who is on a train.
An assembly is a kit of items that always go together, driven by one measurement. A wall frame: studs, plates, noggins, nails. Measure the wall once, and every item works out its own quantity.
SmarteBuild comes with a library of assemblies. Pick one, and its items come into your estimate together.
Search the library by name. Each assembly is labelled: Yours, for the ones your company saved, or SmarteBuild, for the ready-made ones. Already on this job warns you before you add the same kit twice, and the assemblies this job already uses are listed underneath.
Each assembly has a take-off sheet. The questions are what you measure — the length, the height — and each item has a formula that reads them.
Answer the questions, and every item recalculates. Change the height later, and all of them change with it.
The Items tab shows what each item is priced off. The frames follow the wall length, the plasterboard and paint follow the wall area, and the studs follow their own count. Change the choice to point an item at a different measurement. The Questions tab holds the questions themselves, with a default for each, like the usual wall height.
Openings come off with a minus line. Add the garage door, type its width, and switch the line to minus: the wall length and area drop by that much. Recalculate puts the new totals onto the items in the estimate.
Save your own from items you've already priced. Give it a name you'll recognise, and it's in your library for the next job.
An assembly copies the kit, not the job. The rates still come from your price list, so keeping those current keeps every assembly current too.
Doing it, rather than watching it
This page is the tour. When you are in SmarteBuild with a job open and need the detail — every option, every exception, the things the video had no time for — the help centre has the full article.
Assemblies — the full reference
Read about it instead: Bill of Quantities · Price Lists & Products · Take-Off
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