User Guide
What a customer sees from their first login onward: three design engines, a live order tracker, and a service logbook for furnaces already on the shop floor.
Getting Started
Every account starts at the login screen. New accounts require admin approval before they can sign in — this is deliberate, not a bug: it keeps unapproved or unverified accounts out of the workspace entirely.
How it works
- Go to Sign up from the login page and register with a work email and password.
- Your account is created immediately but flagged pending approval — you cannot sign in yet.
- A SmartFurnace admin reviews and approves the account (see §12 User Management).
- Once approved, sign in with your email and password from the login page.
- If your company already has a workspace, ask an existing team member to invite you instead (§10 Settings & Team) — invited members skip the approval queue.
Serkan from AVF Technologies registers with serkan.atas@avftechnologies.com. He gets a "your account is pending approval" message on his first sign-in attempt. The next morning, a SmartFurnace admin approves his account from the Users page — from then on his credentials work normally.
Dashboard
The dashboard is the home screen after login — three module cards, one per design engine, plus a strip of recently saved projects so you can jump straight back into unfinished work.
What's here
- VFD, VHTPD, VFA cards — one click into each design engine.
- Recent Projects — your last few saved designs, with a "View All" link into the full project list.
- The left sidebar is the same on every page: modules on top, then your personal workspace (Projects, Memory Book, Quotes, Settings), then language switcher and account.
The sidebar collapses to icons only via the ← button at the top — useful on smaller screens or when you want more room for the 3D viewport in VFA.
VFD — Vacuum Furnace Designer
VFD turns a load spec (weight, dimensions, process temperature, gas quench requirements) into a complete furnace design: power requirements, cooling system sizing, vessel dimensions, and a recommended model — automatically, from real engineering calculations rather than lookup tables.
Typical flow
- Enter the load: weight, working-zone dimensions (or let VFD estimate them from weight), and process type (hardening, brazing, sintering, etc.).
- Set process parameters — maximum temperature, heating time, quench gas and pressure.
- Submit — VFD calculates installed power, cooling gas flow and fan power, hot-zone and vessel dimensions, and matches the closest standard furnace model.
- Review the results panel, then save the design to Projects or request a quote directly from the result.
A 600 kg steel load, hardened at 1250 °C with a 2 bar nitrogen quench, resolves to a VHF-696 model with an 8-hour cycle time and 600 kg daily capacity per run — VFD shows the installed power, vessel wall thickness, and cooling fan power behind that recommendation, not just the model name.
VHTPD — Vacuum Heat Treatment Plant Designer
Where VFD sizes one furnace, VHTPD lays out an entire plant: multiple furnaces sharing a transformer, water and gas systems, and a 3D-visualized floor layout — including the simultaneity factor that keeps the shared transformer from being oversized.
Typical flow
- Add the furnaces the plant will run (model, quantity) and any auxiliary equipment — N2 buffer tank, emergency gravity water, control cabinet.
- Set a target daily capacity if you have one — VHTPD flags whether the configuration meets it.
- Review the auto-sized transformer: with five furnaces running, peak demand is never simultaneous, so the transformer comes out smaller than the sum of each furnace's rated power.
- Open the 3D plant view to see the generated floor layout, with power cabling routed between the control cabinet and each furnace.
Five VHF-696 furnaces on one line don't need 5× a single furnace's transformer — VHTPD's simultaneity factor (ksim) accounts for the fact that furnaces rarely all hit peak power at once, sizing the shared transformer realistically instead of for a worst case that never happens.
VFA — Vacuum Furnace Assembler
An interactive 3D exploded view of the horizontal and vertical furnace models. Every part is clickable, with its own info panel, bill-of-materials entry, and (where relevant) live stock status — this is the same 3D model used across the platform's marketing pages and the Project Planning module's "view in 3D" links.
Controls
- Horizontal / Vertical — switch furnace model.
- Normal / Exploded / General Explosion — three assembly states, from fully assembled to fully exploded.
- Click a part to select it and open its info panel; drag to rotate, scroll to zoom, right-drag to pan, double-click to focus a part or reset the view.
- Cross-Section — cut the model open to see internal components (hot zone, heating elements) without exploding the whole assembly.
Clicking the pressure safety relief valve in Exploded view opens its info panel with material, weight, current stock level, and a "Send Question" button that emails the SmartFurnace team directly about that specific part — no separate support ticket needed.
Project Planning
Once you've ordered a furnace, Project Planning tracks it through five real manufacturing stages — Designing, Purchasing, Manufacturing, Assembly, Testing — with a checklist and notes per stage, shared documents, and a direct message thread with the SmartFurnace team. This is order tracking, not a saved calculation.
What you can do
- See overall progress and which stage is current at a glance.
- Read the admin's notes for the current stage and the checklist of what's done.
- Download shared documents — drawings, specifications, test certificates, workshop photos — organized by category.
- Message the team directly from the project; replies show up here and as a sidebar notification badge.
- Jump straight into the 3D VFA viewer for your specific furnace model via "Open in 3D Assembly Scene".
AVF's VFA-Std-900 order sits at 50% overall progress, in the Manufacturing stage. The admin's notes explain the pressure vessel passed its hydrostatic test and the hot zone is 60% assembled; a hydrostatic test certificate and a workshop progress photo are attached. AVF asked about the test date three days ago — the admin's reply is right there in the thread.
Memory Book
A service logbook for furnaces already in operation, in two tabs: an Incident Log for reporting and tracking faults, and a Maintenance Calendar for periodic service schedules with a full completion history per task.
Incident Log
- Click + Report Incident, name the furnace and (optionally) the specific component, describe what happened, and set a severity.
- Track status as the admin works it: Open → Investigating → Waiting for Parts → Resolved/Closed.
- Add notes or attachments any time while the incident is still open — once it's Resolved or Closed, your side becomes read-only so the record stays a clean audit trail.
Maintenance Calendar
- Each scheduled task shows as Overdue, Due Soon, or Up to Date — computed live from the next due date, not a stored flag that can go stale.
- Expand any task to see its full history of past completions, each with the technician, date, notes and service report.
A critical incident — an over-temperature interlock trip — gets reported same-day and resolved same-day: root cause was a loose thermocouple connector, re-terminated and verified with two full-temperature test cycles. The semi-annual vacuum system service, by contrast, shows three past completions going back to commissioning — a real maintenance history, not just "last serviced: some date".
Saved Projects
Every VFD and VHTPD calculation you save lands here — a running history of designs, separate from the live-order tracking in Project Planning.
What's here
- Every saved design, with module, name, and last-modified date.
- Open any project to re-load it back into VFD or VHTPD with all inputs intact.
- If you belong to a company workspace, teammates see the same shared project list.
Quote Requests
Request a supplier quote directly from a VFA part's info panel, then track it here through the same lifecycle every quote follows on the platform.
Quote lifecycle
| Status | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Pending Admin Review | Just submitted — a SmartFurnace admin reviews it before it goes to a supplier. |
| Awaiting Supplier | Admin approved it; the supplier now has it. |
| Supplier Quoted | Price, currency, delivery time and notes are in — ready for you to review. |
| Rejected | Declined by admin or supplier, with a reason. |
| Completed | Quote accepted, order placed. |
Every customer request goes through an admin before reaching a supplier — it keeps the supplier-facing side of the platform curated rather than open to unfiltered inbound requests.
Settings & Team
Account details live in Settings; if your account belongs to a company workspace, a Team page also appears in the sidebar for managing members.
What's here
- Profile details and password change.
- Team (company accounts only): invite teammates by email, see their role (Owner/Admin/Designer/Viewer), and everyone on the team shares the same Projects, Project Planning, and Memory Book records.
- An approved Supplier Portal link appears in the sidebar for accounts also approved as a supplier — a separate login system from the main platform (see §14 Suppliers).
Admin Guide
Everything under Administration in the sidebar — visible only to accounts with the Admin role. This is the operational side of the same platform: approvals, the order and quote pipeline, stock, translations, and the service desk.
Admin Overview
The admin landing page: headline counts across the platform and a live system-status check, plus two one-click actions.
What's here
- Total users, projects, VFD designs, and VHTPD plans at a glance.
- System status — database connection and calculation engines.
- Generate System Report and Backup Database quick actions.
User Management
Every account on the platform, with the controls to approve new sign-ups, change plan/role, and remove accounts.
Common tasks
- Approve a new account — every self-registered user starts unapproved and cannot sign in at all until you approve them here (see §1).
- Grant full feature access without Admin rights — set a user's plan to Enterprise to give them every module and unlimited projects, without handing them the Admin role and its platform-wide controls.
- Delete an account — guarded against self-deletion and removing the last remaining admin; blocked with a clear conflict (not a generic error) if the account has Project Planning history that other records depend on.
A new account registers as serkan.atas@avftechnologies.com and can't sign in. You find it here, click Approve, and it's immediately usable — no email verification loop, just an admin decision.
Projects
Every VFD/VHTPD design saved on the platform, across every customer — the admin-side equivalent of each customer's own Projects list, but unfiltered.
Use it to
- Look up a specific customer's saved design when they reference it in a support conversation.
- Spot-check calculation output across the install base.
Suppliers
Suppliers are a separate identity from platform users entirely — their own login system, own approval queue, own catalog. Approving a supplier here lets them log into the Supplier Portal and respond to quote requests routed to them.
Common tasks
- Review and approve/reject new supplier sign-ups.
- See each supplier's product catalog and quote history.
Supplier accounts authenticate completely separately from customer/admin accounts — approving a supplier here has no effect on the regular User Management approval queue, and vice versa.
Quote Requests
Every customer quote request passes through here first — nothing reaches a supplier without an admin decision.
Flow
- A new request arrives as Pending Admin Review.
- Approve it (moves to Awaiting Supplier and notifies the supplier) or reject it with a reason.
- Once the supplier responds, the price/delivery/notes are visible here and on the customer's own Quote Requests page.
Feedback & Messages
General contact-form feedback and VFA part-level customer questions, in one inbox with a reply flow and an unread-count badge in the sidebar.
Use it to
- Read and reply to feedback submitted from the public contact form.
- Answer part-specific questions customers send from a VFA component's info panel.
VFA Stock & Inventory
Quantity and critical-stock threshold for every VFA part, per furnace model — the same numbers customers see as a stock badge on a part's info panel in the 3D viewer.
How it works
- Set quantity and a critical-stock threshold per part, per furnace model (horizontal and vertical parts are tracked separately, even for the same component type — they're physically different parts).
- When quantity drops to or below the threshold, an alert email fires once — it won't re-fire on every save while stock stays low, only when it drops further or after restocking and dropping again.
Project Planning
The admin side of every customer's live order — create a project on a customer's behalf, move it through its five stages, and message them directly.
Common tasks
- New Project — create an order for a customer by email, pick the furnace model.
- Advance the stage as work progresses (Designing → Purchasing → Manufacturing → Assembly → Testing) and update that stage's notes and checklist.
- Set stage dates and a target completion date so the customer's progress bar reflects reality.
- Upload documents by category (drawing, specification, FAT/SAT report, photo, certificate) — they appear immediately on the customer's side.
- Reply to customer messages — replies notify them and clear their unread badge.
AVF's order moves from Manufacturing to Assembly once the hot zone is fully assembled and heating elements pass their continuity test — the admin ticks off the Manufacturing checklist, adds a hydrostatic test certificate to the documents, and switches the stage. AVF sees the update the next time they open the page, badge and all.
Memory Book
Every customer's incident log and maintenance schedule, in one place, with full write access — this is the service desk.
Incident Log — admin controls
- Change status and severity directly from the dropdowns.
- Write the Solution (visible to the customer) and internal-only Manufacturer Notes separately.
- Marking an incident Resolved or Closed auto-records who resolved it and when.
Maintenance Calendar — admin controls
- + New Schedule — define a task, its component, and interval (days / months / operating hours).
- ✅ Mark Complete — logs who performed it and when, accepts a service report link and notes, and advances the next due date automatically (except operating-hours intervals, which need a manual next date since the platform doesn't track real furnace runtime).
Export
📥 Export CSV downloads every incident visible to you (all customers, for an admin) as a spreadsheet — status, severity, dates, and full description/solution text.
A customer can add notes and attachments to their own incident, but only while it's Open, Investigating, or Waiting for Parts — once you mark it Resolved or Closed, their side locks so the record stays a clean, tamper-proof history.
Logs
A raw activity log — logins and key actions across the platform, useful for tracing "who did what, when" without digging through the database directly.
CMS Dictionary
Every translated string on the platform (English, French, Turkish), editable without a code deploy. The codebase ships default values for all three languages; anything edited here overrides the shipped default the next time that page loads.
Use it to
- Fix a wording issue in any language instantly, platform-wide.
- Update part names/descriptions in the VFA 3D viewer without touching code — geometry and pricing still come from the codebase, but labels are editable here.
Admin Settings
Platform-level configuration for the admin's own account and system defaults.
