Ambitious Gantt chart

Hiya,

I am creating a Gantt chart in Excel to show the tasks in an aircraft
turnaround:

The timeline is from 18:00 when the aircraft stops at the terminal gate to
20:30 when the plane pushes back from the gate (and heads to the runway).

All of the tasks in the Gantt chart are the various processes involved on
the turnaround, for example cleaning, security check, fuelling, etc.

So far this is very doable using techniques offered by Jon Peltier and many
other sources.

However, there are two things I'd like to add that I just can't get my head
around:

1. I'd like to capture some items that have no duration, such as push back
time/ pilot arrival time. I assume I am using the right method by pasting
another series in, but I just can't get it to work. I'd like these to be
stars rather than bars. Any ideas?

2. This is the ambitious bit! What I am trying to use this for is to compare
the timelines of the actual process compared to what is planned for. For this
I would like to have such a Gantt chart with two bars/stars for each task -
one bar for the planned (coloured in gray), and overlapping this I would like
a blue bar with the achieved timescales.

Can anyone help me on this - it would really be useful as an ongoing tool (I
have set something up so that the user can select whether they want to see
the performance on a particular day, an average over any timeperiod they
specify, etc). Also, I would like to be able to add this within an Access
database - anyone know if Access can handle it (assuming Excel can in the
first place!).

Thanks everyone,

Basil

Hi Basil -

1. The added series would be an XY series, as used for milestone markers
in this example:

http://peltiertech.com/Excel/Charts/GanttChart.html

2. This requires a more intricate data arrangement. Essentially you keep
the stacked bar chart, but you need to incorporate points between the
visible bars to serve as gaps. Arrange the data like this:

Start Plan Actual
Blank 18:00
Task 1 Plan 18:00 0:20
Task 1 Actual 18:00 0:21
Blank 18:00
Task 2 Plan 18:20 0:10
Task 2 Actual 18:21 0:14
Blank 18:00
Task 3 Plan 18:30 0:05
Task 3 Actual 18:35 0:04
Blank 18:00

Create the stacked bar chart, leaving the word Blank in the appropriate
cells until Excel has drawn the chart. The Start series is formatted
with no border and no fill, the Plan series is gray filled, and the
Actual is Blue Filled.

- Jon
-------
Jon Peltier, Microsoft Excel MVP
Peltier Technical Services
Tutorials and Custom Solutions
http://PeltierTech.com/
_______


Basil wrote:

> Hiya,
>
> I am creating a Gantt chart in Excel to show the tasks in an aircraft
> turnaround:
>
> The timeline is from 18:00 when the aircraft stops at the terminal gate to
> 20:30 when the plane pushes back from the gate (and heads to the runway).
>
> All of the tasks in the Gantt chart are the various processes involved on
> the turnaround, for example cleaning, security check, fuelling, etc.
>
> So far this is very doable using techniques offered by Jon Peltier and many
> other sources.
>
> However, there are two things I'd like to add that I just can't get my head
> around:
>
> 1. I'd like to capture some items that have no duration, such as push back
> time/ pilot arrival time. I assume I am using the right method by pasting
> another series in, but I just can't get it to work. I'd like these to be
> stars rather than bars. Any ideas?
>
> 2. This is the ambitious bit! What I am trying to use this for is to compare
> the timelines of the actual process compared to what is planned for. For this
> I would like to have such a Gantt chart with two bars/stars for each task -
> one bar for the planned (coloured in gray), and overlapping this I would like
> a blue bar with the achieved timescales.
>
> Can anyone help me on this - it would really be useful as an ongoing tool (I
> have set something up so that the user can select whether they want to see
> the performance on a particular day, an average over any timeperiod they
> specify, etc). Also, I would like to be able to add this within an Access
> database - anyone know if Access can handle it (assuming Excel can in the
> first place!).
>
> Thanks everyone,
>
> Basil

As always Jon, you are the Don!

It's a shame we can't merge the axis ticks/tick labels, but it isn't
important (by deleting the 'actual' label as well as the blank, I can have
'Task 1' et al. top aligned to it's two bars. With a fixed task list size, I
could always remove ticks and use textboxes that point to the cells wholding
the task names.)

Thanks also for publishing my query on the bus loads graph in April's
TechTrax, I felt proud to have contributed to a worthy article!

Basil


"Jon Peltier" wrote:

> Hi Basil -
>
> 1. The added series would be an XY series, as used for milestone markers
> in this example:
>
> http://peltiertech.com/Excel/Charts/GanttChart.html
>
> 2. This requires a more intricate data arrangement. Essentially you keep
> the stacked bar chart, but you need to incorporate points between the
> visible bars to serve as gaps. Arrange the data like this:
>
> Start Plan Actual
> Blank 18:00
> Task 1 Plan 18:00 0:20
> Task 1 Actual 18:00 0:21
> Blank 18:00
> Task 2 Plan 18:20 0:10
> Task 2 Actual 18:21 0:14
> Blank 18:00
> Task 3 Plan 18:30 0:05
> Task 3 Actual 18:35 0:04
> Blank 18:00
>
> Create the stacked bar chart, leaving the word Blank in the appropriate
> cells until Excel has drawn the chart. The Start series is formatted
> with no border and no fill, the Plan series is gray filled, and the
> Actual is Blue Filled.
>
> - Jon
> -------
> Jon Peltier, Microsoft Excel MVP
> Peltier Technical Services
> Tutorials and Custom Solutions
> http://PeltierTech.com/
> _______
>
>
> Basil wrote:
>
> > Hiya,
> >
> > I am creating a Gantt chart in Excel to show the tasks in an aircraft
> > turnaround:
> >
> > The timeline is from 18:00 when the aircraft stops at the terminal gate to
> > 20:30 when the plane pushes back from the gate (and heads to the runway).
> >
> > All of the tasks in the Gantt chart are the various processes involved on
> > the turnaround, for example cleaning, security check, fuelling, etc.
> >
> > So far this is very doable using techniques offered by Jon Peltier and many
> > other sources.
> >
> > However, there are two things I'd like to add that I just can't get my head
> > around:
> >
> > 1. I'd like to capture some items that have no duration, such as push back
> > time/ pilot arrival time. I assume I am using the right method by pasting
> > another series in, but I just can't get it to work. I'd like these to be
> > stars rather than bars. Any ideas?
> >
> > 2. This is the ambitious bit! What I am trying to use this for is to compare
> > the timelines of the actual process compared to what is planned for. For this
> > I would like to have such a Gantt chart with two bars/stars for each task -
> > one bar for the planned (coloured in gray), and overlapping this I would like
> > a blue bar with the achieved timescales.
> >
> > Can anyone help me on this - it would really be useful as an ongoing tool (I
> > have set something up so that the user can select whether they want to see
> > the performance on a particular day, an average over any timeperiod they
> > specify, etc). Also, I would like to be able to add this within an Access
> > database - anyone know if Access can handle it (assuming Excel can in the
> > first place!).
> >
> > Thanks everyone,
> >
> > Basil
>