Basic Terminal design

[Cole64]

Hello,

I have been having trouble trying to understand how ACADE wants me to arrange  terminals so that I can show a a single layer terminal strip which is connected internally via a jumper strip in the schematic, can be auto numbered, and shows up in the terminal strip editor and/or panel layout with wires coming out both sides of the terminal. I assume this is common when breaking out a DC power supply. Does anyone know of any good examples, tutorials etc that I can view?

Thanks

Colin

[dougmcalexander]

There are tips about terminal strip editing at www.ecadconsultant.com.

[Cole64]

Thanks for the reply Doug,

I have looked at this before and it appears to be all good and I can understand the function of the terminal editor. However, the example is impractal because the wire 309 will be coming from a transformer supply either possilbly 24VAC or 24VDC and there will be only 1 wire coming from this component not 3, unless the terminal is jumpered on the left hand side using wires which is a waste of time and consumables. Jumpering would normally be done with screwed or tounged bridges though the center of the terminal hence leaving you with half+1 as much terminals as you would using the example.

[dougmcalexander]

My method is to connect a wire layer named JUMPERBAR between terminals. This layer can be marked as a jumper using Wire Color/Gauge labels. The JUMPERBAR carries the wire number through just as a wire would. The wire from/to generator doesn't display wire layers with the word jumper in the name so no worry about the jumperbar appearing as a wire.

After I insert the graphical terminal strip I insert a jumperbar footprint block that carries the part number data so it appears on the BOM. You could add the part number at schematic level using the terminal jumper command, but I still insert the JUMPERBAR wire layer between terminals so the schematic shows a visible connection between terminals.

[Cole64]

Hi Doug,

I did see this in your tutorials that you have on your website, which i might add were very helpful. I have attached 2 pictures; Picture 1 is the schematic drawing which I have configured terminal X1, I have place the Jumper bar layer as per your instructions, Picture 2 is the terminal layout drawing for terminal X1 and as you can see terminals 2 and 3 only have 1 wire entering the terminal which is a waste of terminals.

I can see that the terminal layout drawing is exactly how the schematic is structured, as there is only 1 wire going into X1.2 for example. My question is how do I arrange my drawing so that there is 2 wires going into each terminal?

Thanks

Colin

[dougmcalexander]

You must be in Australia. I recognize the wire colors. You can use an angled tee and bring two wires off each terminal if you don't want spare terminal connections.

[Cole64]

Hi Doug,

I dont understand, maybe because I am upside down (yes in Australia), can you show me an example if you have time?

When I try to use angled tee or dot markers(I dont see any difference between them), this does not let me change the line type of one of the lines coming from the intersection point to declare one as a jumper.

Thanks

Colin

[Icemanau · Accepted solution]

Draw all the wires on the appropriate layer, and then use the Change/Convert wire type to change the ones you need to the Jumper layer.

Before you click 'OK' to convert the wires, you need to de-select the option to convert ALL wires in the network.

When you do this, you will need to select every wire you want to convert as ACADE will only convert the selected segments of the wire.

When I jumper terminals, I try to have the wires on the jumper layer go from terminal to terminal rather than branching off an existing wire. I also edit the jumper on the terminal so ACADE knows that the terminal is jumpered (right click on the terminal and select 'Edit Jumper').

The Angle tee marker helps in defining the wiring route whereas the dot does not do this. You may still need to set the wiring route to clear any incorrect paths that ACADE seems to assign, especially any direct to terminal sequnces. I suggest this be done before going to the TSE.

Same with setting the connection direction of the terminal. This is supposed to set the wire number display when you use the TSE and insert the teminal strip but I found that it doesn't always work properly. I tend to set this within the TSE to get around any problems there.

Regards Brad

[dougmcalexander · Accepted solution]

I've been teaching all day but Brad has instructed you well. Create a wire layer called JumperBar and connect it vertically between terminals, representing the jumper that creates a bus. Use the angled tee or simply connect two wires as a branch to the same terminal if you want to use both sides of a terminal. Like Brad said, if you wish, you can use the Edit Jumper command to define a jumper between terminals and assign a part number. This us hidden, so the JumperBar wire layer provides the visual representation I don't do it that way myself, only because I insert an actual jumper bar footprint over the top of my graphical strips on the panel layout.

[Cole64]

Brad and Doug, I think we have got it! 

Attached are the schematic and the terminal layouts of my drawing and they are what we were after. I also found that we could use the round terminal icon instead of the angled tee as it does not have any tagstrip or terminal attributes, but I like the angled tee better as Brad stated it defines the wiring route and is also helpful when  printed in black and white.

Thankyou for your time.

Colin