Questions about Inventor 2012 Cable and Harness and Autocad Electrical

[Anonymous]

Hey guys,

I've been fiddling around with Inventor and Autocad Electrical 2012 and I'm trying to get a feel for creating detailed wiring schematics by using Inventor to wire components and import the data into Electrical to create the schematic.  I am not an electrical engineer though, I'm a mechanical engineer.  I'm trying to learn this new software so I can teach the electrical engineer how to use it because he's an older guy and not so technically inclined.  I have a few questions about this software but I suppose I'll tackle them one at a time.  The first question is: when I import the Inventor data into Electrical, is there a way to get Electrical to show the proper symbols for components?  For instance, I have a wire coming from a pilot light, going to a junction block, coming out of the junction block and going into a 21 pin connector.  All I seem to get electrical to do is display the default connector symbol for each component.  Do I have to go in and change all the symbols after I've wired all the components or can electrical do this automatically?

[jtrain]

I'm a mechanical guy myself, so take this with a grain of salt, but we have had much better success creating the schematic in Electrical and then exporting the data to Inventor to do the routing automatically.

[Anonymous]

Thanks jtrain but that defeats the purpose of what we are trying to do.  We want to be able to do all the wiring in 3D and import it to a 2D schematic because the schematics we do can get very complex and this will save a tremendous amount of time.

[mflayler2]

When you bring it into Electrical you can only place generic connectors for the routing.  Use the Insert Connecotr from List and place the connector for it to wire automatically.

[chrisw01a]

Sam,

I am in the same boat as you.  I spent a while drawing up a panel in 3D thinking I could import the data into ACAD Electrical.  Well, you can import the data alright, but that is about as far as it goes.  For actually designing an electrical circuit in Inventor and using the data for a schematic, the software just isn't there yet in my opinion.

Hopefully in the future, we will be able to put information into inventor parts like if the part was a circuit breaker, and have all the ratings and such defined in the part, then import the data to electrical for doing the schematic.

I was pretty bummed out when I found out all I could make was a point to point connector!

Chris