Community
AutoCAD MEP Forum
Welcome to Autodesk’s AutoCAD MEP Forums. Share your knowledge, ask questions, and explore popular AutoCAD MEP topics.
cancel
Showing results for 
Show  only  | Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

Where's the power of E in MEP?

19 REPLIES 19
Reply
Message 1 of 20
smbrennan
1470 Views, 19 Replies

Where's the power of E in MEP?

Every year, I hope Autodesk makes some great strides in improving the Electrical portion of MEP, and every year, I find myself disappointed. The biggest improvement came in I think 2010, where conduit size was actual O.D. since then, it appears that nothing major has been improved. I don't want to go into details since there is a "wishlist," but features I'd like to see with more flexibility include:

 

  • Advanced Wires. For example, whatever happened to switch legs? And Travelers? Also, do I work for the only electrical contractor that separates wire ticks into separate networks (ie you can't exceed 3 hots for a single neutral when wiring a basic power home run. If we have 6 hots and 2 neutrals, we Separate them as H-N-N-N-H-N-N-N). Also, as a company standard we have the Grounds at the "tail" end of the run, meaning in the order of hots, neutrals, and ground, the ground is farthest from the direction of the panel, whlie the hot is the "head" end. Because of this, we sometimes have conduit that shares circuits where the current moves in opposite direction. This results in combinatinos like H-H-N-G-N-H. Does anyone else out there use a similar standard.

Okay I said I wasn't going to go into detail, but I can see I already am, so I'll stop there. Regardless, am I the only one that thinks the Electrical content of MEP could be improved A LOT. Is it because there's so many conditions to account for it's a challenge for Autodesk? I personally find that hard to believe with the brainpower they have. It almost appears that what they need is someone with years of experience in electrical construction, or a team of members, to help guide the programmers in what the electrical content should have.

 

Shawn B.

  ||    
To help improve Autodesk Products, please Click Here to Vote for ideas and submit your own.
19 REPLIES 19
Message 2 of 20
alan.skipper
in reply to: smbrennan

Hello

 

I was beginning to think that I was the only person in the world not happy with the "E" in MEP. as far as I'm concerned "There is no E in MEP" particularly from the United Kingdom point of view.

 

Cheers

Message 3 of 20
s.lawrence
in reply to: alan.skipper

^^ What he said ^ ^

Message 4 of 20
alan.skipper
in reply to: s.lawrence

Complete silence from Autodesk on this one; as usual.

Message 5 of 20
smbrennan
in reply to: alan.skipper

I'm really surprised that Autodesk hasn't spoken up on this. Maybe one day they'll realize that a lot of what is done electrically is not just designers. They really need to look at their approach to BIM overall more in depth for Electrical.

Shawn B.

  ||    
To help improve Autodesk Products, please Click Here to Vote for ideas and submit your own.
Message 6 of 20
alan.skipper
in reply to: smbrennan

Autodesk DO NOT CARE. But they are not alone; most other MEP software houses do not have any proper E in their MEP either

 

When will they all realise that nothing will run without electricity!!!

 

I bet we won't hear anything from Autodesk on this.

 

Alan

Message 7 of 20
Mark_Richards
in reply to: smbrennan


Amen.

Every time a new release is announced, I rush to open the new features list like a kid on Christmas only to be met with dissapointment.   Oooh.....wow...., pimpy new transparency control, that wil help me get my drawings out the door quicker.

Face it, E is the ugly stepsister in the MEP family.

I wouldnt complain so loud if I could just buy an upgrade when something worthwile comes out but snice I have to fork out piles of cash every year to stay on subsciption, I'd like a little something in return for my investment.

 

My post from a few years ago pointing out that they do have an army of coders, they just don't apply them well...


Mark said:

Please stop changing the user interface for no apparent reason. It's a huge PITA.

As long as I can remember, the properties pallet icon was a sheet with a finger pointing at it. Now it looks like a commodore 64 computer. Why? Same with explode, It's been a stick of dynamite forever. Ditto for dozens of others.

Does anyone realize how huge of a productivity killer it is to upgrade to new releases? at least 20 hours for me to get things back the way they were, bugs worked out, pallets the way I like them, templates re-pathed, learn the new features, Etc.

Now I have to re-learn goofy new icons that I've known for ever? I welcome new functionality and don't mind investing the effort to learn new features but Icons should not be one of them. Seriously.

I can't believe Autodesk didn't have something better to spend coding hours on in MEP.

Yes I'm ranting, but I just had to turn tool tips on to find the properties palette button.


 

Message 8 of 20
smbrennan
in reply to: smbrennan

Something else that would be nice, is for Autodesk to recognize that WIRE goes INSIDE CONDUIT. They're not separate ... why would you have conduit but no wire? I can understand wire but no conduit, but here in Chicago EVERYTHING has to be in conduit.

Shawn B.

  ||    
To help improve Autodesk Products, please Click Here to Vote for ideas and submit your own.
Message 9 of 20
alan.skipper
in reply to: smbrennan

I don't believe that the guys at Autodesk ever talked to electrical engineers, if they did the engineers they spoke to had never been on a building site and installed anything. They certainly did not speak to UK engineers.

 

I keep offering my services to Autodesk but they don't want to know.

 

Alan

Message 10 of 20
s.lawrence
in reply to: alan.skipper

Yup, we're currently muddling our way through the containment which still doesn't work properly, have just sort of accepted it now! I'm teaching a new user to use cable tray at the mo, and everytime he switches to add a piece of trunking, then back to cable tray the settings go haywire until we force every routing type fitting. And still we have the problem of elbows, Tees etc 'inverting themselves' which doesn't look great on renders or 3D views.

 

Maybe one day....

Message 11 of 20
smbrennan
in reply to: s.lawrence

If you're using cable tray, have you figured out how to get your tray to actually look like tray in a 3D view (or even Navisworks), and not just one giant extruded rectangle?

Shawn B.

  ||    
To help improve Autodesk Products, please Click Here to Vote for ideas and submit your own.
Message 12 of 20
alan.skipper
in reply to: s.lawrence

Until Autodesk treat it as cable tray and not ducting it won't behave as cable tray!!!!

 

Alan!

Message 13 of 20
smbrennan
in reply to: alan.skipper

Actually, back in 2009 it actually LOOKED like cable tray, sides, rungs, and all.

Shawn B.

  ||    
To help improve Autodesk Products, please Click Here to Vote for ideas and submit your own.
Message 14 of 20
s.lawrence
in reply to: smbrennan

Hi,


Yeah, the actual tray usually looks ok. I use the medium duty return flange tray, but before I can just input a size and draw it I have to click the little arrow next to the 'preferneces' button. I then have to click on each of the parts and specify mdeium duty return flange parts for each piece-tray, tees etc. Then it seems to draw ok. But then if you decide to add some trunking, you have to do the same again but for the trunking fittings. Now the annoying part; click on the + in the middle of the cable tray, and it still draws in trunking! So you have to go and repeat the process. Incredibly tedious and non-productive. And usually halfway through it seems like the prgram decides its bored of drawing the bends you specified, so throws in it's own. And the more you draw, the more the fittings 'invert' themselve. You'll know what I mean when you see it 🙂

 

 

Message 15 of 20
alan.skipper
in reply to: s.lawrence

How do you cope with gussetted bends and tees in both tray and trunking?

 

Alan

Message 16 of 20
s.lawrence
in reply to: alan.skipper

Literally just use what's available, I use the 3 segmented bend (until MEP decides to throw in a 300mm radius bend and I have to change it back again!) and for Tees I just use the normal, ungusseted Tee. Fortunately we don't go into that level of detail on our models, but I can see how it is frustrating. I just wish it would stop inverting itself!


Stu

Message 17 of 20
smbrennan
in reply to: s.lawrence

Stu - What profile are you using? I don't see the medium duty return flange you speak of? I use the US Imperial.  I attached snapshot of what I see. It also had one of each tray (minus the "unspecified" type). They all look the same in a 3D view. Is there something in the display manager I've totally missed? Or is this what you see too?

Shawn B.

  ||    
To help improve Autodesk Products, please Click Here to Vote for ideas and submit your own.
Message 18 of 20
s.lawrence
in reply to: smbrennan

Think that's where your missing tray may be-I use the AutoCAD MEP UK version. Attached a pic of the default palette and cable tray pref box on my comp:

My catalogues in options also points to the containment (UK).apc. Hope that helps!

 

Message 19 of 20
alan.skipper
in reply to: s.lawrence

Release 2016 and still crap....

Message 20 of 20
VitalyF
in reply to: alan.skipper

Hi All,

I join the what has been said. (power + low voltage systems)

we filled Wishlist for many years, and also demonstrated for Autodesk demo tools to calculate the Circuit Length,

but to no avail...

 

 

Vitaly

Can't find what you're looking for? Ask the community or share your knowledge.

Post to forums  

Autodesk Design & Make Report

”Boost