Coil pin data not populating Parent Symbol TERMS - ACE 2018

[Anonymous]

Hello,

I've created a custom catalog entry in the database with a set of coil pins and a pinlist.  The problem is the parent symbol TERM attributes are not receiving the coil pin information from the COILPIN field of the catalog database.  The pinThe catalog database connects just fine, all subsequent inserted child symbols receive their pinlist information, in the proper order, based on their predefined pinlist_type attribute (which is 4TP in this example).  The only symbol that doesn't get its information is the first/parent symbol.   Below is a look at the relevant catalog information.  I don't understand why a parent symbol isn't automatically populated with the data in the COILPINS field when a catalog number is selected.  I issue isn't apparent.  Is it a formatting issue?  Any help would be appreciated. 

[Anonymous]

Maybe the answer is here (from the help "searched for "coil pins"):

Type 4 Pin List Assignments
You can set up subcategories of type 4 pin combinations so that some apply to specific contact types and other pin combinations to other contact types. You can also use a type 4 PINLIST assignment to track and control how many schematic terminal symbols can be tied to a given terminal tag-ID.

For filtering of special contact use:

You can set up subcategories of type 4 pin combinations so that some apply to specific contact types and other pin combinations to other contact types. Encode the Pin List entries with a "4" plus a character to provide further filtering of what contacts are available for a given child contact. At the contact end, an attribute PINLIST_TYPE (or Xdata of the same name) must carry a value of "4" plus a character to match up with the coding in the pin list string.

For example, a given device has five N.O. contacts but they are not all the same. Three of them are motor contacts and 2 are auxiliary control contacts. Two different schematic symbols are created - one to be used to show the heavy-duty motor starter contacts and another symbol to be used for auxiliary contacts. Set up the motor starter contact symbol with attribute PINLIST_TYPE with a value of "4C" and the auxiliary contact symbol with PINLIST_TYPE value "4A". In the _PINLIST database table, encode the pin list information of the part number with type "4" entries but use "4A" and "4C" to differentiate which contact pin combinations are for the auxiliary contacts and which ones are for the starter contacts.

4A,1L,2L;4A,1R,2R;4C,L1,T1;4C,L2,T2;4C,L3,T3

When either symbol is inserted and associated with the parent, AutoCAD Electrical sees the PINLIST_TYPE value of the symbol. The contact combinations that do not apply to the inserted component type are filtered out. When you insert a N.O. auxiliary motor starter contact (preset with PINLIST_TYPE attribute value of 4A), you trigger AutoCAD Electrical to pick the next available 4A pin list combination of 1L/2L or 1R/2R. When you insert a N.O. main motor contact symbol (present with PINLIST_TYPE attribute value of 4C), you trigger AutoCAD Electrical to pick the next available 4C pin list combination (L1/T1, L2/T2, or L3/T3).

You have a pin list code of "4TP", 2 alpha characters... it's only expecting 1 it looks like (but not sure if two will work).

Obviously your schematic symbol also has to have the "PINLIST_TYPE" attribute and it must have a value of "4" plus that one alpha character (or two it that actually does work).

[Anonymous · Accepted solution]

Thanks for such a quick reply, Darrell!

I read through that portion of the help prior to posting my question and it didn't help with my particular problem. 

I found that the solution to my issue was in having the PINLIST_TYPE attribute on the parent symbol, instead of the COILPIN attribute.  When I removed the PINLIST_TYPE attribute, and added the COILPIN attribute, the coil pin info populated on the parent symbol.  I never read anywhere that the parent symbol couldn't contain the PINLIST_TYPE attribute, and I don't remember reading anywhere that the parent symbol required a COILPIN attribute, but I could totally have missed it.  Anyway, those two misses seem to have been the culprits.  Maybe the COILPIN attribute is not needed?   

I always thought that AcadE automatically assigned the coilpins field in the catalog database to the parent symbol, without a special attribute.  I'll have to look into it more, but as for this issue, it is SOLVED!  

Thanks again for the reply!

[james_moore]

Where the standard attribute tags are not part of a symbol, ACE saves the data that would go in those attributes somewhere in the project database.  At least I'm pretty sure that's the way it works.  Try adding an attribute to an existing INSERTed symbol some time, and you'll see data automatically transfer to that existing symbol block when you use the appropriate standard tag name.