new terminals for terminal block layout

[Anonymous]

I am trying to use a new phoenix terminal that is not yet in my 2010 database (electrical). I got the .dwg form the phoenix website and I want to add it to my database to use it all the time. How can I accomplish this?

[dougmcalexander]

Use the symbol Builder to add the appropriate attributes for a terminal footprint.  Use AutoCAD’s Wipeout command to outline the portion of the terminal that should hide DIN rail behind it.  Enter the part number into the CATALOG database for part number assignment and make an entry in the footprint lookup database to direct the software to use your downloaded footprint when that part number is assigned. 

[Anonymous]

Everything seems to be working correct now except I cant get the terminal blocks to go next to each other. They are always in a line.. any ideas?

[Anonymous]

Rotate? I mean a template of the terminal.

[Anonymous]

A little more info...

In symbol builder I am building a "panel terminal"

Type is generic

I put in the MFG and CAT

Then I go into wire connection go to others and select 2 level (because its a 2 level terminal)

and than put a wire connection on one of the terminals

than closed and saved the symbol

I then use the command AEFOOTPRINTDB and add the location i saved the symbol in.

I than go to editor and select my TB (just 3) and use the layout preview and there all in a row...

[testsubject]

It sounds like the terminal template is vertical instead of horizontal. As Nata_ly suggested, rotate the template and it should look okay in TSE. ACE expects the terminal blocks to all be horizontal. You can change the orientaion during the insert from within TSE. Be sure to purge the drawing first to get rid of any existing blocks that are not referenced in the drawing.

[Anonymous]

But How can I change how the proceding terminals are inserted, IE ontop, to the left, to the right.....

In other words I create 1 terminal in SE

But my terminal block layout has 30 terminals how does it know where to put the new ones in relation to the original.

[testsubject · Accepted solution]

Terminals are grouped by the TB they are associated with. TSE (Terminal Strip Editor) has the built in intelligence to check the size of the terminal and place the next one in the terminal block list right next to the previous one.

By default, the TSE will build the terminal strip so that it will go on a Dinrail that is mountaed vertically. Therefore, all template drawings have to have the terminals drawn horizontal, not vertical. From within TSE, you can tell it what the orientation is.

What you need to do is open your symbol drawing, rotate it (with 0,0 as the rotation point) so that the "Bottom" of the terminal is on the left side.

[Anonymous]

That explains everything, a nice ahhhhhhhhhhh moment. Thank you for your time.

[Anonymous]

one more quick one. So If i wanted to perminatly change somehting on the terminal block like the position of text what is the easiest way to do this?

[testsubject]

That depends.

For the schematic symbol, just open up the symbol drawing, edit it and use Swap/Block Update to update it for all the drawings in the project.

For the panel symbol, most ACE symbols do not have the attributes stored in them. You will need to add them to the symbol yourself if you want them in a specific location. ACE uses the wd_ptag*.dwg files to add the attributes to each footprint upon insertion.

I tend to just add the attributes that I want to be on each footprint because I do not like the default locations.