Unigue wirenumbers

[johnny.karlsson]

Hi

I struggle with wire numbers and try to create a connection table where each wire has a unique wire number.

This is the most common way of numbering wires in Sweden. Recently I was told that the same technology is used in other countries as well. It becomes more difficult to lay your cable harness when there are several wires that have the same wire number.

So, my question is if anyone has any suggestions?

AutoCAD Electrical way

Wanted way

Regards

/Johnny

[jseefdrumr]

I've never seen drawings where two wires, who share the same electrical potential, have different numbers.

I don't think this software can do that with its native tools.

[johnny.karlsson]

Hi Jim

It can actually be solved, but it looks awful.
If you do not use connection points, but draw each wire to each connection on the component.

I have contact with a company in Germany that labels its wires that way, so it's not just us in Sweden.

[jseefdrumr]

True, it can be solved, but not without breaking a part of ACADE's functionality. Anyone in Europe who assigns wire numbers like this isn't following the IEC standards; ACADE can handle what's within the standard, but it can't necessarily handle things that people do beyond that.

If you need to do this, your only choice is to force wire numbers to be what you want manually. You can maintain the appearance of how you've already drawn things by changing some wires to polylines - ACADE won't recognize a polyline as a wire even if it's on a wire layer. But that means you'll have to insert and manage wire numbers manually, and manually add wire dots/crossing gaps anytime you're using a polyline as a wire.

[johnny.karlsson]

Of course it is possible to find manual solutions, but we want to use as much functionality in ACAD/E as possible.
It is interesting that you mention that the labeling is in conflict with the IEC standard.
Do you know where to find it?

[jseefdrumr]

https://www.iec.ch/

[ramesh.kambang]

There is a way of making each wire to have unique wire number. The whole aerospace and defence industry use this standard (MIL Spec).

To do this:

• Right click the project manager and select Project Properties.
• Int the project properties, select tab Wire Numbers
• In the Wire Numbering Options, check mark option "On per Wire Basis". Make sure you uncheck the other options.

[ramesh.kambang]

...... then re-run the wire numbering tool. Make sure you backup the the drawings before you proceed this.

[johnny.karlsson]

Thanks Jim, it was not my intention to sound rude, I just wanted to get a guide line.
I have been looking in standards for something that describes how wires should be marked.

[johnny.karlsson]

Great, I'm not alone!

I have exactly that configuration, but if I use connection points, it will not be unique wire numbers.

[jseefdrumr]

No problem, and you didn't sound rude.

There are many times where we have to step outside of established standards simply because that's what the customer wants. It's times like that we have to find ways to accommodate them while maintaining as much of the software's functionality as possible. This is one of those times where you don't really have a good out-of-the box option.

[testsubject]

It is easier to do if you don't use connection points and show all terminals. Then you can use the terminal that have a wire number change on them.

[ramesh.kambang]

For aerospace and defence, acade out of the box doesn't work. Most of the European Design Organisations work on metric drawings but use imperial (Military Spec) symbols. They use on point to pont wiring diagrams. So we develop our own symbols and database from scratch. Only few symbols from acade are used.

[rhesusminus]

This is common in most of Europe. A wire has two ends and should be numbered separately, not in a "net", like you do in the US. This makes AcadE pretty much useless in Sweden, where "nollnumrering" is very common (each wire has a unique number starting with a zero).

Here in Norway, we don't use wire numbers at all. The wires are marked with "from/to" information in both ends. And this works perfectly by extracting what we need in a wire from/to report.
But then again... The mechatronics interface to Inventor is useless, as it needs wire numbers to work.

@rameshkabang EPlan supplies the NFPA library in both metric and imperial units 😄

You'll need to turn on "Per wire basis" for wire numbers, and draw like this to make it "work":

[ramesh.kambang]

@rhesusminus

Do you have a link for Eplan NFPA (metric / imperial) symbol library? Cheers 

[testsubject]

I must admit that I really like the "From/To" tagging. 

It is one of the IEC standard ways of tagging a wire.

The Military has  been doing it this way for decades.

It would be a hard sell here though because it makes the wire tags huge.

At a previous job we did use the "To" tag for each end (also a valid IEC tag).

There was a little resistance at first but eventually everyone liked it....

If I remember correctly, IEC allows the following:

To

To/From

To/Signal/From

[johnny.karlsson]

Hi Jim

I can´t let it go...

Two wires who share the same electrical potential, have different numbers.

I use the another method and I got unique wirenumbers for two wires who share the same electrical potential.

Can someone explain?

[rhesusminus]

Hi Johnny (Cadcraft I presume?)

If you draw it like that, AND have "On per wire" checked, that connection will break the "net" (not potential), causing a wire number change. If you use an angled T-marker at the bottom instead, you will not break the "net".

[ramesh.kambang]

Unless you have selected wire numbering option "On per Wire Basis", acade sets one common wire number for all wires who share same electrical potential (like a net). This method is commonly used in the US. Wire numbering per wire basis (unique wire numbering) is predominantly  used in aerospace / defence and also in the Europe.