Reference Components

[Icemanau]

I know that quite often, I'm have to show a contact from one panel in another panel's dwg while still showing the same contact in the panel dwg where it's located.

For example, a high speed trip relay with 10 contacts tripping a number of different panels.

Normally, I just place a contact, fill in the parent and pin information before doing a special explode.

However if the client then decides to change the relay in question or re-arrange the contacts to suit some scheme they have thought up, I then have to adjust both the original contact and the one shown in the second panel's dwg.

What we need is the ability to mark a block as a reference component and tie it back to the main location for that particular block. This would then allow any changes to the main block to be propagated through to the reference block.

Going with the trip relay example, it would be drawn in say panel 7 and all the contacts added to that panel for wiring out to terminals. In panels 1 to 6 there would also be a copy of these contacts. If these copies were a reference tied back to the particular contacts they are referring to, any change to a particular contact would then show on the copy.

These reference copies could also be included in the XREF system so as to allow the users to easily track the main component and the copy. Possibly with a (R) showing next to the location to denote that it's a reference copy in the main listing while the reference copy shows the XREF for the block it's tied to (contact/coil/switch or whatever).

This system would of course have to include the parent blocks like relay coils as well. I have seen quite a lot of dwgs that show a remote coil in the schematic which is also shown in the dwg of the panel where the coil is located.

It could also be used for terminals as well to allow multiple copies of terminals on different dwgs.

Regards Brad

[ccad2509]

Hello Brad

Have you been peeking at the competition?

It’s called an overview symbol in Eplan and it does exactly what you want to do its only been around since 2006

Another one of those features that ACADE users beg for but has been implemented years ago by the completion

[dougmcalexander]

Brad, I have been able to use the WDTYPE attribute to show the same relay contact more than once without error.  I copy the "real" relay block and then I use the Add Attribute utility to add the WDTYPE attribute with a value of REF, for reference, to the reference copy of the contact.  Just be aware that the cross-reference for that particular contact will be shown twice next to the coil, but that isn't necessarily bad.  You can know where the reference version of the contact is and you can surf to it.  If I make a change to the parent, such as a description change, it propagates to all child contacts, including the reference version.  I'm not sure if this exactly addresses every portion of your request, but this is how I handle it.

FYI...I use a similar technique for creating graphical terminal detail drawings.  In the United States there aren't too many takers for creating tabular terminal detail drawings, like we see in Europe.  The Americans want to see graphical terminal strips in the panel layout as a whole and then they want individual drawings that show a close-up view of each graphical terminal strip.  So after inserting the strips into the panel layout, I then use Copy with Base Point to copy each strip or group of strips to a terminal detail drawing.  But how do I avoid the BOM counting two of everything?  There are four ways that I have discovered so far:

1. Special Explode, like you mentioned, but the drawback is that everything becomes dumb at that point.  So what if I resequence item numbers and I want the balloons to update?  I would like for the terminal strips details to have their balloons updated along with the graphical strips in the panel layout drawing.

2. Be sure when I run a BOM that I exclude the terminal detail drawings.  Must remember to do this each time.

3. Check the box labeled "For Reference Only" in Drawing Properties before I generate a BOM report, effectively taking those drawings "off-line" as far as data tracking is concerned.  Must remember to do this each time.

4. Assign the terminal detail drawings a drawing-level Location Code of REF for Reference.  When I create my BOM report format I use location code filtering to filter out location REF by typing ~REF into the Named Location field.  See below:

[Icemanau]

Hi Doug,

With the terminals I was actually talking about having two copies of the same terminal in the project schematics.

One in one location and the other in a different location.

This has been requested a few times before in separate ideas by several people, including myself.

The main use that I can see is for Bus Wiring diagrams where multiple wires go between different panels within the project. With these, you have to show the terminals in the schematic for the panel AND the schematic for the bus wiring.

Regards Brad