ACADE Project Choices That will Cost More (Time and Money) Than You Think!

[#1]

I have been using ACADE in a controls design environment for 7 years. In my experience, I have found many best practices and workarounds as needed to complete my daily work. My post this week discusses the benefit vs. risk of working with legacy (non-ACADE) drawings when starting a project for a new design. More detailed setup guidelines for project specifics will be another post.

While it is easier (and less troublesome to management and bean counters) to use an existing ACADE project when starting a new design, too often the snakes hidden in the grass will come out to bite you as you take the path of least resistance. If the project you are starting with is not properly configured, and the drawings done using good ACADE practice, you are setting yourself up for trouble.

The dialog box above is simple enough. You have an active project that you are told should be the start of your next design job. It seems very straight forward, just set up the new design based on the existing project and proceed.

The first thing that will trip you up is highlighted in red. I have too many times gone to start a new project, while having a drawing in said project open (usually done to verify having chosen the proper base design). All drawing files in the project you are copying must be closed to be able to proceed. The fine print will get you every time!

 AutoCAD electrical is a great product, with many time and money saving capabilities. However, to fully utilize the benefits of the software there are certain core requirements that must be met. As the CAD designer (aka the cad guy) working with many AutoCAD illiterate engineers, I have had no other option than to “just copy project ABC123 and change these few things”.

My experience with ACADE and the pitfalls of not starting a new design properly were (and still are) not taken seriously (my CAD management adventures are another story). Time constraints and budgets are a part of that, I get it. When trying to explain to management and Engineering personnel that a legacy drawing package from 5 years ago, “worked on” by countless people of varying AutoCAD experience levels is a bad start, I get the deer in the headlights look and not much else.

ACADE projects that are properly configured, can provide many benefits to the entire design team, as well as the shop personnel, when working on a project.

Let’s talk about error reduction. When a project is done following good practices, there are many things that can be extracted from a drawing set, of benefit to other departments. Some of these are:

1. A correct BOM can be extracted from the project database (purchasing will like you).
2. Proper component identification in schematics (component ID’s will be correct, as will tags for the back panel assembly (panel builders hate redoing their work).
3. Wire number lists and device tag lists can be exported for import into label printing applications (no more typos from manual data entry).
4. Shop floor red lines can efficiently be processed. (time saved is money not spent against the bottom line).
5. A clean project is a valuable tool to use for future designs (as CAD manager, I can say that this has many benefits).

ACADE projects that are NOT properly configured will be harder to work with, and cost time and money as a project is completed. Many areas of a project will suffer as in the examples below:

1. The BOM cannot be extracted form a project if the components are not properly identified and linked to the project database (see example below). (the result is more work, and likely errors, for purchasing).
2. Component mis-identification in schematics will cause panel build errors and shop red lines (rework time against a job is not a good thing).
3. Improper wire labeling (not using wire numbering properly) will mean manual rework of wire tags. (this can introduce errors into the job easily).
4. Automated updating of components is inhibited if devices are not properly configured, requiring manual updates (did I mention the human error possibilities?).
5. The final product will not be based on valid component data, or properly configured. If this project is copied (as I have seen many times), you will be inviting more failure in the future (duplication of poor work will not make you any friends).

Below is an example of a BOM report extracted from a correctly configured project and drawing.

Note that all the data is present to purchase the required items correctly for the job. This report can easily be extracted to send to purchasing, saving time and avoiding human error when entering data.

Below is an example of a BOM report extracted from an incorrectly configured project and drawing.

In the above screen shot, you see many devices in the circuit. All of them are improperly configured. See the BOM extraction report below

Certainly not enough data to process the ordering of materials or facilitate the practical editing of the drawing.

I apologize if this post seems like a rant against poor project management or setup. It is intended simply to illustrate the importance of not using legacy documentation when creating a new, potentially reusable project when starting a design project.