AutoCAD Electrical wire numbers – Your connections are everything

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AutoCAD Electrical (ACADE) has certain ground rules that users need to follow in order to be efficient. One of the core rules is that a connection between schematic components is a wire, not a line! This is a fundamental understanding for any ACADE user who has created a schematic. Wires, when created, need a number assigned to them to be fully utilized by the program (ACADE). Working with, and editing wire numbers is pretty straight forward – in most situations.

When a user places a series of schematic components on a wire, there are certain rules which they should follow. I will go into detail on proper component placement is another article. A new (or less experienced) ACADE user, commonly working from a new sheet, containing wires set up for component installation, will often set up the drawing inefficiently. In this article, I will address the behavior of wire numbers as they are assigned to a wire during schematic generation.

Wire numbers are easily generated by selecting the wire number command from the ribbon as shown.

However, after completing the command, often the result is less than what is desired. As seen in the screen shot below, all may not be what the user had desired. The wire numbers are valid, and properly generated, however they are not cleanly shown in the schematic drawing. Note how H02263 wire number is on a leader. This is because the devices are too close. We do not need the wire number shown twice. It is already shown with the terminal. Not having the wire number and leader showing is the best way to clean up this circuit.

I would expect to just right click on the wire number to edit it with the hide attribute option from the radial menu that will pop up, as it would for any other schematic component. But not so fast…….

The option to edit a wire number as an attribute is not inherent to the wire number. One could go to the edit wire number dialog box and select “hidden” option.

If you have more than one wire number to hide, this gets old fast.

Note the light to the left of the wire number. If you right click on it, you will get a different set of radial options. Note the added attributes flag. This is where you can “borrow” the attribute editing options you need to hide the wire number!  Any editing that you would normally do with attributes can now be done to a wire number. We will stick with hiding the attribute for now.

Select the “Hide Attribute” option as shown above. Click on the wire number and it will hide, yet the wire will retain the number data assigned to it.

 

The wire retains all of its intelligence and can be edited as any other wire would be. You now have a cleaner drawing with no loss of ACDE functionality!