CADgneto

AutoCAD Electrical Title Block Link

In AutoCAD Electrical we have the power to update title block of a drawing or project with a click of a button. Unfortunately some setting must be done for all this to be possible, but we do it once and that’s it, unless more then one title block is used. Below represent the different setting that are possible in our “Title Block Link Method”. Before I explain to you what the method are I must let you know the file that controls the title block update has the extension WDT. In this WDT file, which can be read and edited as a text file in notepad, it contains the block attribute and what are they link to in ACADe.

This “Title Block Link Method”, found in the drop down menu “Projects” under the name of “Title Block Setup”, shows us 2 methods. Method 2 is actually an attribute inside of your title block containing your links, which for me I found harder to control and editing on the fly, also your attribute name must be named WD_TB. Method 1, which I use religiously and find it easier to control, offers us 3 options.

Option 1, this option is project specific, in other word you need to have a WDT file with the same name as your project i.e. Project = DEMO.wdp, Title Block Link = DEMO.wdt.

Option 2, this option is kind of project specific also, the only difference, you have a WDT file named default.wdt in the project folder. If you have more then one project in a folder, they would all share the same default unless you created a specific project WDT.

Option 3, this option is more Title Block specific, what do I mean by that? If your company uses the same title block over and over, with little changes over the year, this is the option for you. You would name a default.dwt file in your support folder of ACADe. That way if the title block update doesn’t find a project.wdt, or a default.dwt in the project folder, then it would look in the “C:\Program Files\Autodesk\Acade 2006\Support”. Instead of having different DWT per project, which you are using the same title block over and over, then option 3 is your best bet.

In the “Title Block Link Method”, if you choose to use Method 1, the one that you have selected doesn’t really matter, why? Because ACADe searches for all of them but in the order of, project.dwt, then default.dwt in project folder, followed by default.dwt in the support folder and if none of these are found, it will go to method 2 which is the WD_TB attribute.

I hope this is useful information for you to start setting up your company WDT standard, but also this work for your WDL extension.

Good luck with you Title Block Update,

CADgneto

Creating a Circuit in ACADe

In AutoCAD Electrical you can create component by using the Black Box Builder, but when it come to creating a circuit, we can definitely say the Black Box Builder doesn’t help. They’re some tools that our offered by ACADe, Copy Circuit, Move Circuit, Save Circuit to Icon Menu, Insert Saved Circuit and Insert WBlocked Circuit. My goal is to show you the concept on how to create a circuit with out the tools.

To begin, let’s start with a new drawing on the acad.dwt standard. Think of the Coordinate 0,0 (X,Y), as your insertion point. In your new drawing you will design your circuit, with the proper wire layer and component. Once the circuit created, make sure that your insertion point of your circuit is moved to the 0,0 coordinate. Then save your drawing file (DWG) to your hard drive. Now you have 2 locations possible that will make your life easier, you can save it in the user folder of AutoCAD Electrical or in the symbol folder that contains all the other component of ACADe. I’m offering you these 2 folders because the support file search path are already setup by ACADe, but you can put it anywhere as long you add you folder support search path (Drop down menu, Tools, Options… or type OP in command line). When you save this file the name convention does not come into consideration, You can name it what ever you want but to keep my circuit organize I always start with Circuit_*.dwg, that way I know that my DWG is a circuit and not a component.

Once all of these steps are done, you are ready to bring your new circuit in your drawing. I will show you in another post later on how to insert, the circuit, in the component menu with the Icon wizard, but for now let’s concentrate on inserting our circuit in our drawing. Use the command Insert WBlocked Circuit from the drop down menu of ACADe, Components, or you can also use the Icon too. Once selected browse to your circuit and select open.

A Circuit Scale window wills pop-up and all you need is to fill in the requirement needed to you circuit. Once all your requirements are selected, click OK and now all you need is to insert it in the desired location. As you can see you 0,0 in your original drawing is now your insertion point.

Why must we use the Insert WBlocked Circuit over the component insert? If you select insert component you are inserting a Block filled with other block inside. So Electrical will not be able to read those inside component individually. When you use the Insert WBlocked Circuit, you are actually inserting the circuit as an exploded block. That is why you can edit the component individually.

Enjoy your circuitry,

CADgneto