Do you model your own content for electrical routing or do you download from manufacturers catalogues? What is the reson you work this way?
If you download content, which manufactures and what web sites do you go to? is the data availble in the format that you need? what else do you need to do to make it usable
Thanks!
Scott could you indentify the web sites/catalogues you are using most frequently for downloads?
I assume you still have to add detail for elctrical routing such as connection points?
Thanks!
John,
There is a website called 3D Content Central that allows users to to down load
Solidworks 3d models of all different kinds of components.
And yes, you need to add additional connection points.
Ah Ok, I was assuming you were going outside SolidWorks to a manufactures such as Tyco or Molex
No, sorry.
Just thought this link would be useful for what you were looking to do.
Scott, You did notice that John works for SolidWorks. I suspect his question is a survey of what typical SW users are doing to get electrical component models. I am pretty sure he knows about 3D Content Central. :-). John is probably doing some research to help develop the future direction of SW Routing.
No Anna, I didn't pick up on that.
The best place and of course first choice is to find out on 3DCC else check the suppliers/manufactures if they have any 3d data available. The last option is to model up.
Sorry, I should have posted a little more introduction to make it clear who I was
In fact I work for Product Definition at SolidWorks and am involved with gathering user requirements and specify projects for development. And yes, I'm very interested to know all about where you get your bought in content for electrical routing and why
Thanks!
John Cochrane wrote:
I'm very interested to know all about where you get your bought in content for electrical routing and why
Thanks!
The answer should be to save time on remodelling stuff that is already there. Plus those bought out items are more for display purpose, hence an accurate model is not required always.
Thanks John for the clarity.
I guess in my ignorance I thought you were researching for your own creation purposes.
At some stage I will do a proper survey on this, but for now I wanted to here peoples experience directly
I have fully modeled my electrical/electronic components since 2002 in a variety of industries as automotive, agriculture machinery, etc . For most of my designs I have built my own libraries, based on the spec sheets and the physical evaluation on a batch of samples to determine which dimensions may vary, etc.It Seems to be very efective & quick to have the part model totally re-created in a few minutes considering the design intent and also giving a better control of the crictical dimensions and creation of multiple configurations, etc... I also usually check if there are any potential part model available for download that would not impact the design leaving the importance of remodeling only a list of "crictical" components to be populate the electrical/electronic panel/board/PCBs assemblies/sub-assemblies.So, if using SW Routing sure I would consider determine the routing points, which I have not used yet and I do believe would facilitate on the wiring harnesses development. As you mentioned there are a ton of manufacture sources as TYCO. Maybe you could in the near future post a specific survey classifying by applications/industries to collect
that data for SW Routing development.
Thanks,
Robert Cruz
First, a little disclosure, I work for a connector manufacturer www.omnetics.com. We specialize in high end custom connectors, so I won't feel bad if you haven't heard of us. We have models available on our website, but they do not include connection points - largely because they were made before we had access to routing. And that it is hard to predict how the end user would like them set up; a single point or one for each contact location. I have found 3DCC to be completely hit or miss when I need another connector. There are not a lot of connector manufacturers with full catalogues on there and for the generic stuff, you never know what people will name or tag it as. Jeremy
Robert Thanks for this.
It's a good answer and I'm sure fits with the practice of a lot of design enginers in the lectrical and other sectors such as injection molding.
Very often it's just quicker to model it your self. Do you ever consider uploading your parts to content central so other SolidWorks designers can make use of them?
Thanks
John
So you'd identify two major problems as:
1) Search - Don't know the search terms you need to use to find the content you need
I suppose this is the primary problem with 3DCC, maybe this could be addressed with some kind of visual search tool?
2) Consistency - Don't add electrical routing data such as connection points because you can't predict how a customer would need them set up
I suppose the supplier could set the connector up in two versions, one with a single CPoint and one with a CPoint for every connection
Thanks
John
we would probably be more likely to try to put both in the models - mostly because our IT manager probably doesn't want to double the number of files/links on the website.
So, routing users, would you prefer us to include routing points? or would you rather add your own?
Jeremy
I would say as a general rule of thumb it takes longer to find a particular model than it does to model it myself. The nice thing about modeling it myself is that I can do it to serve my particular purpose. Many models I find online are way too complex for what I need, for an example take a look at any chip capacitor or resistor, these woould be fine if they were just an extruded rectangle, on other parts why is the origin completely off the part for example? why do the top, front, and side planes not correspond to anything in the part? or not be logical if they do? Over time I have learned to find models quickly from places like molex, tyco, TI, ... but if I can't find the model immediately it's often quicker, and better in the long run to just do it. You can get burned by using someone elses models without comparing it to the spec. This in itself almost takes as long as creating the model yourself.
keep in mind it may only take one bad model out of a hundred to burn you.
I have been with Solidworks since the 98 version but I am still new in the SolidWorks Community as Forum, SolidWorks Portal, etc ...
So much to explore and learn but I am sure in the future will be a possibility to do some work at 3D content Central ...
Thanks.
Robert Cruz
Something like the Tyco Electronic's picture search would be nice, but it would need to be quite detailed and load quickly or I wont use it. http://www.tycoelectronics.com/picturesearch/
I tend to go where I can find the model I need. Sometimes I can find it on ContentCentral and sometimes its nowhere to be found. If that is the case I will usually venture out to a manufacturer's website and look for a datasheet. They usually have enough dimensions on there that you can get a rough idea of size and shape.
One thing I have noticed is that its not always easy to search on ContentCentral. The way users enter info about the part can be so different from submission to submission that you basically have to go through the list one by one or look on a different site. So John, if you're looking for "enhancement requests" I would suggest making it easier for users to follow a specific format when uploading new parts.
I have to model most of my own parts. Sometimes it's due to the actual parts I want being specialty pieces, sometimes they're made by a regional manufacturer and different in key details to the mostly US stuff found online, other times it's designing around existing parts which can't even be identified, let alone downloaded.
Some manufacturers like Telemecanique have been very good for downloads in the past. But that's about the only one I've found that was useful to me. 3DCC is good for small standardised parts like fuses etc, but I've yet to find a larger part on there which matches what is actually available in my location.
John,
A little late maybe since the last post is from August....
The problem in search in 3DCC goes beyond electrical routing parts. It is difficult to find any part due to different tags etc.
I would consider as a sulution, strictly drop down menus for every part that a user want to upload.
Categories can be quite a lot i know and it is a serious job to be done but i believe it is the right way for SW to go.
Then every part will be strictly categorized.
George
George,
I agree completely. It sounds like a lot of work because it would basically require restructuring 3DCC from the ground up, but in the end it would definitely be worth it. As much as I don't like going on the web and trying to track down data sheets and modeling my own components, unfortunately that seems to be the easier route more often than not.
John - Are there plans in the works to re-vamp 3DCC or are you just probing the masses to see what the consensus is?
Steve
Sorry George and Steve,
I have been away from the forums for a while occupied with other things. I agree about 3DCC and strict categorization, though there may be other ways to improve search. I'm afraid I dodn't know the answers about improving 3DCC.
My query was more general and was related to discovering where electrical routing users obtain their content and whether they always model themselves or try to download.
Apologies again for being away from this tread for so long
John
John,
I like to download the components from the manufacturers website because this way
I know what they are supplying is accurate to their specs. Plus when it comes to the
more complicated parts it is a huge time savings.