On the surface, when comparing AutoCAD Electrical vs SOLIDWORKS Electrical the seemingly offer the exact same electrical schematic design capabilities, but if you dig a little deeper and ask around, you’ll quickly learn there’s a deeper story to uncover.
While AutoCAD Electrical has served many industries since its release in 2004, many of the early decisions made in product development that were accepted by customers at release have lost their novelty in the 20 years since. This has left many companies asking the questions, “Is there a better way?” or “Maybe it’s time to switch?”. SOLIDWORKS Electrical offers many advantages over other Electrical Schematic tools and implementing it can help streamline your existing Electrical design process.
AutoCAD Electrical vs SOLIDWORKS Electrical Project Level Information
To start, SOLIDWORKS Electrical uses a database to store electrical project information as opposed to a project file. This offers a lot of distinct improvements to how you may be handling complex projects currently. The ease of use for SOLIDWORKS Electrical projects can help automate currently tedious tasks such as linking different drawings together, associating symbols and footprints, or numbering parts and wires.
SOLIDWORKS Electrical Project Management
The automation effect is just the beginning, and the advantages go even further! Since we are leveraging a database to manage projects, the templates we use can store a lot of important information without keeping track of multiple libraries’ files or copy settings from an existing project. When you create a new project in SOLIDWORKS Electrical any project-specific settings, naming conventions, and reports/rule checks are all carried over. This extends to specific drawings or sheets that might exist in my template; a tool that’s useful for starting similar projects from the same base schematic instead of starting from scratch.
Additionally, SOLIDWORKS Electrical keeps track of my active projects and automatically switches between them when opening drawings from each respective drawing. This removes the human error aspect and enables the user to more easily reuse data across projects.
AutoCAD Electrical vs SOLIDWORKS Electrical Parts and Symbol Libraries
One of the more tedious tasks in other programs is having to add additional components to my library and further organize them into new families/classifications. Typically, this requires interacting with a Microsoft Access or SQL database directly and has a high potential for things to go awry.
SOLIDWORKS Electrical on the other hand has an integrated Import Wizard that makes the whole process shockingly streamlined. You can import component information directly from Excel with a custom mapping to align columns with SOLIDWORKS Electrical attributes or even do a simple copy/paste into the library. The custom mapping can be customized but there is even an import configuration for AutoCAD Electrical! At this point, new part families can be created to easily classify components into their respective categories to more easily find them later.
SOLIDWORKS Electrical Import Wizard
Creating the new components is great but its even greater when they get paired with symbols so they are truly represented within the schematic. The one thing to note, however, is that the symbol is not the end-all-be-all of the component and doesn’t actually “hold” the component data. Ultimately, there are a couple of benefits of a system like this:
- Marks can be reserved by assigning a component to the project and are calculated in Bills of Materials regardless of whether a symbol is being placed or not
- A component can be represented with multiple symbols. This can be different drawing types such as line diagrams, schematics, and 2D Panel Layouts; all of which are linked together in the project
- Marks and Properties can be updated across the entire project by simply editing on representation of the component
- Surfing/Finding representations of a component is simplified since we aren’t driven by a symbol
AutoCAD Electrical vs SOLIDWORKS Electrical 3D CAD Integration
Defining electrical schematics in the SOLIDWORKS Electrical Suite is extremely streamlined with the information we’ve discussed so far but the power of the tool takes a big step up when we look at the SOLIDWORKS Electrical 3D integration. By combining SOLIDWORKS Electrical Schematic and Electrical 3D, a user can take the information defined in the schematics and leverage it for mechanical assembly. On the SOLIDWORKS mechanical side, you are given a list of components for the location within the schematic, and they can be placed within the assembly. If you’re asking where the 3D Models come from, it’s all stored within the same parts and symbol library we utilize on the Electrical Schematic side!
With all the components placed in the assembly, we can leverage the other great piece of functionality: Wire Routing. The routing can be done either manually or automatically and takes into account all of the electrical definition done within the schematic. All wire styles and connections are used in conjunction with the 3D Models to fully detail out the Electro-Mechanical Assembly. Further, the lengths that are calculated for wires and cables are pushed backward in the SOLIDWORKS Electrical Schematic reports to ensure full data visibility, no matter where you look.
Mechanical Assembly Using Electrical 3D
Wire Run List with Lengths from Mechanical Assembly
Additional Areas of Improvement
All in all, both AutoCAD Electrical and SOLIDWORKS Electrical are both very capable electrical design tools but the SOLIDWORKS Electrical Suite has a few more enhancements to discuss. In a general sense, SOLIDWORKS Electrical does a lot of the heavy lifting for a user when it comes to managing the designs. There is no need to worry about copying settings from existing projects, managing link lists or library files, and any of the key settings are just part of the template. This includes things like the endlessly customizable reporting tools within SOLIDWORKS Electrical.
We aren’t stuck with a predefined list of report types and the different reports can be mixed together to get a fully cohesive look at the design. Lastly, when it comes to integration with existing data management tools SOLIDWORKS Electrical has a direct link into SOLIDWORKS PDM to ensure workflows are being followed, Bills of Materials are connected, and project information is visible to all who need it.
Get more information about SOLIDWORKS Electrical
Whether you’re looking for a perfect fit for your electrical schematic design needs or investigating a potential change with the tools you currently use, please don’t hesitate to reach out and we can discuss all of what the SOLIDWORKS Electrical Suite has to offer. Learn more about our selection of SOLIDWORKS Electrical Training Courses and our SOLIDWORKS Electrical Deployment Services.
