Editor’s Pick: Enhanced Electrical & Fluid Product Design Automation

By Anthony J. Lockwood

Dear Desktop Engineering Reader:

I have to say that I find EPLAN is an interesting product. The company just came out with version 2.2 of its EPLAN Platform technology, and I’m even more intrigued.

The basic idea of EPLAN is that it is a set of PC-based design automation solutions for electrical, fluid power (i.e., hydraulic, pneumatic, cooling, and lubrication systems), and process and instrumentation control systems. All of the applications seem geared to make planning, managing, and documenting your work key priorities. Reuse and standardization seem universal. The applications can interface with each other seamlessly and have the ability to interface with third-party design and enterprise systems.

The set includes design applications for electrical controls engineering, fluids,  cabinet and enclosures, wire harness, and process automation. There’s also a product called the EPLAN Engineering Center, which is said to enable the concurrent design and modification of electrical, mechanical, fluid power, and software systems by dividing machines into mechatronic functional units for efficiency. EPLAN Platform technology is the heart of it all.

EPLAN Platform technology provides the core functionality used and shared by the EPLAN product line. It serves like a database of your design and documentation, and handles the data exchange among the EPLAN toolset. Additionally, it integrates the EPLAN products with third-party mechanical design and enterprise systems. Consequently,  through the EPLAN Platform, all your tools and systems access the same data source, which should eliminate redundant data entry and maintains your data integrity.

Now EPLAN says that Version 2.2 of its EPLAN Platform offers a number of enhancements to make working with it easier as well as extensions to various features and functions. It also introduces a new module for field cabling that, among its other features, provides the ability to document field cabling of a machine or plant directly in an EPLAN project.

EPLAN seems to be a comprehensive system with some pretty unique methodologies for uniting and imposing discipline on your design automation engineering projects. You can read about the new features in EPLAN Platform Version 2.2 from today’s Pick of the Week write-up. But what you might prefer to do is hit the link at the end of the piece and sign up for an evaluation CD and see for yourself.

Thanks,  Pal. — Lockwood

Anthony J. Lockwood
Editor at Large, Desktop Engineering

Read today’s pick of the week write-up.

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