Editor’s Pick: Integration Shortens Wiring Harness Design Processes

A press release crossed the wires a few weeks ago from AUCOTEC, a company that I was aware of but not really up to snuff on. AUCOTEC develops software that supports the entire life cycle of machines, plants, power distribution, and mobile systems such as cars, trains, and airplanes. Its expertise covers process control, electrical and electronics engineering, mechatronics, and wiring harness design. Let’s start with a look at AUCOTEC itself. It’s an intriguing outfit.

AUCOTEC has been developing software for electrical engineering and process control since 1985. Its client base reads like a who’s who: Atlas Elektronik, Emerson, Honeywell, and ThyssenKrupp to name a few. It seems that AUCOTEC is stepping up its North American activities after decades of success in Europe, although it’s been over here a dozen years. Engineering Base (EB) is its flagship system.

EB is a software platform for system designers and electrical/electronic and mechanical engineers and their organizations. The elevator speech is that EB strives to end and then link collaboratively isolated processes such as mechanical engineering, process control, wiring harness design, and power distribution engineering. EB is like a hub. It provides the functionalities for project and data management and control of your data across multiple power station units, cabinets down, and even a sensor installed in Patagonia. It’s database-driven, leverages Microsoft components, and scales from a notebook computer to global environments connected by networks or the cloud. EB unites 2D ECAD and 3D CAD tools and enables multiple engineering groups to work from a single database, which inherently enhances collaboration, work quality, and process efficiency.

Four main solutions make up the EB platform’s value for you: EB Electrical for diagrams and cable run design; EB Instrumentation for P&ID editing for preliminary planning in process engineering and instrumentation; EB Power for process planning in energy distribution facilities; and EB Cable for wire harness design and engineering software. EB Cable is today’s Pick of the Week.

EB Cable uses the EB data-driven architecture to give you a planning and design tool that interconnects all of the data relating to a wiring harness from the initial design through the deployment. It offers what the company calls “complete independence from the working method.”  That means you select the most efficient approach for the work you have to do. An example being you can choose graphic representations of the wire harness for general diagrams and then use lists to handle detailed wiring.

The news with EB Cable today is its new linkage with CATIA V5. This connection lets electrical and mechanical design engineers work in parallel and then synchronize their data at any time, which can compress the entire cycle. Automation whenever possible, such as automatic follow-up document generation, further compresses the processes. And design decisions are traceable, which should keep the compliance people content.

EB Cable is also available in a package tailored for automotive applications. You can learn more about EB Cable and Engineering Base from the Pick of the Week link over there. Make sure to download the Porsche case study and to sign-up for a trial version. This sounds like good stuff.

Thanks, Pal. — Lockwood

Anthony J. Lockwood

Editor at Large, Desktop Engineering

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

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