Hey Gang - Long time reader, first time poster.
I am looking for a software tool that can help develop and manage LV cable and conduit schedules for % Conduit Fill, Circuit VDrop, derating per NEC etc. I am an EE consultant working with a ~25 person design team designing electrical substations for smaller utilities and NEC compliant industry (large scale renewable projects) in the US.
Our typical substation design uses a homemade combined cable/conduit scheduling tool in Excel with lookup tables etc but it is clunky and difficult to modify when the contractor changes material cable changes, equipment moves, etc and is still largely up to the designer or engineer to ensure all cross-checks and changes trickle down.
Typical cables our designs:
Low Voltage AC & DC equipment power, PT and CT secondary cables, multi-conductor control cables, fiber optic in innerduct, etc.
We use CymCAP for MV and HV cable heating analysis and a tool like PullPlanner for bigger cable pulls, no problems there, just looking for a reliable commercial tool that can help without having to build a custom VB program in-house. I know AutoCAD electrical can do some aspects of BOM management, but our designs are rarely cookie-cutter and I don't want to spend more time maintaining models and databases than we can help. I see from a previous thread in ~2008 that there was a Dolphin Software - Volts program, looks like they have been out of business for 10+ years. Short of going full-on BIM (which the customer won't want to pay for), are there tools out there to do this kind of schedule management? Any suggestions?
I am looking for a software tool that can help develop and manage LV cable and conduit schedules for % Conduit Fill, Circuit VDrop, derating per NEC etc. I am an EE consultant working with a ~25 person design team designing electrical substations for smaller utilities and NEC compliant industry (large scale renewable projects) in the US.
Our typical substation design uses a homemade combined cable/conduit scheduling tool in Excel with lookup tables etc but it is clunky and difficult to modify when the contractor changes material cable changes, equipment moves, etc and is still largely up to the designer or engineer to ensure all cross-checks and changes trickle down.
Typical cables our designs:
Low Voltage AC & DC equipment power, PT and CT secondary cables, multi-conductor control cables, fiber optic in innerduct, etc.
We use CymCAP for MV and HV cable heating analysis and a tool like PullPlanner for bigger cable pulls, no problems there, just looking for a reliable commercial tool that can help without having to build a custom VB program in-house. I know AutoCAD electrical can do some aspects of BOM management, but our designs are rarely cookie-cutter and I don't want to spend more time maintaining models and databases than we can help. I see from a previous thread in ~2008 that there was a Dolphin Software - Volts program, looks like they have been out of business for 10+ years. Short of going full-on BIM (which the customer won't want to pay for), are there tools out there to do this kind of schedule management? Any suggestions?
