Inserting Panel Footprints and Nameplates (12:22 min)

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[MUSIC PLAYING]

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Now that we've looked at setting up projects, doing

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all of our schematic drawings, defining what our reports are

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and extracting those, let's take a look

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at how we connect our panel drawings

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to our schematic drawings.

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In here, remember panel layouts do not have to mean enclosures.

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That is often the use case, but definitely not a requirement.

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It could be an entire conveyor and you're

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laying out your components on that conveyor.

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It could be additional types of layouts

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that you may want to be showing the physical representation

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and size of the electrical components

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that you've placed in the schematics.

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This is also an opportunity to not do

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this work here in electrical, but to take this portion of it

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to Inventor.

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If you've ever seen Autodesk Inventor,

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that is a 3D parametric package that

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could let you lay out all of your mechanical design

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and then associate your electrical design with it.

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So you do not have to do your panels here or your layout

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drawings here.

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You could do those in Inventor instead.

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That, to just to go back to it, is

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the electromechanical workflow.

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But if you do choose to do it here,

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it can be done in both 2D and 3D.

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All of the blocks and symbols that come with electrical

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are in 2D, but AutoCAD is obviously a 3D package

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and you could absolutely do your panel drawings in 3D

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if you so choose.

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Let's get going.

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We will, for demonstration purposes, be doing this in 2D.

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I've already done all of the hard work

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by putting this into the schematics.

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So now what I want to do is go to my panel tab of my ribbon

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and I want to come up underneath where the icon menu is.

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I want to choose a Schematic List.

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These different lists give us abilities

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to insert based off of information already

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in the project as opposed to going manually to the icon menu

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and having to reinsert everything one by one.

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So if I do an extraction on my entire project,

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and I grab all of my drawings, I will then

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see a list of every single component

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already in my schematics.

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I can then begin to filter them.

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So in here, I can sort my list.

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I typically like to sort by the tag name and then the location

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code.

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You could say location code first

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if you're trying to work on all of an operator station,

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all of a particular junction box, something like that.

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And then you actually have third and fourth levels of sort

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if you want to.

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I'm not that worried about it, so I'm

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going to leave it like it is right now.

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When I do that, I am now seeing a grouping of all of my circuit

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breakers, my cables, my limits, which is my proximity

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switches everything together into this list in this format.

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The crucial part of this is that we actually

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have catalog information associated with it

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because that will allow me to insert the block associated

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with that catalog number.

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Remember, this is not as generic as the schematics.

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In the schematics, a push button could

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be a push button with many, many different part numbers.

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But those different push buttons may

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take on very different sizes and shapes

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once we actually have that manufacturing

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information into them.

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So in the panel, because this is supposed to be full scale,

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we need to be able to get that actual block that represents

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that particular part number.

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So what I'm going to do is scroll down

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and I am going to find a few push buttons here.

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So I'm going to grab these two push buttons

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by shift selecting them.

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So you can shift select as many objects as you want

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and insert them in a group, or you can do them one by one.

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And I do see that I have part numbers on them.

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And I'm going to click Insert.

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When I do that, I can either be prompted

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to place each one of them one by one.

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That's the prompting for each location,

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or I can use uniform spacing.

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Now, I know this drawing very well

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so I know that I can type in negative 2.5

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so that it will go downwards from the first one I

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place to separate these two to line up with these two rows.

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I could have inserted an entire row all at one time

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by setting that spacing evenly.

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So it's very easy and fast to be able to lay out your panels

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once you have your schematic information in.

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I also don't need to see the dialog

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box per each one of these.

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I already filled all of that information

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out in the schematics.

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So there's no need to go back and have

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to look at those again.

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So I can save time by clicking suppress the Edit dialog

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box and props.

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Now, the order is important when you're placing something

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by uniform spacing.

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So make sure that these are in the order

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you want them to be in.

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You can move them up and down, reverse them, and sort them

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however you want.

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Once you click OK, we're now in the panel.

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So we actually get to go back to a few

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more of our core AutoCAD skills.

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We're no longer attaching to wires

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so we don't need to use all of those same commands

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that we were doing when we were trying to make sure that wires

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would heal and update wire numbers and all

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of that information.

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So now, we can go back to some of our standard tools including

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things like objects snap and object snap tracking.

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So I'm going to make sure that both of those are on.

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In my screen, I have objects that are tracking on.

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And I have my object snaps that I need to turn on.

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I am going to turn on my center point object snap.

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And the reason I'm going to do that is because I

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want to line up these two push buttons with the one

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I'm placing.

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I can use my object snaps tracking to do that.

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Once I click to place it, it will insert

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that block and the next block.

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And it will bring me right back into my dialog box

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so that I can keep adding all of the different symbols

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that I have in here.

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Now, one of the things that we can do

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and with the new push buttons you can see the little x's

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got put in here, that is this existing option.

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That will tell me every symbol that

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already exists in the drawing set

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so that I don't duplicate them.

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I can also hide existing.

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If I click on that, it just removes them from my list

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altogether so that my list continues to shorten

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and I know how many more blocks I

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need to insert to have the schematics now match

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in the panel.

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If I'm done, which I am at this point, you just click Close.

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Now it wants to go back and update my schematic symbols.

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We will task that for now and we'll

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take a look at the task list.

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Here, I now have my two push buttons,

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but I need to get those nameplates that

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would match the rest of the nameplates on the drawing.

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So the way to add nameplates is to go back up to my icon menu.

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And in this menu, it looks just like the schematic icon menu.

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However, a couple differences that you

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should be seeing towards the bottom

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is nameplates, DIN rail, and enclosure.

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That's how you really know you're in the panel icon menu

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as opposed to the schematic.

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Now down here, I am going to grab nameplates.

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And there are generic nameplates that

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just come with the software.

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They're very standard.

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They bring up certain types of attributes into them.

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Or you can actually use nameplates

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that come with catalog numbers based off

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of specific nameplates you may be ordering, if you're not

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building your own.

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So in here then, I would do a catalog lookup.

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And it's searching under nameplates,

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and I'm going to pull this back out,

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and I'm actually going to go to an 800 team.

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And with that, I am going to grab one of the first ones

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right here, and click OK.

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Now, it's asking me which symbols

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are going to be associated with the nameplates.

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Once I grab both of them they, will

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both get nameplates attached.

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These nameplates copy the information

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from the component into the nameplate

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so that it can be brought up and put directly on screen

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with the attributes that are associated with them.

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Hopefully, that has your mind spinning

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about what those particular attributes are doing.

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So if you think about it, the schematic

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got all of the information.

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It was then transferred to the panel footprint

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when we assign it to it from the schematic list.

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And now the nameplate is basically a child component

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of that panel footprint.

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So three different symbols that all carry the same information

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and you only need to change that information in one

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space and they will all update.

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OK, so this is the first one and I'll click OK on it,

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and the next one.

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And you can see it copies that information in.

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If something is overlapping it, potentially this nameplate

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is a little bit large or the component

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is a little large for the nameplate,

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we can actually adjust the location of these attributes

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to be able to move them without having to explode or do

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anything else.

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And if you having problems with the snap, you just turn it off

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and then you can bring it, and then you sort that, too.

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You can bring it to the location you want.

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So very, very easy to edit and adjust those

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attributes if needed.

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But again, you should never really

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have to do things manually.

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So if you're doing that every time, perhaps you

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need a different nameplate, or you just

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need to adjust those attribute locations on that block

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in its actual W block form so that every time you insert it,

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it's coming in exactly as you want to see it.

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If we want to be able to put balloons on these

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as well to bring in the item number information,

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that is also a part of our panel tools.

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How we set up the way our balloons look

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is a part of this configuration button right here.

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This is the panel configuration.

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And we can define what we want our balloons to look

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like from this dialog box.

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You have options between circles, ellipses, polygons.

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Make sure when you click into polygon,

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you realize that this is actually a button.

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When you click on that, you can choose many different forms

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of polygons.

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It is not just the one you see here.

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Or you could have nothing.

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And it's just the text with the leader

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as opposed to it being put inside of any sort of shape.

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I'm going to leave it with a circle.

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And I'm going to click OK.

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And then when we come over to our new symbols,

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I am going to click to add balloons

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from the Insert component and footprint's panel.

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You select the component.

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And then I get to choose where I want the leader to start.

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I'm going to turn off ortho this time.

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You could have puller on, though,

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to make sure you're getting your 45 degree angles.

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And then you just draw your landing piece.

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Be careful with object snaps.

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If I hit Enter right now because I have the centerpoint object

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snap on, it's going to try to snap this directly

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to the center of that circle.

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So I just turn it off.

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And now I'm going to hit Enter and that

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puts that new item number right inside of the bubble.

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I can also do the same thing with the nameplate.

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If I don't want a leader, I can just

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click wherever I want to put that balloon.

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And if I want the balloon only and not to draw it,

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I just hit Enter again.

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Now, if I want to be able to bring those together,

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it's a very simple AutoCAD move.

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And again, using things like object snaps

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will allow me to bring them together.

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So you can group balloons together or you can have them

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as all separate leaders.

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In this case, this is showing me both the nameplate

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and the push buttons part numbers.

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If you need to reorder or resequence

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all of your item numbers, that is this button here.

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So in here, you can have it run through the entire project

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and do a resequenced to make sure

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that every part number in the project

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is getting its own unique item number.

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Please take a moment to do the exercise on inserting panel

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footprints and nameplates.