Inserting a .xls in a autoCAD Electrical 2015

[Help Newbee]

I have inserted a .xls into a autoCAD drawing. The problem is after I scale up the .xls within the drawing to have the text a good size to read. Part of the .xls is outside the drawing border. Can I break up the .xls and put in two autoCad drawings and still keep in the integrity of the .xls? If not what is the best solution?

[ReMark]

What is the purpose of the spreadsheet?

[Help Newbee]

the xls is material reference info.

[ReMark]

No provision for tracking that natively in ACADE?

[Help Newbee]

Thanks for your help.

[ReMark]

I was asking a question.

 

If there is no provision for tracking materials built into AutoCAD Electrical then you have a couple of options. Insert the spreadsheet as an OLE object or use the TABLE command with the Data Link feature where you can specify a range of cells thereby allowing you to split the spreadsheet up between two drawings.

 

Found this reference to "bill of materials" re: ACADE 2015.

 

http://www.autodesk.com/products/autocad-electrical/features/all/list-view

[Help Newbee]

I'm sorry I didn't understand. Thanks again for your help. I will try that and let you know how it goes.

[JohnS]

You don't have to insert as an OLE you can just copy and paste it, then use OLE to edit it. Try to stay away from data links, the excel sheet linked has to be stored with the drawing forever, it's a pain when the link is broken. I use ACADE as intended and generate many reports for my drawing sets, I never insert/paste Excel spread sheets.

[rkmcswain]

We print the XLS to PDF, then insert the PDF.

Guaranteed WYSIWYG results.

 

It also works going XLS->DWF->DWG

[JohnS]

Again use the default_cat.mdb data base to insert part numbers into the schematic devices so you can run a BOM report. Some one told me once, they don't use the mdb data base because they have a parts data base and don't want to up keep two parts data bases. So they developed an automated spread sheet to create their BOM, then inserted into the drawing. What they didn't realize is that automated spread sheet is another data base of sorts and the effort into creating and implementing that spread sheet could have been used to populate the default_cat.mdb with the parts, if they weren't already there, and used to run BOM reports as intended by Autodesk.

 

 

Bottom line utilize the tools in ACADE for smart clean drawing sets. I run; Fuse chart, motor chart, component chart, 2 BOM's, terminal jumper chart, WPS and CPS reports in my drawing sets.

[Kemphas]

Sometimes using a Excel file makes sense. I recently started using ACADE and have found it very difficult to integrate the report building BOM's in my current project and ultimately abandoned it.

 

I have in the interum been building our components lists into a company MDB catalog.

 

Regardless when I start using ACADE's built in reports tool I will still be using external referenced excel files to some extent. For example my first ACADE project had some 40 panels, 20 of these panels were identical J-Boxes and making one BOM with a datalink made sense instead of running the report 20 times.

[JohnS]

From a properly setup drawing set you can run reports and also create an excel file, since as you say you are new to ACADE I would expect you to have trouble setting it up. That said are you able to contact your local Autodesk dealer and get help?

 

The most efficient way is to let ACADE generate as much as possible to eliminate as much human error as possible.

[Kemphas]

I have contacted Autodesk Support, and they are more incompetent then people on this forum to be honest.

 

 

The program is quite on the edge of being soooooo good and yet it falls short far too many times.

 

For example cable conductor lists, my industry does not utilize cables with unique identifiers for each conductor it utilizes pairs for example a 24pair triad cable would have 24 different red, black, and white conductors... I utlimately abandoned the idea that each conductor in the multi-paired cable would be identified as the cable and replaced the unique identification intended for conductor color with "pair 1" "pair 2", i then custom made blocks to display this. This has ultimately been a compromise but has worked well in ACADE's shortcomings.

 

Now here is the problem, when you assign a conductor to a parent, you get a list of conductors already used... THIS LIST IS AWESOME!!!! AS IT WILL IDENTIFY SPARE QTY's.... but the cable reporting tool does not give a Utilized / Un-utilized number so now your back to doing it manually... All it gives is the name, and part number of the cable.... IT HAS THE INFO... But I CANNOT HAVE IT...

 

Frustrating to say the least.