There are two roles that everyone needs for both 2D (logical) and 3D (physical) electrical design. These are called the ‘Collaborative Business Innovator’ (IFW) and ‘Collaborative Industry Innovator’ (CSV) roles.

CATIA V6 Electrical Required Foundational Roles

Collaborative Business Innovator brings the connected environment into an entire organization. This role allows people from inside or outside of your company to securely view and share content while in a web browser. It also lets you do all of the work in a single location from design to market. You can add the power of collaboration and data sharing to your 3DEXPERIENCE platform and create a hub for your designs in a convenient place where you can collaborate on the cloud from anywhere.

On the other hand, Collaborative Industry Innovator is best described as a product data management tool. This browser-based role gives PDM additional functionality by letting users compare, markup, and view realistic CAD data. This provides a collaborative way to monitor iterations and changes to your electrical designs.

2D Electrical Schematic Role Breakdown

Collaborative Business Innovator and Collaborative Industry Innovator are the base roles you need for the 3DEXPERIENCE Platform. Together, these tools integrate seamlessly with the roles that make up CATIA Electrical. For the creation of schematics and 2D logical designs, you’ll need the ‘Systems Schematic Engineer’ (TIC) role. This tool allows designers to create intelligent schematics for wiring, cabling, piping/tubing, and HVAC systems. Let’s look at some of the capabilities

• Fully define 2D electrical component, port, and wire/cable libraries
• Define and connect electrical and fluid system schematics for a complete detailed logical system design
• Build logical architecture of harnesses
• Capture attributes and technology automatically within the schematic.
• Edit the attributes of electrical components within the schematic
• Create links between logical components and realistic 3D representations
• Analyze connectivity and quality of schematic design and ensure synchronization with the 3D design using business intelligence rules.

3D Physical Electrical Design Role Breakdown

For 3D physical design, you’ll use the ‘Electrical 3D System Designer’ (ELG) role. This tool is an integrated 3D electrical development environment, which enables the physical design of wire harnesses and cabling in the conditions of the complete product. Some of the main features to point out include:

• Create electrical geometries, electrical branch geometries, and electrical physical systems
• Synchronize electrical schematics to 3D designs to improve electrical systems quality and consistency
• Create or import conductor specifications
• Design and optimize electrical wire harness bundles and cable ways accurately in the realistic environment of the full system
• Route 3D wires and cables to obtain exact bundle diameters and wire/cable lengths
• Simulate routes between selected network ends and compute route lengths

CATIA V6 Electrical provides a logical to physical electrical system design solution and is fully integrated with the 3DEXPERIENCE Platform. This means that you can easily incorporate CATIA V6 Electrical into your design lifecycle process. This allows you to efficiently collaborate with the other roles that 3DEXPERIENCE has to offer, giving you a more seamless process.

Jacob Quintana
Application Engineer Specialist, Electrical
Computer Aided Technology

In the steps below, we will walk through the process to convert your CATIA V4 models into either a V5 part file with parametric features or a simple “dummy” file that holds just the solid geometry.

Steps to Convert Your Models

1: Open your CATIA V4 model in the CATIA V5 software.

2: Right click on the MASTER icon in the specification tree and select “Copy”.

3: Create a New Part by selecting “File” then “New”. Scroll down the available List of Types in the new window that opens and select “Part”. Click “OK”.

4: Enter your Part Name and click “OK”. For this example, we will call our new part “Part1”.

5: In your newly created part, right click the “Part1” reference icon and select “Paste Special”.

6: From here you will have two paste options to choose from; CATIA_SPEC and CATIA_RESULT.

• CATIA_SPEC will create part features in V5 that correlate to the model features in V4. This will give you a parametric model that can be edited.
• CATIA_RESULT will produce only the solid geometry of the V4 model into a V5 part. You can’t edit this part.

Once you select which paste option to use, click “OK” and the part will be pasted.

After the CATIA V4 model is pasted, it is now converted into a CATIA V5 part file. You can now save the part within the V5 software as a .CATPart file or any of the other available file types (e.g. .IGES, STP, etc.).

One of the great features of CATIA V5 is that it has a wide variety of functionalities. Unfortunately, navigating through all of them to find which ones are going to be beneficial to your business can be a bit challenging and individually hand picking which options to use could end up being expensive. This is where CATIA V5 PLM Express comes into play.

CATIA V5 PLM Express provides numerous bundled solutions or configurations based on overall functionality. This allows customers to buy pre-made packages that are geared towards their company’s needs. Often, these configuration packages result in more functionality at an overall lower cost.

Some of these configuration packages include Mechanical Design, Complex Surface Design, Sheet Metal Design, as well as many others. If your company needs multiple configurations, CATIA V5 PLM Express allows you to bundle different configurations together, allowing for even more versatility and customization. There is even a starting configuration, CAT3DX, that provides the base functionality of CATIA V5 as well as an entry level for the 3DExperience Platform.

Listed are some of the more common configuration bundles and their general application:

• CAT3DX + MCE – Advanced Mechanical Design
• CAT3DX + MCE + HDX – Complex Surface Design
• CAT3DX + FPE – Sheet Metal Design
• CAT3DX + GAE – FEA Analysis
• CAT + MCE + CPX – Composite Design

How to Install

When installing CATIA V5 PLM Express, there are several crucial steps to ensuring a successful install. Below is a step by step guide to getting the software up and running for you. Before doing any of these though, you will need to verify that you have installed the Dassault Systemes License Server (DSLS).

Step 1: Locate your two CATIA PLM Express Edition 3 zip files. For this example, we will be using V5-6R2018.CATIA_PLM_Express.win_b64.1-2 and V5-6R2018.CATIA_PLM_Express.win_b64.2-2 files.

Step 2: Create a folder to extract both CATIA PLM Express Edition 3 zip files into. We will call this folder “CATIA_PLM_Express”. Extract both the V5-6R2018.CATIA_PLM_Express.win_b64.1-2 and V5-6R2018.CATIA_PLM_Express.win_b64.2-2 file into this newly created folder.

• When creating the folder name, you will want to avoid using special characters and spaces. You will also want to make sure that the file path does not exceed 180 characters in length.

Step 3: Open your newly created folder. You will notice that inside it, a new folder, “CATIA_PLM_Express.win_64”, has been created.

Step 4: Open the “CATIA_PLM_Express.win_64” folder.

Step 5: Next, open the “1” folder.

Step 6: Double click the “setup” file to begin installing the software. When installing the software, use the default settings unless otherwise recommended.

Step 7: While the software is installing, go to your Windows Search bar and type in “Notepad”. You will open the Notepad app to create a new text file.

Step 8: With the Notepad app open, you will type in one of the following text formats:

Device Name:4085

Or

IP Address:4085

The IP Address format is used when the DSLS is put on an external machine. When this is the case, you will need to open the 4085 ports in the firewall to allow proper communication.

For this example, the device name is CIN-TECH-JZ, therefore the text file will read:

CIN-TECH-JZ:4085

Step 9: Click File, Save As, and browse to where you have your CATIA PLM Express Edition 3 software download zip files. Here, you will save this text file as the following:

DSLicSrv

• It is important you save this file exactly how it is spelled out including proper capitalization.
• Do not add “.txt” to the end of the file name.

Step 10: Once the software install is finished, uncheck the “I want to launch CATIA PLM Express V5-6R2018”, and click Finish. There are a few more steps before the software is ready.

Step 11: Right click on your newly created “DSLicSrv.txt” file and Copy it.

Step 12: Go to your C: drive.

Step 13: At the top of the window, click “View”. then go to the right side of the screen and click the down arrow under “Options”, followed by clicking “Change Folder and Search Options”.

Step 14: A “Folder Options” window will open. Select the “View” tab at the top. Towards the middle of the screen will be a “Hidden files and folders” icon with two options below it. Select the “Show hidden files, folders, and drives” option.

Step 15: Click “Apply”. Then “Ok” in the “Folder Options” window.

Step 16: In the C: drive, open the newly unhidden “Program Data” folder.

Step 17: Open the “DassaultSystemes” folder.

Step 18: In the “DassaultSystemes” folder, you will create a new folder called “Licenses”. Ensure that you spell it with a capital L.

Step 19: Open the “Licenses” folder and paste the “DSLicSrv.txt” file into it. This step allows this computer to point at the License Server.

Step 20: Open the CATIA software. An error message will pop up. Click ok.

Step 21: The License Manager window will open with a list of Available Configurations or Products. Select all that apply, the click OK.

Step 22: Close out of the software, and re-open it up. Your CATIA software is now ready to use.

Josh Zumberger |CATIA Applications Engineer
InFlow Technology | A Computer Aided Technology Company

To start, you will need the FTA License to create the 3D Annotations and the ST1 License to export to STEP. If those licenses have been acquired, you will need to go to Tools > Options > General > Shareable Products to activate them.

CATIA V5 PMI Part 1

Next, you will want to adjust your settings so that CATIA will export STEP files in AP242. You can do this under Tools > Options > General > Compatibility > STEP. Here, you will want to change the Application Protocol to “242 ed1” in the “Export” section and make sure 3D Annotations is checked in the “General” section

CATIA V5 PMI 2

After the part is finalized with your 3D Annotations, you can export it by highlighting the part in the tree, selecting File > Save As, and choosing “stp (*.stp)” from the “Save as type:”  dropdown menu in the Save As window.

CATIA V5 PMI 3

Below we can see that the PMI data is included when imported in to SOLIDWORKS and 3DEXPERIENCE, respectively.

CATIA V5 PMI 4

CATIA V5 PMI Part 5

CATIA V5 PMI 6

If you have done any research, watched promotional videos, or listened to anyone talk about 3DEXPERIENCE, you will have heard the term “Data-Driven” ad nauseam (and for good reason). Most of the benefits that 3DEXPERIENCE has to offer comes from this “Data-Driven” approach. Having the platform set up this way eliminates the need to store data in a file-based format. The data is, instead, stored in a streamable package. 3DEXPERIENCE utilizes a Cloud-Based platform that is set up on a Dassault or on-premise server. These servers will stream data to users according to their access rights that are set by an admin. Users can range from anyone in the internal company, to suppliers, and even customers.

A major advantage of having a Data-Driven platform is that it gives a “single version of the truth”. This means that modified data will be updated across the entire platform in real time. The data is ALWAYS up-to-date. For example, if two designers are modifying different parts within an assembly at the same time, each designer can see the modifications that the other has made without having to close, re-sync, and re-open the assembly. The user needs to simply perform an “Update” command. This also means that whatever data the supplier or manufacturer can access is always the latest. This circumvents the issue of wasted time by having worked on outdated data.

The 3DEXPERIENCE platform creates an environment where nearly every aspect of the project can be managed within the suite. Because the system is cloud-based, the users can connect project data such as benchmarking documents, timelines, open issues, and deliverables to the CAD data/project with an optional drag-and-drop functionality. This connected data can also be tracked and monitored, thus giving managers “invisible governance” over a project. Because the suite is Data-Driven, project managers can track progress and assess development schedules in real time without micro managing their teams.

3DEXPERIENCE is split into two interfaces. Web and Native. The Web Apps are opened through a web browser and gives the user access to Social, Collaborative, and Information Intelligence Apps. The Native Apps include all the 3D design, drafting, rendering, and simulation apps which run from a local computer and require software to be installed. These apps can include CATIA, SIMULIA, DELMIA, and SOLIDWORKS.

The new Data-Driven approach also changes how an assembly is managed. In CATIA V5-6, an assembly was saved as a bulky product file with all the sub-assemblies and child parts within it. However, in 3DEXPERIENCE, there are no assembly files. Instead, the sub-assemblies and child parts are linked to the assembly through logic paths. This is especially useful when the assembly has multiple variations. In V5-6, a unique CATProduct was created for each assembly variation. This could take up large amounts of data as well as become cumbersome to keep track of. With 3DEXPERIENCE, connecting the assemblies with Data-Driven logic paths saves space and simplifies variation management. This also comes in handy when a company works with multiple manufacturing facilities with varying capabilities. 3DEXPERIENCE keeps track of variations based on manufacturing facility as well as providing the capability to include replacements for parts on the BOM/EBOM that may not be available to the facility at the time. Thus, avoiding errors and time delays in production.

The 3DEXPERIENCE Platform enhances BOM/EBOM capability as well. In 3DEXPERIENCE the BOM and 3D data are directly linked. Changes to the 3D data are now immediately reflected in the BOM and vice versa so that BOM errors during development are minimized. The connectivity of 3DEXPERINCE’s platform also gives users the ability to roll-over items in the BOM and have them highlight the associated part(s) in a 3D viewing space.

The Cloud-Based and Data-Driven 3DEXPERIENCE Platform has quite a few noticeable differences from its Client and File-Based predecessor. However, these differences are crucial to improving communication, productivity, and quality output to compete with today’s demanding marketplace. The conversion from CATIA V5-6 may take some getting used to as well as some extra training. Luckily, InFlow Technology offers regular training sessions to turn any novice 3DEXPERIENCE user into an expert in no time.

Tim Ramos
Application Engineer
InFlow Technology

Upon opening the platform, you immediately notice that the interface has been completely re-vamped and has adapted a more sleek and modern look.

CATIA V5 Interface

3DEXPERIENCE Interface

Another striking difference is the new Top Bar. Instead of the typical Top Bar Menus (Start, File, Edit, View, Insert, Analyze, Window, and Help), you are left with some icons, a search bar, and the ultra-handy Compass. These icons essentially replace all the functionalities that were available within the CATIA V5-6 top bar menus.

Me Menu: All information related to you

My Roles/Profile: Activate or Deactivate roles. This will enable and disable certain features and accessibilities for the user. An Admin or Project Manager will assign these roles to each user profile.

My Status: This denotes the user’s communication status for collaborative instant messaging inside of 3DEXPERIENCE. Statuses can be “Online, Busy, do not disturb, Be right back, or Away”.

Preferences: Gives user access to customize actions, commands, toolbars, standards as well as access to the “Preferences” menu that is familiar to the V5-6 platforms.

Work Offline: Gives user ability to complete work without being connected to the Cloud or Internet all together. This will limit the user to the 3D Modeling Apps.

My Offline Content: View and manage offline content.

Add Menu: Create and add content

Import: Import 3D XML 3DEXPERIENCE Native Files, CATIA files, and Non-CATIA-Native files (STEP, IGES, STL, x_t, etc).

Physical Product/3D Part/Drawing: creates a new file of type chosen.

Share Menu: Share, save, & collaborate

Save: Save, Save with Options, Save All, Local Save.

Share: Share data to Collaborative Spaces or to Community .

3DMessaging: Instant message with others on 3DEXPERIENCE.

Export: export to 3D XML, STEP, IGES, X-PDM,and CATIA V5.

Print: Print items.

Home Menu: Switch to another Collaborative Space

Collaborative Space: Switch to desired Collaborative Space and Role within that Space.

Manage: Opens the 3DSpace App.

Help Menu: User assistance and support community

Get Started: Opens welcome window giving brief overview of platform.

Help: Redirects to web browser that will provide help on current command.

User’s Guides: Grants access to online or installed user assistance.

Tutorials: Provides various tutorials embedded within client.

User Companion: Starts User Companion (if Computer-Based Training module and Companion have been installed), or routes to 3DS eLearning solutions page.

About 3DEXPERIENCE Platform: Shows 3DEXPERIENCE background information

The search bar, or “3DSearch”, creates a unified user experience for finding information on the 3DEXPERIENCE Platform. The 3DSearch is built on Dassault’s industry-leading Exalead CloudView technology and is available across all the applications and experiences within the Platform. 3DSearch allows for all data and metadata stored in the 3DEXPEREINCE Platform to be searched using Full-Text Search within the context of the active application. To help users sift through large amounts of results more easily: a user can select sub-categories, utilize built-in help menus, refine searches using predefined scopes, and access previously saved searches. A user can also filter data by using 3DEXPERIENCE’s unique tagging system (6WTags) that categorize objects by Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How criteria.

The Compass has changed from V5-6 to 3DEXPERIENCE, but by name only. 3DEXPERIENCE still has a graphic manipulator that was known as the “Compass” in CATIA V5-6. Except now it is referred to as the “Robot” and is in the bottom right of the screen next to the new “Swap Visible Space” command.

In 3DEXPERIENCE, the compass is the user’s gateway to all their roles and applications for both Web and Native Apps

To access an app, the user simply clicks the quadrant of the Compass, activates the necessary role, and chooses the desired app. CATIA V5-6 does not have the Compass, however, there are some parallels with access to the 3D Modeling commands. In CATIA V5-6, a command toolbar would be accessed by choosing the desired workbench from the Start menu or from the Workbench Toolbar.

With 3DEXPERIENCE, the user will now select the desired quadrant of the Compass, select the applicable Role, and then select the applicable App. This is a slightly longer process, but is necessary to better organize all of the capabilities that 3DEXPERIENCE has to offer.

If you’ve been playing along on your own 3DEPXERIENCE client, it’s become apparent that not only are the command icons larger and more intuitive, but the toolbar layout is vastly different than that of V5-6. Instead of a set of toolbars that can be shown/hidden, rotated, and moved: the toolbars which are specific to the active app are pinned to the bottom of the screen in what’s called an “Action Bar”. Each Toolbar is split according to function and categorized within a tab. Commands which are most often used in each app are placed in an “Essentials” tab for easy access. Much like a “favorites” feature. 3DEXPERIENCE still gives the option to make edits to this action bar as well as create custom action bars.

3DEXPERIENCE Action Bar

CATIA V5-6 Toolbars

While working in 3DEXPERIENCE, selecting just about any geometry will prompt 3DEXPERIENCE to show a toolbar with commands specifically related to that geometry. For example, selecting a line in a sketch will prompt the interface to show a toolbar with commands for Construction Element, Trim, Break, Offset, Auto Search, Constrain, Fix, Horizonal, and Vertical to apply to that line.

Finally, you will notice that even the command bar is more user friendly than in CATIA V5-6. In 3DEXPERIENCE, if a command that the system does not recognize is entered, 3DEXPERIENCE will open a window with suggested commands similar to the original input.

If you would like to gain a more in-depth understanding of what 3DEXPERIENCE has to offer, Inflow Technology holds regular training sessions to get you up to speed in no time.

At InFlow Technology, we provide product lifecycle management and product data management solutions, with a focus on ENOVIA, SOLIDWORKS PDM, CATIA, and SIMULIA products, services, training, and support.

“It starts with providing the right solutions and our commitment to making sure our clients are successful,” said Justin Webster, Vice President, InFlow Technology. We want to build lasting partnerships with our clients.”

In 2017, we added CATIA 3D modeling and design software to our solution portfolio. CATIA is used in a wide variety of industries for product design by some of the world’s most recognizable brands.

“The addition of CATIA to our portfolio was a decision that made sense. We always look for ways to add more value to our relationships with our clients. Many were already using CATIA in their design process. By adding CATIA, we have positioned ourselves as a one-stop shop for our clients,” said Rod Levin, President, InFlow Technology.

For more information, visit our website at www.cati.com.

Jim TeDesco, Vice President, Marketing
Computer Aided Technology, LLC and InFlow Technology, LLC
www.cati.com