About Routing Conductors in Complex Assemblies

Electrical 3D Design supports devices (single insert connectors (SIC), shells and backshells) and assemblies for conductor routing.

Important: Only assemblies connected through the following connection points are supported: Single insert connector and shell should be connected via the cavity connection point of the connector and the cavity of the shell. However, connection through cavity of the connector and cavity connection point of the shell is not supported for conductor routing. Shell and backshell should be connected through the connection points of the two devices.

The computed conductor length is an addition of the length of segment between assemblies plus the values of Extra Length attribute on intermediate devices.

It is possible to route conductors to complex assemblies. Electrical conductor routing algorithm automatically manage conductor routing to the specified device through the supported complex assemblies:

• Conductors are routed to the terminal device (a shell or single insert connector or contact) or to the cavity of terminal device of a valid complex assembly.
• It is possible to visualize the conductor's route through complex assemblies using the Link Review tool.
• Realistic value of conductor lengths is computed and stored on conductors after conductor routing.

You can specify a shell and a contact as the termination element for conductor end in an .xml file. The process of defining a shell and contact in xml is similar to the one of SIC / connector.

A contact does not have a cavity though it has a segment connection point. Therefore, the contact should be mentioned as it is in the .xml file to define one of the conductor termination elements.

It is possible to:

• define several backshell connection points to shells
• define several backshell connection points to equipments
• define several segment connection point to backshells
• assemble a shell through its cavity connection point inside another shell cavity (ability to define cavities and cavity connection point on shells).

Here are two examples of complex connector assemblies:

Important: Only the specified complex assemblies are supported. Any change to the assembly structures prevents the conductor from routing to the terminal device. Conductor routing to a complex assembly with segment connected to an intermediate device of a complex assembly is not a good design practice. Hence the segment should start / end at the device's end in a complex assembly. Conductor routing with segments connected to segments or contact succeeds. If the segment is connected to an intermediate device, conductor routing also succeeds. But in this case, the shortest route solution is not guaranteed. Only assemblies connected through the following connection points are supported: A SIC and a shell should be connected via the cavity connection point of the SIC and the cavity of the shell. A shell and a backshell should be connected through the backshell connection points of the two devices. A SIC and a backshell should be connected through the backshell connection points of the two devices. A SIC and a contact should be connected via the cavity connection point of the contact and the cavity of the SIC. A shell and a contact should be connected via the cavity connection point of the contact and the cavity of the shell. Two shells should be connected via the shell connection points of both shells. A complex assembly having a shell connected to more than one SIC is not supported. It is not possible to route conductors across or within a complex connector assembly.

During the conductor length computation, only the Extra Length of the cavities and the Extra Length of the backshells are taken into account.

Extra Length set on other types of connection points and on other devices are not considered in the computation.

• For cavities, the Extra Length attribute can be set in the cavity's properties using the context menu.
• For backshells, the Extra Length attribute can be set while creating a backshell or by modifying a backshell reference's properties using the context menu.