A harness design is the best way to plan your electronics or electromechanical systems. These harnesses bundle a ton of wires together and map out their route to make sure your components are correctly connected together.
In this guide, we’ll explain why it’s so hard to design a harness, the complexities involved, what Creo Schematic is, and why CAD/CAM Services is the best choice for your next harness design.
We expedite every harness design by using Creo Schematic, but what is it? Creo Schematic is a built-in tool within the CAD program PTC Creo. Creo Schematic is really good at two things: 2D designs, and laying out a system.
In this case, we use Creo Schematic to lay out the full system of wiring needed for your project, and subsequently put together your harness design. It offers automatic wire routing which takes into account wire gauge, how many wires are running, and minimum bend radii across the board.
In addition, we can use a pre-made library of parts to make sure the right wire dimensions are used.
In our experience, using Creo Schematic for harness designs is the quickest and most accurate way to put together wiring runs for your entire mechanism.
If you’ve tried to design a harness in the past, you already know how complicated it can be. It seems so simple: just run some wires from this board over to those sensors, but it never is. Routing cabling manually in CAD is a nightmare, and validating that the design actually works is difficult to do — sometimes you won’t know if your design is okay until everything is built and you go to integrate components. At that point, it’s too late.
Another major issue is knowing how to physically locate each component. Putting a sensor too close to a thermal source or liquids will ruin your design. It takes a trained eye to know where each part should be, which directly impacts how the harness is laid out.
It’s also worth noting that designing a harness isn’t something you can pick up quickly and execute correctly on your first attempt. It takes a lot of trial and error, and a lot of time to know how to correctly design a harness.
The good news? Our team at CAD/CAM Services not only has the experience, but we also have the software to help us create multiple harnesses and validate the designs before anything is built. Through Creo Schematic, we can expedite the project and build in a lot of extra confidence.
We’ve been helping companies like yours for over 35 years, and we have skilled harness designers on-staff to make every project look easy.
At CAD/CAM Services, we offer comprehensive harness design services. If you simply provide us a layout for your components, we’ll handle every other aspect of the harness design. This is great news for design teams who aren’t comfortable designing a harness, engineers who are buried under other work, or a manager who wants to save money on their harness design.
The solution is CAD/CAM Services. With us, you’ll unlock:
The entire process is streamlined, thanks to our 35+ years of working on complicated projects. We learned exactly how to create accurate, high-quality harness designs without wasting any of your time.
We can join your weekly update meetings or just call you whenever we have updates. We’re here to be out of the way and fit perfectly into your existing workflows.
When you choose us, we’ll start with a quick consultation. During this time, you can explain your electromechanical system and tell us what you’re looking for. We’ll spend time explaining specifically how we can help.
When you choose CAD/CAM Services, you are leveraging a team of industry experts. As mentioned, we’ve created countless harness designs for a number of companies, from small electronics shops to massive government defense projects.
With us, you don’t have to worry about the major learning curve associated with harness design. Instead, lean on our engineers who have the expertise to exceed your expectations and deliver harness designs that work perfectly.
In addition, you won’t have to spend the time or money training your team how to use Creo Schematic. This program is counter-intuitive in a lot of ways, and it’s not comparable to a typical CAD program. It can easily take months to get a strong grasp of all the nuances within Creo Schematic, and most of our clients don’t have that kind of time to waste.
Instead of trying to DIY your harness design, you can allow our team at CAD/CAM Services to save you time, reduce overall errors, and ultimately save you money. We are here to help so your engineers can focus on other aspects of the overall design — let our guys handle the harness design.
It’s really easy to get started with CAD/CAM Services. Get a free, personalized quote, or reach out for a quick consultation to better understand our harness design services.
So many companies have chosen CAD/CAM Services for our professional harness design services. We utilize Creo Schematic to deliver the best possible results without wasting your time, and without sacrificing on quality. Choosing us will free up your engineers, avoid costly learning curves, and take a major part of the design off your plate.
Reach out to us today to get started, and learn how CAD/CAM Services can transform all of your design and CAD tasks.
Depending upon when you catch us, yes, we can handle rush jobs. We often work over the holidays, Thanksgiving and even Christmas holidays. If you have a deadline – call us.
For years we have run three shifts of about 30 drafting folks per shift – allowing us to deliver work 3x faster, and seven days a week. Yes, we work 24/7, so you do not have to. The fun never stops here.
For 3D scanning, this is a different question. Because of the common setup work required, at best expect a 48-72 hour turn to be scanned. CAD or simulation services are in addition to that.
The Department of Homeland Security has identified 16 different infostructures:
This is both Government and private sectors.
If you are in any of these industries, this directive is important to you for many reasons. Do you know where your critical sections are? Are they well protected? Are there concerns for Hazmat, security clearance requirements, and other concerns? Can you quickly rebuild what might be lost?
The important part of this means that critical infrastructure must be secure and able to withstand and rapidly recover from all hazards. Achieving this will require integration with the national preparedness system across prevention, protection, mitigation, response, and recovery.
Further details can be found at: Government PPD-21
DHS – The National Infrastructure Protection Plan details: The National Infrastructure Protection Plan
Industry specific plans: 2015 Industry specific PPD-21 plans
CAD / CAM Services provides PPD-21 for the following industries: DHS – CAD / CAM Services
The Presidential Policy Directive 21 (PPD-21) is a Critical Infrastructure Protection and Resilience United States directive that aims to strengthen and secure the country’s critical infrastructure.The goal of this directive is to reduce vulnerabilities, identify and disrupt threats, minimize consequences and hasten response and recovery efforts related to critical infrastructure.
The directive defines resilience as the ability to prepare for and adapt to ever changing conditions, terrorists, and withstand and recover rapidly from disruptions. Resilience includes the ability to withstand and recover from deliberate attacks, accidents, or naturally occurring threats or incidents.
Yes we do, and have now for several years. In addition, we also support the industry specific plans as well.
Yes, we did back in 2008. We started using Cad Perfect™ back in the early 1990s because all of our customers wanted only real Cad Perfect™ work. Back then the buzz words were terms like machine ready, or DXF Traceover and others.
The problem is, nobody wanted that. They all wanted drawings and models that they did not have to touch. Everybody wanted drawings just as if they hand redrew the work themselves.
Thus, Cad / Cam Services™ was the first company to start offering ONLY Cad Perfect™ work.
It depends on the scope of work:
Simple jobs have a lead time of 48 hours. Larger projects are delivered and invoiced weekly.
Yes. NDAs are a common part of our business. All data is yours – not ours, and treated as proprietary data and not for public consumption or use. Probably 70% of our work is under NDA agreements. We can generally get these signed within the day.
Fill out our quote form, attach your files, or simply send us an email. Tell everything about your project, like the model purpose.
For smaller files < 15 MB you can simply email them to us. For something larger, just drop them in any number of drop boxes like Dropbox, Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive and others. Or if you would like, just contact us for a private, hardened link.
It is fine to use most any time of compression such as *.zip, *.rar, *.tar, *.7z, *.arc, *.LBR, and even *.iso images.
A direct email is [email protected]
We also use a hardened OwnCloud web file sharing platform for unlimited file transfers. We provide unique and very private Web Storage Portals, this also supports file syncing for extreme convenience for you. Because so much of our work is DOD or weapons design work, Security – and confidentiality is very important to us.
The more information we have, the more accurate the simulation results will be. It also depends on what type of simulation you want to run. For a simple FEA, we can run an accurate simulation with just a 3D CAD model and loading/force/pressure information that you want to simulate.
Don’t have a 3D model? Not a problem, our team can make one for you from scratch, and then run an FEA on it.
For a more detailed answer, a well-run FEA will need:
• Material properties: What material is the part made out of? We can run different FEAs with different materials to help you pick the right one.
• Loading conditions: The size, location, and type of load you want to simulate.
• Bonding condition: How is the part held in place? Is it bolted, welded, or just sitting on a tabletop?
• A 3D model
• For other simulations: Please provide us with all thermal, dynamic, aero, and/or fluid flow information. Feel free to call us and we’ll walk you through what we need.
A Finite Element Analysis (FEA) is a form of non-destructive testing (NDT) that shows how your part reacts to real-world loading events. A common example is running an FEA on a support bracket. The FEA will give results showing how much the bracket deflects, how much reactive force is seen, and the kind of internal stresses the bracket experiences.
FEA results will change dramatically based on the position and angle of the load, how much force is applied, the material properties of the part, and the design of the part itself.
An FEA is used to optimize a part before manufacturing begins. It allows you to find weak points within your part or assembly, and it will predict a failure before you physically make anything. This gives you an opportunity to fine-tune each part to optimize its size, strength, and cost before you start producing it.
Yes, our team has license access to all of the major simulations on the market. Currently, we offer:
• Finite Element Analysis (FEA) Simulation Services
• Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) Services
• Discrete Element Method (DEM) Simulations
• Testing Simulated Products
• Fiber-Based Material Simulations
• Geometric Optimization and Design Iteration
• Aero and Hydrodynamics Analysis
On our advanced computers, an FEA can be run in a matter of minutes. For incredibly detailed or complex FEAs, it might take a few hours or even overnight. Not to worry, we have dedicated workstations that just run FEAs 24/7, so you won’t have to wait long for the results.
Generally, an FEA is a good idea for any new part that you’re going to make. The FEA tells you whether or not your design is optimized, and it points out your part’s weak points (physically, not metaphorically). For structural or load-bearing parts, FEAs are often required by your industry standards. For any one-off parts or custom pieces, an FEA can keep your operation safer.
Consult with our expert engineers to get a better understanding of whether or not your part needs an FEA, and let CAD/CAM Services handle the full project for you.
In our experience, FEAs are invaluable. Spending a few hours running a simulated FEA in the background can save you weeks of your time, thousands of dollars, and countless headaches. One time, we ran an FEA for a client and found that their base platform needed to be an extra 1/4” thick, or else it would have collapsed under the weight of the machinery and people. Without an FEA, the platform was likely to fail in real life, and risk people’s lives — but it was completely avoided with just a simple FEA. In this case, the original designer changed the thickness of their platform in CAD, created manufacturing drawings, and then sent the plans out for fabrication: a change that took a day of effort.
An FEA can:
• Save you time
• Save on manufacturing costs
• Help you to avoid common design issues
• Optimize your part so you don’t overpay for manufacturing
• Keep your people safe
• Maximize power and fuel-efficiency
• Minimize drag
• Avoid thermal or physical failure
• Understand cyclic loading results
• Find the failure point of your designs
• Fine-tune your material selection
• Learn the physical limitations of each part
• Establish confidence in each design
• Be shared with stakeholders and investors to secure funding and buy-in
We have a minimum order fee $150.
We create 2D drawings from our 3D models for QC purposes. We follow aerospace standards and deliver ±.005” accuracy models for all projects. All of our QC is done by a different person than the designer. On Catia work, we often use Q-Checker for Airbus.
First of all, we need to know the target CAD system and whether you have an existing template, or set of CAD standards for this project.
The main question is the overall complexity. As each part and assembly consists of different features and elements the best way is to provide us with an example. Again, a picture is worth a thousand words.
If you already have a model and need us to improve it or update it in any way we need to know which dimensions and features are critical and which can be modified to achieve your desired result. Even a before and after example works very well. We started with x, and got to this CAD file.
We can also offer you better options if you provide us with the purpose of your project (demonstration, 3D printing, FEA Simulation, CNC manufacturing, etc.). This helps us better refine the task.
Per hour. Hourly rate depends on what CAD software used and typically starts at $75 per hour. In general, to make this process safer for you, we often provide you a fixed not to exceed the cost as well. That way, you are protected from an open-ended PO. However, the reality is our fees are based on time. In addition, services in say Catia or NX are more expensive than say Solidworks. Or, simulation services are commonly done by real engineers.
Yes, we do. CAD/CAM Services employs over 100 engineers and drafters to handle your most challenging engineering projects. When you need an engineer, you need CAD/CAM Services.
Our engineering services are really versatile, and they include services such as making CAD models, running simulations and doing calculations, reverse engineering parts, and optimizing designs. Our engineers can do all of the design work for your prototype or production item. With dozens of services offered under one roof, you can get more when you choose CAD/CAM Services.
Our engineers have tons of experience and impressive educations, which is why we can offer so many projects in the first place.
We can do almost anything: design a motor mount, reverse engineer an entire F-35 fighter jet, or create a million digital mock-ups of your parts. In fact, these are all projects we’ve done for big companies in the past.
If you’re not sure how an engineer can help, contact us and let one of our associates explain exactly what CAD/CAM Services can do for you.
Yes, we can. Our trained and qualified engineers can run manual calculations, develop calculator tools, and use non-destructive engineering simulations to calculate whatever you need. We will share the results of these calculations with you and also define what the results mean, in plain English.
Our team has over 100 engineers and drafters, and we have a ton of flexibility. Plenty of our clients keep a handful of engineers busy full-time, so we’re not opposed to assigning an engineer to help you long-term.
We will use our experience to assign the right number of engineers to your project. If you ever think you need more or fewer engineers, just let us know and we’ll adjust the assignments.
Whether you need one engineer for one day, or 20 engineers for a year, we can help.
Our designers will run a finite element analysis (FEA) and do hand calculations whenever loads are a concern. This is just another way that we can guarantee CAD Perfect® designs for all of our customers.
People choose to outsource engineering work to save time, save money, and simplify their workforce. With our team, you don’t have to pay for sick time, pay for days off, or deal with admin or HR headaches. Instead, you pay us a simple rate, and you only pay for the direct engineering effort that we provide.
The biggest bonus is that you can add or remove outsourced engineers in seconds — just tell us, and we’ll make sure you have the right engineering power assigned to your projects.
When you choose CAD/CAM Services, you also free up all of your in-house engineers to work on other tasks. In our experience, involving CAD/CAM Services makes everything simpler and smoother.