CadActiveSupport

concept

ECAD

Board-level ECAD/MCAD work in Creo: catalogs, area checks, board setup, and drawing notes and dimensions.

ECAD is CadActive’s board-level layer between electrical board design and mechanical design in Creo. CadActive does not replace your ECAD authoring tool or Creo. It makes board naming, area checks, sockets/fasteners/inlay, and drawing notes and dimensions repeatable from the CadActive ECAD ribbon.

You need an ECAD license. What you can do also depends on whether a board part, board assembly, or drawing is active.

Who does what

Role

Where

What they do

Admin / CAD manager

Web app — ECAD → Configuration → Catalogs; Organization → Settings

Edit catalog name, description, and unit system. Set zero-height depths.

Engineer

Creo — CadActive ECAD group

Validate areas, create board models, set name/thickness/sockets/fasteners/inlay, and place drawing notes and dimensions.

What it includes

  • Catalogs — organization name, description, unit system, and default in the web app. They do not stock socket, fastener, or inlay SKUs. See ECAD Catalogs.

  • Validate ECAD Areas — interference and design-rule checks on the board assembly. See Validate ECAD Areas.

  • ECAD Model Builder — File → New from a CadActive template, from the ECAD group. Same dialog as Standardize Model Builder. See ECAD Model Builder.

  • Board setup — ECAD Board Name, ECAD Board Thickness, ECAD Board Sockets, ECAD Board Fasteners, and ECAD Board Inlay. See ECAD Board Setup.

  • Drawing notes — Add ECAD Component Notes and Add ECAD Area Notes. See Add ECAD Component Notes and Add ECAD Area Notes.

  • Board dimensions — Add ECAD Board Dimensions, including Edit Sheet Definitions inside that dialog. See Add ECAD Board Dimensions.

  • Socket Site Locations — export and import SITE_ coordinate systems on the board part, grouped as SOCKET_SITES. See Socket Site Locations.

ECAD owns board-level work. Cabling owns routed wires and harnesses. Schematics owns 2D logical diagrams.

ECAD does not have command-line actions. Use the CadActive ribbon in Creo. Shared flags for other products are on Creo Parametric Command Line.

Socket site positions export and import from Socket Site Locations. Export from Validate ECAD Areas is still a CSV of design-rule results in that dialog.

In this section

In this section