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Life is weird, I was just using this site yesterday to do some electrical diagrams for a wiring harness I am building for my ancient mobile. My trouble was und

Life is weird, I was just using this site yesterday to do some electrical diagrams for a wiring harness I am building for my ancient mobile. My trouble was understanding how to flow something through a series of relays, and implementing "AND" and "OR" logic with a relay series. if(AC && Temp > 160) { run both fans } if(AC || Temp > 160 { run both fans at reduced speed } Now, the AC is already a relay, but you can just do 'and' and 'or' together without a extra set of diodes. Anyway, falstad, I love your CircuitJS. I wish I could drag items around though, as for me the hardest part of making sense of things is having a good clean layout. Random question to readers: does anyone know of a tool to generate the very nice wiring diagrams you'll see in bently and other automotive manuals? I imagine they were originally by hand but later were done with a CAD tool. Just wondering if there are any good open source options. CircuitJS fails there because I want to create objects, like a 4 pin relay, that has pinouts numbered (87, 87a, 30, etc get reused a lot!) and have colored cables (because they're colored in real life!). Anyway love this

bigiain 4y ago
> does anyone know of a tool to generate the very nice wiring diagrams you'll see in bently and other automotive manuals? Does Fritzing get close to what you're after? It can create stuff like this: http://troybaverstock.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/arduino-servo-button-red-green-RGB-LED-wiring-diagram.png http://troybaverstock.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/arduino...
- drewzero1 4y ago
  I've played around with it a bit in the past for Arduino stuff, and it could be promising for this application. Do you get to pick the colors of each wire? (Bonus: are striped wires supported?) Ideally you'd be able to mark each wire with an indication of color(s) and diameter so the diagram could be printed in black and white (example[0]). I assume that could be done with labels, but on the scale of a vehicle that could get real tedious real fast. When I need a pretty diagram I typically use either Dia or Libreoffice Draw. Neither is perfectly suited to vehicle wiring, but they get the job done. (Edit: also no simulation, which both of the tools mentioned upthread seem capable of.) [0] http://i.imgur.com/0KFX51Z.jpg http://i.imgur.com/0KFX51Z.jpg
  - calvinmorrison 4y ago
    Drew, why do you have a fuel diagram of a Saab 900? are you another saab guy? The wiring diagram I am working on is actually for my 900, for which the original fans are bulks, tend to break, and are a NLA. I've exhausted my spares and so now I am going a different route. But yes, these are exactly the diagrams I am talking about. Having a computerized version of this would be awesome, actual colors, inlining some information or having 'hyperlinking' around. A lot of the density in these diagrams is to simply fit them on two pages. But, at the same time, it'd be cool to have a picture of say, the solenoid with arrows pointing to the particular pins or replacing the numbers with labels, or say, selecting a relay and having an 'active' path so you could easily see how things flow around without finger tracing it over 3 pages.
    - drewzero1 4y ago
      Coincidentally, yes! I had to use that diagram to troubleshoot a no-fuel issue on my '83 900 last year. (Bad pump.) Now I'm learning all about fuel leaks and brake calipers and putting too many miles on (and paying too much attention to) my emergency backup Saturn. What year is your 900? I haven't heard of this fan issue yet, but there are a lot of really specific SAAB things that I'm sure I'll encounter if I can keep this car going long enough. What I'd really like would be to select a wire and have it highlight the wire and every connection; that'd make continuity tests a lot easier to confirm. I'm sure places like Haynes have some great software in-house they can use to make their diagrams.
      - calvinmorrison 4y ago
        please reach out to me at calvin@pobox.com. It's good to have saab freinds on call when you have Q's. I have... a LOT of experience with 900's. This is my 88. I am getting fairly close to ripping out the whole fan relay system as it's very complex and replacing it with fewer, simpler, easier to replace and maintain switches and relays. Even with the 80's CIS stuff I have experience so... happy to help. The pre 86 calipers are trash though, if you are east coast i have a whole set of 88 front knuckles you might be able to swap over (Not sure if it'll work with your axles). Anyway, I have a good network of saab people offline so parts and things I can usually wrangle up. Last year we did a saab underground railroad and shipped an 1968 96 transmission 700 miles for free over a few months of people visiting people
Ccecil 4y ago
https://github.com/formatc1702/WireViz https://github.com/formatc1702/WireViz Haven't used it personally...but it looks nice.
- drewzero1 4y ago
  Ooh, that does look promising. I might have to try this to document some custom cables at work. Thanks for the tip!

bigiain 4y ago

> does anyone know of a tool to generate the very nice wiring diagrams you'll see in bently and other automotive manuals? Does Fritzing get close to what you're after? It can create stuff like this: http://troybaverstock.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/arduino-servo-button-red-green-RGB-LED-wiring-diagram.png http://troybaverstock.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/arduino...

drewzero1 4y ago
I've played around with it a bit in the past for Arduino stuff, and it could be promising for this application. Do you get to pick the colors of each wire? (Bonus: are striped wires supported?) Ideally you'd be able to mark each wire with an indication of color(s) and diameter so the diagram could be printed in black and white (example[0]). I assume that could be done with labels, but on the scale of a vehicle that could get real tedious real fast. When I need a pretty diagram I typically use either Dia or Libreoffice Draw. Neither is perfectly suited to vehicle wiring, but they get the job done. (Edit: also no simulation, which both of the tools mentioned upthread seem capable of.) [0] http://i.imgur.com/0KFX51Z.jpg http://i.imgur.com/0KFX51Z.jpg
- calvinmorrison 4y ago
  Drew, why do you have a fuel diagram of a Saab 900? are you another saab guy? The wiring diagram I am working on is actually for my 900, for which the original fans are bulks, tend to break, and are a NLA. I've exhausted my spares and so now I am going a different route. But yes, these are exactly the diagrams I am talking about. Having a computerized version of this would be awesome, actual colors, inlining some information or having 'hyperlinking' around. A lot of the density in these diagrams is to simply fit them on two pages. But, at the same time, it'd be cool to have a picture of say, the solenoid with arrows pointing to the particular pins or replacing the numbers with labels, or say, selecting a relay and having an 'active' path so you could easily see how things flow around without finger tracing it over 3 pages.
  - drewzero1 4y ago
    Coincidentally, yes! I had to use that diagram to troubleshoot a no-fuel issue on my '83 900 last year. (Bad pump.) Now I'm learning all about fuel leaks and brake calipers and putting too many miles on (and paying too much attention to) my emergency backup Saturn. What year is your 900? I haven't heard of this fan issue yet, but there are a lot of really specific SAAB things that I'm sure I'll encounter if I can keep this car going long enough. What I'd really like would be to select a wire and have it highlight the wire and every connection; that'd make continuity tests a lot easier to confirm. I'm sure places like Haynes have some great software in-house they can use to make their diagrams.
    - calvinmorrison 4y ago
      please reach out to me at calvin@pobox.com. It's good to have saab freinds on call when you have Q's. I have... a LOT of experience with 900's. This is my 88. I am getting fairly close to ripping out the whole fan relay system as it's very complex and replacing it with fewer, simpler, easier to replace and maintain switches and relays. Even with the 80's CIS stuff I have experience so... happy to help. The pre 86 calipers are trash though, if you are east coast i have a whole set of 88 front knuckles you might be able to swap over (Not sure if it'll work with your axles). Anyway, I have a good network of saab people offline so parts and things I can usually wrangle up. Last year we did a saab underground railroad and shipped an 1968 96 transmission 700 miles for free over a few months of people visiting people

Ccecil 4y ago

https://github.com/formatc1702/WireViz https://github.com/formatc1702/WireViz Haven't used it personally...but it looks nice.

drewzero1 4y ago
Ooh, that does look promising. I might have to try this to document some custom cables at work. Thanks for the tip!