HydraCAD actually can do a lot of that stuff automatically. Thanks, Trever Williams Designer Unlimited Sprinkler Fire Protection 11130 Petal St. Suite 800 Dallas, TX 75238 214-349-8444 - Phone 214-349-8450 - Fax
-----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Kurt Olson Sent: Thursday, February 15, 2007 7:55 AM To: [email protected] Subject: RE: Design software I have experience with all three of the major sprinkler design packages. I began my career using SprinkCAD about 12 years ago and it has been the package I have used a majority of the time. I am therefore partial to it because I know how to make it do every thing I want. I think the best part of SprinkCAD is that the calcs and listing are integral to the drawing. The advantage of this is that the drawing and calculations always match. If you change the drawing and run the calc all pipe sizes and lengths in the calc match the drawing. Also all you have to do to change the calc is change the drawing. This is the same for listing. When the drawing is ready for approval it is complete and very little must be done for stocklisting. The one thing with SprinkCAD is you have to accept how the program labels the pipe for listing because the forced tags do not work as well as Tyco would like to believe. While never actively designing with HydraCAD I did supervises a design department that used it. The biggest problems I had with it was that the drawing and calcs are separate. While you can export the drawing info to the calcs no elevation were transferred and all the riser lengths and elevation info had to be added. Also once you do the export you then change the calcs to work and all that info must then be transferred to the drawing. We had many cases where the drawings were rejected because the calcs did not match the drawing. For stocklisting all the mains and lines have to be tagged manually and even then you must check every piece to make sure it was listed and listed correctly. HydraCAD is more difficult to learn and use than either SprinkCAD or AutoSPRINK. I have converted HydraCAD users to SprinkCAD with little problem but no one has been able to teach me HydraCAD. I used AutoSPRINK for about a year but this was five years ago. I had no problems learning the program. The drawing, calculations and listing worked very well but the drawing plotting was not so good. Every thing had to be plotted to scale so it was hard to get 1" pipe to stand out on the drawing. The AutoCAD compatibility issue is also a downfall of AutoSPRINK. IMHO either SprinkCAD or AutoSPRINK are an upgrade from HydraCAD. They say you get what you pay for. Kurt Olson Design Manager Atlanta Division East Coast Fire Protection -.----Original Message----- Fr.om: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Andy Johnston Sent: .Wednesday, February 14, 2007 11:34 AM To: [email protected] Subject: Design software We are considering making the jump from HydraCAD to Autosprink It is a big dollar difference and would like some impute from somebody that has used both. Not looking for software sales men, but people using it daily. Any comments would be greatly appreciated. If you don't think it should be a forum topic my Email is [EMAIL PROTECTED] Thank you for your attention. Andy Johnston _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list [email protected] http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list [email protected] http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum _______________________________________________ Sprinklerforum mailing list [email protected] http://lists.firesprinkler.org/mailman/listinfo/sprinklerforum
