IEC standards are also 11x17 (or A3 which is close), and most electronic schematic software works on a 0.1' grid (2.54mm - same as IEC which works on a 2.5mm grid)
Most of the Auto industry has switched to Eplan, which is nice (but waaaay too expensive to be taken seriously) and at least has a good symbol library and fairly legible design standards (ie, 11x17 symbols as opposed to D size). You can completely re-do the symbol library and autocad electrical can be a very powerful tool, but it takes a lot of time to get to that point. That said, it is the standard and you do see many companies use it (not the auto industry anymore, ironically enough). Because Autocad is based in the auto industry, there are some pretty dumb and archaic standards built into autocad electrical - like 'D' sized sheets and symbol libraries that, when printed on 11x17 or 8.5x11, are nearly illegible IMO. On the subject of a 'good' symbol library, Autocad Electrical does not have one IMO. There are other autocad clones such as Bricscad (which offers a perpetual license and lisp, plugins, etc that autocad LT does not) or ZWcad. DWG is definitely the standard - so whatever you look for should be able to export to DWG.īasic autocad is fine if you have a good symbol library and can keep good documentation of the components you use.
