First, ensure that your project settings are set to US customary if required. To do this click here for instructions.
Get into touch with us at support@neara.com to have this NESC tool enabled on your account.
1. Select Edit from the top menu bar
2. Select Setup NESC Rules from the drop-down
3. Click the + as highlighted in the below screenshot.
This will bring up a list of tools/views/reports that you are able to add to your layout.
4. Select NESC Ground Clearance Preset
After selecting the NESC Ground Clearance Preset, you can see that a table has been added to your below view.
In the table you will see the following columns:
Pole 1 & 2: The two poles at the ends of a conductor
Inferred Surface: Neara can infer the surface that the conductor is crossing by considering nearby feature points. To add features points you can either import a survey file or use the terrain tool to add in feature points manually.
Surface Override: The user can enter in different surfaces to override the preset ground surface.
Note that surfaces can be (in lower case):
- road
- railway
- water
- ground
Surface Min Height: The software will determine the surface min-height based on what the surface has been defined as.
This can be changed by clicking on the settings cog under the column header. You will see a snippet of code as shown below.
The surface name and minimum clearance requirement are defined in the following format respectively, "water", 12.5 * unit("ft"). Copy and paste this underneath the existing water surface rule to create your own one or make changes to the existing rules if required.
Conductor Class: Conductor classes with their respective cable rule are as follows:
"ELEC_BARE" - L3
"ELEC_INS" - L3
"TPX" - L2
"communications" - L1
"neutral" - L1
You can edit the conductor class of a conductor by selecting library from the menu bar at the top and selecting conductors. You will then be able to click on the class field of any conductors and enter in a conductor class label to define it.
You can also add in and define additional conductor classes and cable rules be selecting the settings cog underneath the cable rule column header in the NESC table.
Add in your additional cable rules by adding in your conductor class and relevant cable rule in the following format "conductor class", "cable rule" below the TPX rule.
Cable Extra Clearance: The cables extra clearance value has been derived from the cable rule. Select the settings cog to adjust your cable extra clearance values manually.
Required Clearance: The required clearances value is a sum of Surface Min height + Cable Extra Clearance.
Ground Clearance: This is the value of the minimum ground clearance of your existing conductors.
Clearance Pass: This field determines whether your conductor passes or fails the required clearance.
Get into touch with us at support@neara.com to have this NESC tool enabled on your account.