Overview
Cabling creates the routes connecting strings to DC boxes, DC boxes to inverters, and inverters to transformers. It is step 5 of the Electrical Design window, and how it runs depends on the placement mode you chose.
Prerequisites
Stringing must be complete and the devices must be placed.
Step-by-Step Guide
1. Auto (cloud) mode: cabling runs for you
After Auto placement, cabling runs automatically. Use Regenerate Cabling to re-run it against the current devices and strings. Moving a device prompts a re-cabling so the cables detour around the new position.
2. Manual mode: generate the trenches
From the ribbon, use Trenches then Generate Trenches from Roads so the trenches follow the service roads, or draw and convert your own trench polylines.
3. Manual mode: assign and generate
Click Assign DC Trench, pick a transformer, then select its DC trench polylines. Repeat with Assign AC Trench. Then run Generate Selection for one transformer, or Generate All for every transformer. Manual cabling is trench-authored: the cables follow the trench plan you drew.
4. Review sizing and voltage drop
Either way, PVX.AI color-codes each DC box group and sizes the cables to meet a voltage-drop target, using standard defaults (IEC or NEC standard, conductor material, target voltage-drop percentage, and system voltage). It reports the cross-sections, cable lengths, total cable power, and voltage-drop percentage per group, so there is no separate loss run to trigger.
5. Engineer the trench detail
Trench settings sit in the electrical panel as a collapsible card with a live preview. Choose the IEC installation method and cable separation there, or let PVX.AI choose them, and the derating reads the clearance that will actually be built. 3D Drape drapes the cables onto the terrain with true 3D lengths, and Trench Sections draws construction-ready cross-section details.
Tips & Recommendations
- On a site with more than one PV area, the cable tables are written one per area: the Excel export and the on-drawing tables read DC Cables (PV-1), DC Cables (PV-2), AC Cables (PV-1) and so on. A single-area drawing keeps the table names it has always had.
- Sibling cable runs that share a road are bundled into shared trenches per road parcel.
- As an alternative to string homeruns, the cloud cabling engine can design trunk-bus and Y-harness eBOS from parts in the Harness Components catalog.