Archibus Smart Client Extension for AutoCAD
Sustainability & Risk/ Emergency Preparedness / Define Systems and Zones

Drawing Zones

Typically, critical building systems are tied to zones – that is to say, building systems cover a specific area on the floor plan.

In emergency situations, first responders can use zone drawings to identify at-risk areas. For example, if the sprinkler system in Zone 1 has automatically been activated, first responders can look at the zone drawing to determine the exact area of the floor that may have a fire. Similarly, they can consult the zone drawings to see at-risk areas within a zone.

Once the emergency is contained, assessment managers can travel throughout the building and examine your rooms and equipment items in terms of the zones in which they are located. For example, if a system fails, they can use the zone drawings to see the rooms and equipment items that fall within the zones and that will be affected by the failure.

As a CAD specialist, you may need to add zones to floor plan drawings.

Procedure

  1. Prerequisite: A business process owner or Smart Client user must first record critical system information.
  2. In CAD or the Archibus Smart Client, move to Sustainability & Risk/ Emergency Preparedness on the Navigator.
  3. If you are working in Smart Client and CAD is not active, select the appropriate Draw Zones task. You can choose from the following, which have the conventional uses listed below.
    Zone Type
    Standard Usage
    System Category
    Layer

    Fire

    Fire Protection and Smoke Zones

    Electrical System

    ZONE-FIRE

    Sprinkler

    Sprinkler Zones

    Fire Protection System

    ZONE-SPRINKLER

    Security

    Security System Zones

    Electrical System

    ZONE-SECURITY

    Emergency

    Emergency Lighting Zones

    Electrical System

    ZONE-EMERGENCY

    HVAC

    HVAC Zones

    Mechanical System

    ZONE HVAC

  4. The task presents the Drawing List so that you can choose a drawing to work on. Choose the drawing, and Archibus loads your CAD tool, displays the selected drawing, and makes CAD the active application.
  5. In CAD, open a drawing (if necessary).
  6. In CAD, prepare the drawing for working with a specific type of zone by choosing on the Navigator the appropriate task, such as Set Sprinkler.
  7. Create a polyline representing the area that is covered by a particular building system. For example, if you chose "Sprinkler" above, you would draw a polyline to represent each area that is serviced by a particular sprinkler system.
  8. Assign the polylines intelligence by data editing them; this converts them to zone asset symbols. Complete the fields as follows:
    9. Field Description
    Building Code /Floor Code The system completes these fields with the drawing's space hierarchy values
    Zone Code Enter a unique code for the zone. You may wish to number the zone according to the building system, such as FIRE-HQ-18-01.
    Description Use this field to describe the area covered by this zone.
    System Code

    From the validating Systems table, choose the building system that covers the area you graphically depicted with the zone polyline. For example, if you are drawing the zones for the sprinkler system, you would choose Sprinkler from the validating Systems table.

    Note: Typically, you develop multiple zones for each building system. You do not map each zone to a particular piece of sprinkler equipment, but you link multiple zones to the entire sprinkler system. Similarly, you do not link a zone to a particular piece of HVAC equipment, but you develop multiple zones for the entire HVAC system.

    Highlight as Outline On reports displaying this zone, this option determines whether the zone is highlighted by a highlight pattern or an outline. If set to Yes, reports use a fat polyline displayed in the color specified for outlines from the Highlight Pattern Acad field (below). If set to No, the system uses the highlight pattern as defined in the Highlight Pattern Acad field.
    Highlight Pattern Acad Displays the highlight pattern information for the selected zone. This information is used by the system to highlight the zone on a floor plan drawing.
  1. So that you can view the drawing with this type of zone information over the web, save the drawing as an Archibus Enterprise Graphic file by running the Publish Enterprise Graphics command, located on the CAD Navigator for your convenience.

Directly Editing the Zones Table

The recommended method for mapping zones to their building systems is to graphically represent them using the Draw Zones task. However, you may need to edit your zone information by directly editing the Zones table. To do so: