Emergency One puts out the fire with Zuken’s E³.series

Emergency One UK has grown rapidly over the last few years. In recent months a bottleneck had arisen in the factory, caused by lengthy electrical installation times; which was leading to a delay in the completion of vehicles. There were three main reasons; the extent of customization involved in each vehicle, not being able to test and verify the electrical system on screen at the design phase, and a low supply of specialist electricians who could perform the installations. This called for a solution that would give them the power to design-out errors up front early in the product development process and deliver high quality detailed schematics that would take out the requirement for highly specialist vehicle electrical installers.

Quality and control through design, while delivering the flexibility to manage the customization process, was the driving force behind the move to E³.series.

Every fire and rescue service wants a highly customized vehicle - from individual features and functions down to the colour of the red used. Documentation wise, this was an absolute nightmare. We had to create a new schematic every time. We wanted to introduce a new design control system that would allow us to standardize harness set-up, and make the vehicles more plug and play to allow for future retro-fit upgrades. commented Graeme Shields, Design Manager at Emergency One UK Ltd.

E³.series is a Windows® based solution for the design and documentation of complex electrical and electronic systems. Emergency One UK Ltd is using the core module, E³.schematic, the specialist design documentation suite E³.cable for the wiring, cable and wire harness creation, and E³.formboard for the creation of nailboard displays. E³.formboard was a very important part of the solution package. The add-on will allow them to send professional documentation to their harness manufacturers and is excellent for fault finding. The documentation output from E³.series will also enable Emergency One UK Ltd to provide full detailed schematics in the owner’s manual, to support the total life time of the vehicle.