Manual

What this manual is

This is the beginner’s manual for PECAD for Electric Fence Installers. It follows the same order as a standard CAD beginner guide: the window first, then how to look at a drawing, how to draw, how to be exact, how to use layers, and how to change what you have drawn. The last chapters are the fence and the quotation, which a general CAD guide does not have.

PECAD is a 2D drawing desk. You draw the site, you place the fence, and you issue the quotation. You do not need a separate CAD program to open a DXF or a DWG of the boundary.

Edit this Word file and send it back. The next manual will follow your changes.

This version

This version is the drawing desk and the electric fence in one program. The menus run File, Edit, Electric Fence, then View, Shape, Settings, Tools, Window and Help.

1. Open a DXF or a DWG of the site.
2. Draw a fence from the Electric Fence menu, or draw the boundary yourself.
3. Count the material and print the quotation.
4. Save as DXF when another CAD program must open the file.

The parts of the window

PECAD opens on an empty drawing named Drawing 1. The black area is the drawing. The red mark at the origin shows the X and Y directions. Zero degrees is to the right.

1. The top row is the menu.
2. The icon rows are the tools you use most: New, Open, Save, Print, Undo, and the draw and modify tools.
3. The layer bar shows the current colour, the line type, the line width, and the Electric fence list.
4. Under that, the layer name at the left is the layer you are drawing on. New layer adds one. Width and Height are the sheet.
5. The bottom bar is the command line. It tells you what PECAD is waiting for, and it shows the angle.
6. Paper1, Model and Layer List sit under the drawing. Work in Model. Layer List is where you switch layers off.

Move near a line and it turns yellow. Click it and it turns red. Red means selected. Click empty drawing and the selection clears.

More than one drawing

File, New opens another drawing as its own tab. Copy in one drawing, click the other tab, and paste. Close a tab from Window, or from the small cross on the tab.

Start a command

You can start almost every command in three ways. Click the icon. Click it in the menu. Or click the command line, type the name, and press Enter. LINE, TRIM, OFFSET, MOVE and the other names in this manual all work from the command line.

A number typed on its own is not a command. Select the line first, then type the angle.

The mouse

1. Left button: pick a point, or select an object.
2. Wheel: roll to zoom. Hold the wheel and drag to pan.
3. Right button on empty drawing: cancel. That is the same as Escape.
4. Right button on an object you have already selected: the extra commands for that object.

Undo

Ctrl+Z undoes the last change. Ctrl+Y puts it back. If PECAD says there is nothing to undo, the last click did not change the drawing. Cancel a half-finished line with Escape before you undo.

Pan and zoom

1. Roll the wheel to zoom. The drawing stays under the cursor.
2. Hold the wheel and drag to pan.
3. Zoom all, or View, Zoom all, fits the drawing in the window.
4. Use Zoom all when a DXF opens far away. The top of the plan is North unless you say otherwise.

Lines

The line is the object you will use most. Click Line, or type LINE and press Enter.

1. Click the first point. One corner of the job can sit at the origin.
2. Move the mouse. The command line shows the angle.
3. Click the next point, or type the length and press Enter.
4. The command stays active. Click the next point, or press Enter or Escape to stop.
5. F8 keeps the line horizontal or vertical. Two lines that meet are joined.

Press F12 if you want the length and the angle beside the cursor. Press it again to turn that off.

The other shapes

Five ways to be exact

Object snap tracking is F11. Pause on a snap point. PECAD remembers it and lines the next point up with it. You can line up with two points and click where the guides cross. Object snap jumps onto an existing point. Tracking uses that point as a guide for a new point.

Do not type 30 before the line is selected. Then 30 is an unknown command. Select the line, read its angle, then type the angle you want.

What a layer is

A layer is a clear sheet over the drawing. Every line sits on one layer. Switch the layer off and those lines hide. They are not deleted. A busy DXF, such as Karoo Park, is usable only when the layers you are not working on are off.

1. Open Layer List, or click New layer.
2. Name the layer. Give it a colour, a line type and a line width.
3. Click that name. New objects go on it. The box at the top left shows the current layer.
4. Click an existing line. The same box changes to that line’s layer.
5. Drag the edge of the layer list until the names are readable.

Do not draw the whole job on one layer. Put the site, the fence, the text and the hatch on their own layers. The fence template uses the layer Electric fence.

Colour, line type, line width

A property can belong to the layer, or to one object. The three boxes on the toolbar set the colour, the line type and the line width of what you draw next, and of what is selected.

There are ten colours, and red is one of them. There are seven line types and seven line widths. ByLayer means the object takes the colour of its layer. Click one object to read its layer, colour, line type, line width and angle.

The modify tools

Select first, or start the command and then pick. The objects turn red. Delete removes the red objects. The markers must not disappear and leave the objects behind.

Hold Ctrl, or Shift, and click to add to the selection. Ctrl+A selects everything. Click empty drawing to clear it. Trim waits until you have pressed Enter after the cutting edges.

Make a block and take it apart

A block is several objects treated as one. A gate is a block. So is a circuit breaker, if you are drawing a kiosk.

1. Select the objects.
2. Copy as block.
3. Paste as block. They come in as one object.
4. Click the block. The whole block is selected. The cursor does not jump to a line inside it.
5. Explode turns it back into ordinary lines, so you can snap to a point on it.

Drag a gate and the fence on either side moves with it. The opening stays clear. The fence wires do not run across the driveway.

Model and paper

Model is the drawing, at true size. Paper1 is the sheet you print. Draw in Model. Switch to Paper1 only when you are setting the printed sheet. The top of the plan is North.

A fence job also has views: North, South, East and West, and a vertical view and a horizontal view. Those views show the same fence from the side, with the brackets, the stays, the warning signs and the earth. The South view of the test fence shows the sliding gate half open.

Text

1. Click Text, click the place, and type.
2. To change it, click the text itself. Clicking the object under the text selects the object, not the words.
3. Move the text, edit the words, or delete the text on its own.
4. Set the text size and the text colour in the properties. The background of a label is separate from the text colour.

A length and an angle

1. Click Dimension.
2. Click the first point, then the second. PECAD writes the length.
3. Click a finished line to read its angle in the command line.
4. To set the angle, with the line still selected, type the degrees and press Enter. The start point stays.

Fence lengths in the template are typed in metres. The drawing itself is in millimetres unless you say otherwise.

Print and PDF

1. File, Print Preview. Check the sheet.
2. File, Print.
3. On a quotation, Save writes a PDF. Print prints that sheet.
4. A one-page quotation is marked Page 1 of 1. Two pages are Page 1 of 2 and Page 2 of 2.

Ctrl+S saves at once and does not ask. File, Save As gives the drawing a new name. Choose DXF when another program must open it. If the drawing has changed, PECAD asks before it closes.

Draw a fence from the template

Electric Fence is the menu after Edit. The same seven types are in the Electric fence box on the layer bar.

1. Click the type.
2. Type the North, South, East and West lengths, in metres. The top of the plan is North.
3. Draw the fence. It goes on the layer Electric fence. Each side is labelled. Red is the start, yellow the return, green the earth.
4. Choose the type again to change the template. The four lengths stay, so you can correct one side.

How a fence is built

1. Every wall starts with a bracket and ends with a bracket. A freestanding fence uses posts, not wall brackets.
2. The fence stops at the gate. The wires do not cross the opening.
3. The gate is a block and it brings its own wires, usually three. Past the gate the fence continues.
4. Under the gate the three wires run in a pipe. They are red, yellow and green.
5. The energizer has three earth spikes, as close to the energizer as the job allows.
6. Stays and warning signs show on the views.

Seven ways to get a quote

Click any item, quantity or amount and type. The total and the VAT follow. The last line is empty. Type on it and a new empty line appears. A quotation is not stored in the program. A real quote uses the July 2026 Stafix list.

The keys

Documentation, PECAD Manual opens this file in Word. The same file is on pecad.co.za under Manual.