This araea of activity is concerned with rules for the preparation of documents, that are customary as part of the documentation of electrotechnical equipment and installations. The rules focus on the information to be included and how it should be presented to a user, in order to be correctly understood, and are therefore basically independant of the medium used for the documents.

Main publications

IEC 61082 Preparation of documents used in electrotechnology, is adopted in most countries in the world, and also practically applied, with the exception of areas where the impact of (old) ANSI for some application areas are still strong. This publication was subject to revision and a consolidation of the earlier four parts IEC 60182-1, -2, -3 and - 4 into one publication IEC 61082-1 was published 2006-04.

The publicatin provides general rules for the preparation of documents and specific rules for a number of document kinds like: (schematic) diagrams (overview diagram, circuit diagram, function diagram, ...), connection documents, installation documents, etc.

IEC 62027 Preparation of parts lists, which deals with all common kinds of component listings for engineering purposes.

IEC 62079 Preparation of instructions - Structuring, content and presentation deals with instruction documents for the entire life cycle of a product or system.

IEC 60848 GRAFCET specification language for sequential function charts, specifies a document kind to be used for the earliest phase of the life cycle of a product or plant: the functional specification, an area that might need further work.

Closely related topics: Structuring principles and identification, Document and documentation management, Graphical symbols for diagrams

Maintenance work and new projects (2010-01)

IEC 62079 Ed. 1 is subject to revision. A Maintenance Cycle Report, document 3/886/MCR, has been circulated together with a call for experts (document 3/887/DC) to the Maintenance Team TC3/MT 21. The revision work will incorporate the project proposal 3/853/NP which special focus on consumer products.

Document 3/948/CD for IEC 62079 Ed. 2 has been circulated for commenting. Commenting was closing 2009-09-25. After that 2nd CD is being prepared.

IEC 62027 is under revision. The work is carried out by TC3/MT20. Document 3/989/CD for IEC 62027 Ed. 2 Preparation of object lists, including parts lists has been circulated for commenting with the closing date 2010-04-16.

Documentation of products, systems and plants including integrated technologies, e.g. conventional electrotechnology with control by means of process computers is, an area that is not yet fully explored, and for which the need is increasing in order to increase the efficiency of engineering, is on the list for Proposed Work Items (PWI 3-3). Presently, no active work is carried out.

The later phases of the product/plant life cycle has not been thoroughly investigated with regard to document standardisation needs. True is that the document kinds already standardised are being used during these phases, but document kinds produced in those phases, is an entirely new group for which a need may exist for standardisation. Driver behind this is the trend on the market to outsource the maintenance of industrial plants, something that involves organisations specialised on this and therefore also a need for standards.