Manage Cathodic Protection Systems
You can view and and edit your cathodic protection (CP) systems. You can use the Cathodic Protection Systems tool to view CP systems' details at any time, but must begin an edit session to create, modify, or delete CP systems.
To access this tool, click Cathodic Protection Systems on
the ArcFM Gas Traces toolbar or ArcFM
Water Traces toolbar
.
The following sections describe the components of this tool.
All Systems view
This view displays when you open the Cathodic Protection Systems tool. The data displayed in this view correspond to the data currently stored in the table with the CPSYSTEM model name. Click a CP system to display its general attributes in the pane at the bottom of the window:


Status
This view indicates the status of your individual CP systems. Each CP system can be in one of four states:
-
Protected: The absence of any icon indicates that the system is protected by at least one anode or rectifier feature.
-
Unprotected: The system includes neither anodes nor rectifiers and is not cathodically protected.
-
Not Current: The data displayed for a particular CP system in the list of all CP systems is not up-to-date compared to what is seen in the map. Double-click the CP system in the list to view its current details, then decide which of the following actions to take:
-
Unprotected and Not Current: The system lacks anodes and rectifiers and is out-of-date compared to the map display.
Navigation
The All Systems view also contains a variety of navigation features:
-
Right-click commands: Right-click each CP system to zoom to, pan to, or highlight it in the map.
-
Back and forward buttons: Navigate between the views you have visited.
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Search: Filter the list of CP systems according to search terms.
-
Zoom: Click the magnifying glass
to zoom into the currently selected CP system.
-
Filter by CP system status: Use the drop-down menu to filter the list according to system status.
TIP: Click Customize > ArcFM Options and visit the General tab to adjust highlight settings.
System-specific views
Double-click a particular CP system within the All Systems view to access its details. When you do so, ArcFM conducts a Cathodic Protection Trace to gather the latest details about that particular CP system. ArcFM highlights the traced zone in the map:
-
Click the Select Features button
to add all of a system's features to your selection.
-
Use the tabs to view details about specific rectifiers, anodes, and test points:
-
Double-click any feature listed in the Rectifiers, Anodes, or Test Points tabs to display its details:
The following image shows rectifier details:
The following image shows anode details:
The following image shows test point details and graph:
-
When you use the Select Features button
while viewing the details of a specific anode, rectifier or test point, it adds only that feature to your selection. Similarly, the Zoom icons
next to the each feature in the list zoom the map to that specific feature.
IMPORTANT: When you double-click a CP system from the All Systems view in order to access its system-specific view, ArcFM conducts a CP trace. This displays the latest data according to the map. If you modify that CP system, its system-specific view will not display the latest data until that view is accessed again from the All Systems view (when ArcFM conducts a new CP trace).Unlike the system-specific view, the All Systems view displays data currently stored in the CP system table. This data is not necessarily up-to-date with the state of the gas or water network. Click the Update Status buttonto update the status icons shown in the All Systems view. Based on these status icons, you can determine whether you need to enter a specific CP system view and save or redefine it.
-
Click the Refresh button
to display the latest test point readings.
-
Although the normal test point voltage range is between -2V and 2V, the graph expands to accommodate outliers. When outlier test point readings require such expansion, you will only see eight Voltage labels on the Y axis.
-
Test points without a Reading Date are not graphed.
-
Test points without a Voltage are not graphed.
-
Create CP Systems
When editing, you can create new CP systems from scratch.
- Click Cathodic Protection Systems on the ArcFM Gas Traces
toolbar
or ArcFM Water Traces toolbar
.
- Click Create new system
in the All Systems view of the Cathodic Protection System window.
- Place the flag on an edge in the map—typically a distribution main. ArcFM traces conductive edges in all directions until it reaches the end of the edges or an insulator. It defines this collection of features as the new CP system.
- Name the new CP system and click OK. The new CP system displays in the All Systems view.
Modify CP Systems
You may want to modify your CP systems for a variety of reasons. The CP system status icons in the All Systems view provide a means of determining which systems are unprotected, out-of-date with gas or water network data, or both.
- Click Cathodic Protection Systems on the ArcFM
Gas Traces
or ArcFM Water Traces toolbar
.
- Use the right-click navigation commands to visualize a particular CP system.
- Edit the map to make changes to one or more of the
features that belong to a CP systems. IMPORTANT:
-
In general, you should only edit the gas or water network features that belong to the CP system, and not the features in the special CP system feature class (which do not belong to the gas or water network). DO NOT directly edit the Shape of features in the CP system feature class. Doing so prevents proper functioning of the autoupdater that maintains the RefreshNeeded field, causing problems with CP system status updates. Most other fields in that feature class, including Shape, are assigned automatically by the CP tools in ArcFM. In the Minerville sample data, this feature class containing CP system geometry is called CPSystems.
-
With the exception of custom fields you may have added, the Name and Technician fields are the only fields in the CP system feature class that you are encouraged to edit. All other fields in that class are automatically assigned values by tools in ArcMap. Immediately after you edit the Name or Technician fields using the Attribute Editor (or Attribute Table), click Cathodic Protection Systems on the ArcFM Gas Traces toolbar
or ArcFM Water Traces toolbar
to reload the tool. This helps you avoid overwriting the changes via the tool's Update Status button.
-
If you undo edits or stop editing without saving edits, do not rely on the Update Status button in the All Systems view to generate an accurate representation of current map data. Instead, close and reopen the Cathodic Protection Systems tool.
-
- Double-click the zone to which changes were made and click
Save
.
IMPORTANT: Only the traced features highlighted in the map will be saved. If you have added new features to the CP system after accessing its system-specific view, do not click Save. Instead, return to the All Systems view and again double click the modified zone. The new CP trace will discover the features you added and highlight them in the map. Now when you click the save button, the new features will be saved to the CP system table. If you click Save before conducting a new CP trace, the CP system will save only what was originally traced and remove the Not Current status. That will prevent the Cathodic Protection Systems tool from discovering the features you added.
Redefine CP Systems
In the course of editing your CP systems, you are likely to encounter two situations that necessitate the use of the Redefine command:
-
You split an edge by placing a non-conductive point feature on a conductive edge belonging to a particular CP system.
-
You move a feature, such as a distribution main, so that the trace that recognized the original CP system does not know where to begin tracing.
TIP: Indications that you should use the Redefine command to modify your CP system data include the following: -
The System Length and System Surface Area attributes contain values of zero.
-
When the appropriate area is visible in the map display and:
-
The right-click highlight command in the All Systems view does not highlight the edges belonging to the CP system, but rather another area on the map.
-
The automatic highlighting in the system-specific view does not appear where it belongs or does not appear at all.
-
- Click Cathodic Protection Systems on the ArcFM Gas Traces
toolbar
or ArcFM Water Traces toolbar
.
- Right-click a CP system in the list and use the highlight command to verify that the system is not correctly defined.
- Double-click the CP system to display its system-specific view.
- Click Redefine system
.
- Click to place the flag on the edge that should belong to this CP system.
- If you were redefining an existing system whose edge was split by an insulating feature, remember to create a new CP system for the edge on the other side of the non-conductive feature.
Delete CP Systems
You can delete existing CP systems. When you do so, you are not deleting the features themselves, but rather the metadata that recognizes those features as belonging to a particular CP system.