Can some help me design my board in eagle?

[bobhaha]

Hey guys,

Trying to design my board in eagle... but I'm having problems with layout.

I have spent a good 3 hours trying different combinations,but to no avail.

I think I have got the layout how I want it... but I cant seem to find a way to route it, without overlapping or getting 100+ errors!

If you think you can give me a hand with this... please let me know by posting here or PMing me.

-Adrian

 

[Machinist Joe]

I also need help with this! I've been asking around too. But everybody seems busy. Hell, I can't even draw the schematic.

 

[bobhaha]

Well this is what I have so far....

I can try and give you a hand Joe, shoot me a PM....
-Adrian

 

[Jufran88]

Hey bob, I don't know if you solved your issue yet, but you can edit the clearance tab in the design rules. That should fix your clearance issues. However, each board house has different specifications on their minimum values. So it might be a good idea to get ahold of that information and change the design rules to reflect those values.

Looking at your board it seems your using the default EAGLE design rules?

:beer:

 

[bobhaha]

Yep... cause when I rendered it out it looks fine.

I'll try change the default design rules. Thanks Jufran88.

-Adrian

EDIT: Ok, so I tried changing them down to 1mil clearance and I'm still getting errors around the pins of the IC. Is that ok to ignore? What is typically the minimum distance that most manufactures have? 7mil?

 

[Jufran88]

No problem!

It's still getting errors at 1mil? Is it a clearance issue or masking? I'm not too sure what the standard is, does your board house give you the min/max values?

You can ignore some of those warnings, the pads look ok to me. I've experimented with different layouts to see what I could get away with and they've all came back to me with no issues, but it just depends on the board house.

 

[Things]

Most PCB manus recommend 8mil spacing, but 6mil minimum for the one I use.

8mil is 0.2mm, I hope your IC pins aren't that close!

 

[AUS]

Yes I was going to say, check your DRC rules... Spark Fun have some good tutorials on Eagle including design layout rules. I have two sets of rules, one for home made boards and one for the boards im getting made up by a manufacturer.

By the way, you can just accept the errors if you check it and make sure it is actually right. You can hide all the layers except pads and tracks on one side print it out A3 size or something and check it for errors by eye.

 

[AUS]

EDIT: Ok, so I tried changing them down to 1mil clearance and I'm still getting errors around the pins of the IC. Is that ok to ignore? What is typically the minimum distance that most manufactures have? 7mil?

Adrian- read this mate.

The issue is probably because you need to allow room for solder masks and stuff on manufactured boards. I'll send you the design rules from work tomorrow. What version of eagle have you got?

 

[bobhaha]

I have eagle 6.2.0.

I read through that site, thanks AUS... but I'm still learning terminology... so I dunno how much is sinking in. I am trying to do as they say... but real estate is quite slim on my board. To me I think it should be fine. The only issues I'm having now is drill size error. My drill size if set to 5 (mil... I think?) Which I have read is basically the smallest you wanna go. Not sure why that is coming up as an error.

I guess I can just do a quick prototype run of like a whole panel... and see if it works or not.

Would the fab house tell me if there is issues or if it will not work for them?

 

[bobhaha]

Ok, so I finally got down to 0 errors with a clearance of 7mils :wave:

But now I'm finding out I may have been a dumb shizz for not linking the ground planes to anything....

I cant seem to wire any of the parts that should be tied to ground to the copper pour.

Secondly I also can't seem to output to gerber. I've tried using CAM in eagle, but its not outputting what I want. I set the "device" to gerber..Thoughts?

-Adrian

 

[Jufran88]

Ah, you need to make a ground plane, use the wire tool and put layer to bottom or top and go over the dimension of your board. Then use the info tool to change the property of the signal to GND. This will make that layer the ground.

To make the gerbers there should be a default CAM file with EAGLE. Just press the CAM button and load the CAM file and it should show you the tabs for different layers: cream, solder side, component side, solder mask and such. Just process job and it will create gerber files in the project folder its saved to.

 

[AUS]

Yea the fab house usually sends you proofs of each board level- at least mine does. We have eagle 5 and I can't update without paying again, I might do that soon. the one I use takes native eagle files and makes the Gerber's themselves.

I use 3mm hole pads for mounting holes and If you name them and the ground plane the same signal name as the ground they will all link up. Otherwise you will have gaps around the pads.

Experiment with different shape pads too. If I'm etching a board myself I use oval pads for PTH componants and slightly larger pads on SMD's as they're easier to solder, but you can get away with smaller pads on a fab house board as there is a solder mask to stop bridging.

Plus you can go down to 5mil wires on fab boards but I can never etch anything that fine myself

I'll Dropbox the eagle rules for you today.

 

[bobhaha]

Ah, you need to make a ground plane, use the wire tool and put layer to bottom or top and go over the dimension of your board. Then use the info tool to change the property of the signal to GND. This will make that layer the ground.

To make the gerbers there should be a default CAM file with EAGLE. Just press the CAM button and load the CAM file and it should show you the tabs for different layers: cream, solder side, component side, solder mask and such. Just process job and it will create gerber files in the project folder its saved to.

I just worked it out. You need to create a polygon around the board and call it EXACTLY the same as the ground in your schematic. In my case AGND. That makes sens now... and makes routing so much EASIER!