More issues in PCB Design

Kerala's gerber2png sometimes does not allow download

Tried the other fab program to create images from gerbers, but I have no idea how to use it. Therefore, I went back to inscape. BUT the workflow is quite annoying: in Kicad plot as pdf. Import in Inscape. Manually change the background. Export as png. Process can be shortened and less prone to errors if we can avoid the manual background change.

Alternatives to inverting images

Solution 1: Inverting button in Mods CE: sometimes the images are not read correctly and so can not be inverted.

Solution 2: Inverting in Inscape. Sometimes does not work. For some reason traces sometimes will not change colors.

Solution 3: Inverting on this website. Works smoothly but crops the image to minimal size, effectively changing the distance from the margin. Mods CE does not allow to change the offset of the pictures, therefore the milled PCB would be useless. Second more relevant problem: The inversion is not precise!

Solution 4: back to Kicad. Are there ways to simplify the work flow through more efficient exporting? In Inscape, are there faster ways to get the required settings?

1. Kicad: After drawing the outer line in the Edge.Cuts layer inside the PCB window, double click on it.
2. Kicad: This will pop up an new field where the properties can be changed. Change 'line width' to '1' and 'type' to 'solid'. 'solid is especially important because otherwise the margin will not show up the way we want it to.

   

3. Kicad: 'File'->'Plot'. A new window will pop up. Select the desired address with a click on the stereotypical folders button. Right next to that field, the plot type can be changed. Select either 'svg' od 'pdf' format.



4. Inscape: In red menu hit import pdf/ svg. 'Path'->'Trace Bitmap'->'Apply' to be able to change the color of the traces themselves.
5. Inscape: change the color of the traces by going to the blue menu on the right 'Fill and Stroke' and change the colors to pure white (000000ff) of both the margin and the fill.
6. Inscape: Draw a rectangle using the green menu on the left side. If it is not visible it means that the margin and fill are the same color as your page background. If that is the case change it's color to a visible using the method mentioned before. This rectangle should be pure black (FFFFFFff in both margin and fill!).
7. Inscape: Change the layer order by dragging the rectangle (short: rect) in the blue 'Layers and Objects' menu to the bottom. It might help to close the dropdown menu of the path. This step can be avoided id the rectangle is drawn before importing the images from Kicad but I also always forget.
8. Inscape: Drag the edge cut picture to the rectangle. Make the rectangle the same size taking advantage of the magnet fit property of Inscape.
9. Inscape: Drag both the margin and rectangle to the traces (hopefully you have not lost it yet). Align the black rectangle in a way that you want to have the PCB.
10. Inscape: Select the rectangle and all traces and go to the 'Export' in the blue menu. Change the background type to pure black, select the location to export to and for the format 'png', and click 'Export' in the purple menu on the bottom.
11. Inscape: Select the margin and export that one in the same way.

PCB broke

After soldering the components (yes, I kow y soldering could be better) I stacked them on top of each other. The serial to uart converter in particular I transported already connected to the premade RFID module. This resulted in some pins breaking. For 2 of them, the pads on the PCB itself came off.

Solution: Resolder the pins. Bridge the broken pads with wires. See picture below for more details.

The edge cuts are shown above the traces after processing in Mods CE

Solution: several people in the lab had the same problem. They milled their PCBs anyway and it works. This error seems to be based on the 3 dimensional graphic preview of Mods CE.

Variation: edgeCuts are not getting gcoded:

For some reason, there is a shadow on the edgeCut png.

Solution: none found yet.

The PCB is not straight

Solution: set the z-Axis 1mm lower