I am trying to route a very simple microcontroller board. I followed the instructions in the plugin manager for installing the recommended autorouter. (Got jre21 from adoptium.net, got freerouter 2.1.0 from github, and got the kicad plugin from the plugin manager)
However half the time there unconnected ends as shown below:
This is a trivial board with plenty of space for routing. (The board is a few inches on each side and the only signals are VDD, VCORE, GND, NRST, BOOT0, SWD, and SWC. Itâs literally the most trivial microcontroller board possible.)
Please no comments about how we shouldnât use autorouters. (I have designed 100 PCBs using EAGLEâs builtin autorouter for most traces. I am not going back to 100% manual routing.)
update
After looking at individual layers, I realized that this may be just a cosmetic issue. The signals are actually connected, but there is some metal overhang. Nonetheless, it makes me wonder if this autorouter is going to be able to handle more complex boards, such as what we could do in EAGLE (before it went away).
I wonder how we should comment â routing made by an autorouter isnât made by KiCad, so we here in a KiCad user forum canât comment on the problems. And you didnât even have a clear question or request.
I wonder how we should comment â routing made by an autorouter isnât made by KiCad, so we here in a KiCad user forum canât comment on the problems.
Regardless of who makes the autorouter, itâs a basic feature of KiCad, and therefore we can expect the same level of support as for any other basic feature. As I mentioned in the question, freerouting is â as best I can tell â the recommended autorouter. If this is not the case, then please tell me what the recommended autorouter is. (I just donât need to hear that autorouting is not useful or not a basic feature, as my experience from EAGLE already tells me otherwise.)
And you didnât even have a clear question or request.
The question is how to make the autorouter behave reasonably. Extra pieces of metal is not reasonable. Iâm not sure how to make it clearer than already worded.
Last I knew it was mostly in triage mode. It was ported to the new java by people determined to not let the old java code languish but it was more about java evangelism than anything to do with the actual program. Other than some lipstick I donât believe anything has happened to the âcode that matters to routingâ since the original?
The routing happens outside of Kicad. Have you tried asking the freerouting folks where the issue is? Iâd think that the plugin has some problems with the start and end points from the sounds of it. I donât know if the track cleanup tools from inside Kicad would help as I havenât used them in quite awhile.
No. Definitely not. KiCad only provides an interface to exchange data with an autorouter, and has no links whomever provides the autorouter. I guess this interface can even be used with different autorouters.
But KiCad does have: PCB Editor / Tools / Cleanup Tracks and Vias, and you can use it to: Delete tracks that are unconnected at one end
No, itâs not a basic feature of KiCad. Nothing external (i.e. a plugin) isnât part of KiCad nor a basic feature of KiCad, and it doesnât belong to KiCad itself. Itâs a 3rd party plugin.
Thereâs no ârecommendedâ autorouter. Anyone can recommend what they want, but the KiCad project doesnât recommend any autorouter.
KiCad isnât Eagle. Iâm not sure what kind of âautoroutingâ you would expect. KiCad has a useful pushânâshove router, and it can autocomplete simple tracks.
Furthermore, Freerouting isnât specifically for KiCad either. Other ECAD suites that implement the dsn-ses interface can use it. The place to report issues is Freeroutingâs GitHub site.
1)The autorouting is made by a plugin, you need talk with plugin creators/maintainers.
2)The autorouting was abandoned by most EDA tools. This has a reason, the electronic become more complex than one NE555 with a led.
Today the MCU has more than 100MHz, require high speed traces, balanced lenght, controlled impedances. Uses crystal that must be routed with exclusion zones for EMI control. Uses 4 to 20 layers. Ground planes, power planes, stitching vias and planes coupling.
For The moment a autorouter cannot understand that a differential track at 480MHz need a continuous plane. Or why you need enclose a crystal with a gnd that is same (and different) to the rest of gnd.
It would probably be quicker for us to route your board for you than try and answer a question about a Plugin (one I have never installed) that most regulars here have never used.