Hi,
Can a project be comprised of more than one board layout? The example I’m thinking of is having a vertically mounted PCB with pots and other controls, mounted via pin headers to a horizontally housed PCB that will hold the rest of the circuit.
Would it be possible to do this with one schematic, allowing flexibility in where I move components between the two boards, or does it need to be broken into two projects?
Thanks
Geoff
It can be done. But you’ll have to live with the fact that every time you re-read the netlist, ALL component footprints will be re-loaded as well & you’ll have to delete the ones not needed for the current board. Once that is done, everything goes as usual.
I haven’t looked into manually creating separate netlists / cmp files from one master schematic.
Could you design it all on one PCB but with a break in the middle (with v scoring or mousebites) so that you could save money on fabrication as well?
that is a great idea -
you can go on step further -
what about making ‘big’ pads so that you can break it and directly solder…
so you could design a footprint that will be broken apart…
as @madworm has written - it is not really possible in two separate board files- where can get kicad the information from which part belongs to which board…
That’s fantastic news! I actually read it first time as “can’t”…but now the coffee is kicking in.
I think I can deal with the netlist limitation. All the unwanted parts will be in a stack in pcbnew so easy to find and remove.
From what you’ve suggested madworm , it would be two different .kicad_pcb files. How would I access those? Would I need to copy the default project one, and somehow invoke pcbnew external to KiCad to find the other?
[quote=“ChrisGammell, post:3, topic:606, full:true”]
Could you design it all on one PCB but with a break in the middle (with v scoring or mousebites) so that you could save money on fabrication as well?
[/quote]I expect so - they will be the same width so should panelise side by side nicely. If I’m reading madworm’s suggestion correctly perhaps this could be done by merging the two gerbers?
[quote=“s_light, post:4, topic:606”]
what about making ‘big’ pads so that you can break it and directly solder…so you could design a footprint that will be broken apart…
[/quote]So if I make a footprint that was two rows of wide pads with a gap I could cut the single board design down the middle? Similarly that would work for putting two rows of pin headers such that one would receive the pins from an angled set of headers and be soldered in that way, using Chris’ mousebites idea through the middle of the footprint to make it easier to separate. Rather than two independent pin header rows, the footprint could be made up like a PDIP package, just without the box on the silkscreen, so DRC doesn’t complain the connections aren’t made.
Would that be the preferred way?
Thanks,
Geoff
Yes, works well. I just finished designing exactly such a board. All the electronics on one main board, and the LED’s on a daughter board that plugs in to the main board. You separate out the two sections using any one of the methods shared here. I used a set of matching male/female headers.
Use an existing / empty “.kicad_pcb” file as the base for a 2nd board within a project. It will show up in the launcher application. Open that file by double-clicking on it.
Thanks everyone. I think that’s given me enough info to get into trouble now.
Cheers!
Geoff
Anool, what libraries are those for your project?
I don’t quite catch your query - @firewalker. Are you asking about the footprint library I used for the project ? Anycase, design files are available at this repo if you want to poke around. I take standard footprints and modify as needed, saving them to a project specific library.
Yes @Anool. I was referring to the library used. I saw some nice looking 3d parts that I believe are not part of the standard pretty libraries if I am not mistaken.
You can grab them from the repo link I posted. Usually, I hunt around for 3D parts using Google etc. A nice resource I found is www.3dcontentcentral.com which has 3D files for a huge number of parts, plus it’s possible to download them in various formats, including VRML. However, their VRML format doesn’t work with KiCad (YMMV), so I download in STL and convert to VRML using Wings3D.
Some board houses don’t allow having multiple boards in one design, even if it is e.g. only separated with a silk line. I witnessed this first hand with Eurocircuits while I could order the same composite board fine at leiton.de.
