Cannot view CircuitMaker 2000 drill files in KiCad

Software
1

Hi, everyone. New member here.
I’ve been designing electronic circuits and PCBs for well over 50 years. I’ve heard about KiCad of course, even tried it out briefly several years ago. But I’ve grown so used to my old CircuitMaker 2000 that I kept putting off learning about KiCad. I’ve finally decided to enter the KiCad world and, with your help, I hope the learning curve isn’t too steep for these old grey cells.

Here’s my first question: KiCad can view Gerber files created with CM2000 except for the drill files. It kept throwing up the error message “Tool definition not supported”.

While searching for a solution, I came across a thread in another forum where the OP reported a similar problem, saying that a PCB manufacturer rejected his CM2000 design because it had no drill file. One reply said that manufacturers need the Excellon RS274X format whereas CM2000 uses the RS274D version. The reply further said that the D version creates a separate aperture file while the X version embeds aperture sizes in the main file.

The CM2000 manual clearly says that it uses the RS274X format, not the D. Moreover, the drill file generator in CM2000 has the option of embedding or not embedding the aperture data. Neither option works. I simply cannot load CM2000 drl files in KiCad Gerber Viewer.

Can anyone please throw some light on the matter?

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Don’t worry, there are a lot of grey beards (shaven or not) on this forum.

RS274D is ancient. RS274X is also getting old. KiCad currently defaults to the X2 version of the Gerber format.

What is your intention with these old files? Why do you want to open them with KiCad’s gerber viewer in the first place? Do you want to Reverse engineering KiCad project from Gerber files ?

KiCad does have importers for schematics and PCB’s for a bunch of different programs (and those are being extended slowly) Circuitmaker is among those, but probably only a newer version. Maybe it’s an option to first convert your files to a newer circuitmaker version, and then import your old projects into KiCad.

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I think I twiddled once with very old drill files, added some lines to get KiCad to read it, or mirror coordinates, but I can’t remember details. But the file formats are simple, you may get it to work with visually comparing with a file that works with KiCad and a text editor.

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A sample file uploaded here would be useful, there are many “interpretations” of the standards.
I have promoted you a level so that you can post.

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