Circuit variants

Projects
1

I’m creating a device which will have several variants. Most of the circuit will be the same, but there will be different PCB layouts and parts of the schematic will vary, too (a different DC-DC converter circuit).

Any ideas/suggestions on how to approach this? I’d rather not create multiple copies of the schematic.

The best idea I have so far is to put everything under git and create branches there. This will work, but I’m afraid merging could prove non-trivial, because the changes might not be localized in the KiCad files.

2

My suggestion would be to split your schematic in multiple blocks / files. (kicad supports hierarchy schematics) Then you can create (in same folder?) different kicad projects that will reuse that blocks.(maybe you can place that files blocks in folders). That way if you change something in one block it will change for all projects (remmember to generate after the netlists). Also, you need caution to number the symbols (ie: Rx Cx…) so there will be no conflicts in the design.