Hello all together,
I would like to know if here are some people who used Kicad for designing Circuit Boards,
which are power directly from mains voltage like SMPS or an Inverter.
And if there are example Projects or templates for kicad projects on line Voltage.
I am mainly interested in the network classes and restrictions/Constraints which and how they’re setup in a Project.
Thanks
Someone posted a link to this site which has a lot of projects to download and look at, or use. Just enter some search terms.
I’ve never asked about a mains powered circuit here but have seen others ask. Not to many people want to get involved with that because of the dangers involved. It requires some expertise to design the boards for those. Here in the USA where most small items run off 120V mains, Europe uses 220V which is more dangerous. I doubt one could get help with a 120v board and a 220v is highly doubtful.
In most countries it was 220V, in some (or may be only GB) it was 240V. As an compromise since many years official is 230V for all countries (as being in 10% tolerance of both).
If I were designing with KiCad PCB with AC230V on it (I have never done it) I would probably not make any settings about it in classes. I would just carefully route these few tracks far away form the low voltage part.
Check the relevant regulations (like IEC60950 depending on your jurisdiction and application) and don’t (I can’t stress this enough: really don’t) take any values you find on the internet. Line voltage kills you, bystanders and burns your house down in the blink of an eye.
EN 60950 has been replaced by EN 62368-1 since 2020.
Unfortunately there is far more risk assessment to be done rather than following a simple fixed figure for creepage and clearance.
Thanks for the correction (didn’t have to do a project with mains in quite a while which I’m not too sad about ^^)
Thanks for the replys i’ve found already some of the projects where i found some good examples.
My goal is to use Kicad for some simple testing PCBs for work and i want to replace Eagle which is used in the company for this purpose.
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