Hello,
In Kicad 6 is there any news regarding the export of the pcb to gcode?
I used a plugin for inkscape 0.9x but in version 1.1 it doesn’t work anymore and I don’t know how to export to gcode for laser engraving.
Best regards
Thank you.
I use pcb2gcode but the result is not very good to me.
Well, too bad.
G-code is manufacturing related and has nothing to do with KiCAD.
G-code should be generated from the Gerbers.
Been using this for 7 years and its a wonderful program (for my CNC Mill needs).
It has a ‘Laser’ checkbox in the tool panel (when setting up your tools).
It’s a Windows program but, I run it on my Mac using the ‘PlayOnMac’ Wine App… Just click the CopperCAM.exe and Bingo! I’ve used some other versions of Wine to run it but, now that I upgraded to Monterey, the only two Wine’s the run it are PlayOnMac (it’s free) and CodeWeaver’s version of Wine(not Free)…
EDIT: Bertrand (CopperCAM’s author) has tweaked/added features for me (by request). Good responses and timely… You can use it for Free unless needing to do large files…
EDIT2: I (just now) quickly made a Kicad Plugin to run CopperCAM/PlayOnMac. I don’t really need it - was just curious if a Wine/Windows app would run from Plugin. It Does! 
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Hi BlackCoffee,
Sound good but I never use Windows, only Gnu/Linux.
I use FlatCam, bCNC and CNCjs. bCNC and CNCjs are my favorites.
FlatCam not work with ubuntu >=20.04 and grbHAL. bCNC works fine.
In 2019 I was using Inkscape0.91 and work fine to engraving the kicad svg files, but in 1.1 not works Area in GcodePlot plugin. Now works fine to lines but I can not to fill. I’m find alternatives to this.
I’m going to try this pcb2gcode configuration in command line to see if I get it. Normally I have used the GUI to do it but then when importing in the Gcode sender it draws the travels and that is something undesirable because I have to be cleaning the gcode, something that does not happen with inkscape.
I have tried with this command and works fine but I have changed --dpi=1000 for --vectorial=true
I’ll keep testing, but the gcode looks much better.
Best regards
Another (open source) project for PCB milling:
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Yes but in Ubuntu >20.04 fail. It’s necesary to use the Beta version that is hosting in Bitbucket.
I did a test with pcb2gcode and it’s amazing. I get better definition with my cheap laser than using my laser printer and UV exposure. This afternoon I will prepare some pcb to see if it works well.
Sounds like it’s almost solved.
FYI - here’s a link to ‘PlayOnLinux’ so you can run some Windows programs (including CopperCAM) on Linux…
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