Footprint editor rotation not centered

[BillC]

I was trying to make a footprint for a 3 phase inductor so made the outer polar array of 3 pads centered on 0,0, then tried to rotate the group 60 degrees. Well it did rotate 60, but not from 0,0. How do you rotate a symmetric group around its center? (using v6.0.1) If I keep rotating, it does end up where it started, but all other positions are not properly centered.

[jmk]

There is a footprint anchor (origin point) icon (third up from bottom on RHS) in footprint editor.

[mf_ibfeew]

Another way: Right-click → context-menu–> special Tools → Move Exactly.

You can set the angle and the rotation-center:

• rotate around center of selection
• rotate around local coordinate origin

The local coordinate origin can be set every time with the space key.

[BillC]

The anchor point seems to have no effect, tried from 0,0 and from some random point way outside footprint, still rotates exactly the same. I didn’t notice the Move Exactly option, but tried both options with different anchor points and it also had no effect. I even tried moving the group of pads off center of 0,0 origin and the group still rotated the same way, not around the 0,0 origin.

[poco]

Hmm… I am not at pc, but try searching ‘rotation angle’ in preferences. It defaults to 90 degrees. Change that (temporaly) to 60 degrees, so that your rotate (hotkey R) command will temporaly work in 60 degree steps. This rotation should work for multiselection and any reference point (0 0 as you wish).

[BillC]

I am aware of the rotation angle in preferences, which I have used, but the problem is with the center point the program uses.
I have done some testing and think I found what is going on. It seems like it takes the mid point between the farthest left and right pads for the x center, and the farthest top and bottom pads for the y center. Since pad1 is at 0,-10 and pad 2 is -8.66,5 and pad3 is 8.66,5 which is a polar array centered around 0,0 , It rotates around … welp not 0,-2.5 but 0,-2 ??? Well I thought I knew what it was doing.
I can make it work by placing a dummy pad opposite pad1, but wish there was a better way.

Thanks everyone.

EDIT: just noticed the 0,-2 oddball center point was due to having grid set to 0.1, but when I set it to .01, it would rotate around 0,-2.27… still wrong
(Also I had wrote 0,2 instead of 0,-2 )

[jmk]

@BillC

The anchor point seems to have no effect,

Did you open the footprint editor,
Open your footprint so it can be modified,
Change the anchor… easy to see as the cross hairs move to the new location you have selected,
Save, close, then place this new footprint on your PCB?

[BillC]

Sorry, I didn’t write that very well, I meant to say ‘The anchor point seems to have no effect when rotating a group of pads’. It was a new footprint, opened footprint editor, new footprint, I was able to edit. On an unrelated footprint, I did notice that I was unable to edit, so I am aware of that problem.
Haha, Thanks! While trying to make a screenshot to show the problem, I found that if I draw a circle (trying to show that they are centered on 0,0) with the radius on the pad center or larger, select the pads and the circle, they DO rotate the way I want.
The start position of pad array:

The problem when rotating selecting just the 3 pads:

The solution for my problem, selecting the pads and the extra circle:

Thanks again! I was going to give up and draw in CAD to find coordinates, then do it manually, but the extra circle makes rotation work for my odd pad count.