How can I make a slot in the PCB?

Layout
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I’m making a PCB that has 3 ‘panels’ but want to use slots with retaining tabs so a solder mask can cover all 3. Two of the circuits are round so mouse bites are cumbersome. However, I can not find how to make the slots. After scouring the forum I found questions about them, but nothing on how to make them. I could not find any section in the documentation either.

Thanks,
Garry

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Can you show a picture or something? It’s a bit difficult to understand what you want, and what it has to do with solder mask. If you just need long holes (slots) inside the one larger panel – to separate smaller panels – you should draw the slot shapes in the Edge.Cuts layer.

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I incorrectly said solder mask when should have said solder stencil.
OPD.kicad_pcb (1.3 MB)

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Now I think I understood.
Any closed shape on Edge.Cuts that is internal to PCB is the opening in it.

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You must communicate with the fab to make it clear that you are assembling the panel and will be using a stencil for the whole thing.

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This video from Stephen Hawes explains how to manually create PCB panels with mouse bites:
How to Panelize PCBs in KiCAD

If you want to make panels from one board KiKit is a super flexible tool. I have not succeeded to use the GUI, but making panels on the (KiCad-) Commandline is a great thing.
I just build my command from the examples in notepad, then copy the complete command (multi line) and paste it in the terminal window. After a few sips of coffee the panel is prepared automatically.

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Piotr: Thanks for the reply. My drawing has internal lines on Edge.cuts but when I look on the 3D viewer it get an error ‘Board outline is missing or malformed’ and there are no slots.

I should have given a better description from the start. The circuit consists of 3 boards; a transmitter, a receiver, and a control board. I want all three of these on one PCB for the stencil. Then the small round circuits can be snapped off. This whole circuit of three parts could then be panelized. Do the lines in Edge.cuts on the included file make sense of what I’m trying to do?

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Thanks for the reply. My circuit consists of three different PCB’s. One is a transmitter, one receiver, and one control. I’m trying to get all three on one PCB as they are all needed. So I’m not really trying to make a panel but put three separate circuits on one PCB.

I did watch the video, but it was far too fast and more enthusiasm than instruction.

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Do the lines in Edge.cuts on the included file make sense of what I’m trying to do?

In principle yes, you already can see the finish line. But remember the words in piotrs advice: “Any closed shape”.
The DRC-error “Board outline is missing or malformed” directly points you to your mistake: you have no closed shapes on the edge.cuts layer, but only individual lines.

So you have to draw:

  • the correct outline of the board as really closed shape (all 4 lines must be really contact each other)
  • you need “cutout”-shapes on the inner area of the pcb, and these shapes must also consist of of closed shapes.
    Be careful at designing the cutout shapes. Look at your pcb-manufacturer, they normally specify a minimum drill diameter.

Look at this pcb-file as example:
OPD_working.kicad_pcb (8.4 KB)

All cutouts are made with a 2.0mm gap - so a standard 2mm-routing bit can be used by the pcb manufacturer. (some pcb manufacturers charge extra costs for smaller routing bits)

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Thanks so much for the reply. Now I get it. The change is made and I can see the slots in the 3D viewer.

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