Import from EAGLE with multiple sheets?

Schematic
1

Hi!

Tried all day long, without success.
I try to import an old EAGLE board I designed 4 years ago with EAGLE 7.7.0.
All should be OK on EAGLE’s side, the board had been printed and placed 300 times…

Importing the layout kinda works (seems just flood-filling problem; I’m OK if I have to tweak the board a bit).
But what completely fails is importing the schematics. EAGLE file is 1.25 MB in size and uses multiple sheets.
What I get in KiCAD after a couple of seconds is just a single and empty sheet. KiCAD’s sch-file is just 1 k.

If I select “View -> Show Hierarchical Navigator”, all I get is just the empty schematics named “root”.

So can KiCAD import hierarchical schematics at all?

KiCAD version is (5.1.2)-2

TIA,
Nick

2

I wouldn’t bet on it but it’s possible that a 5.1 branch nightly build (pre-5.1.3) version from https://kicad-downloads.s3.cern.ch/index.html?prefix=windows/testing/5.1/ might help. There are several Eagle import related bugfixes there.

3

Do you have newline chars in the description of the schematic pages?

4

Welcome to KiCad! And, Welcome to the KiCad Users Forum!

Eagle Import is fairly new, and as was stated by @eelik the best way to try new Eagle import features is to use the 5.1 branch nightly build.

Is it a good idea to use a nightly build version?

Just a heads up so you have a better idea where you want to invest your time to end up where you want to be.

5

That FAQ article doesn’t describe the stable branch nightly builds accurately. Using them is always relatively safe, although it can’t be guaranteed no new bugs have been introduced when fixing old ones.

6

Good morning!

Thanks for the warm welcome!
So I tried a nightly build:
Application: Eeschema
Version: (5.1.2-181-gecadc8bbb)-1, release build

But that didn’t change anything re schematic. Still empty.

@Rene_Poschl:
Yes, there are newlines.
Here is one example within a package (you didn’t ask that):

<package name="TQFP100">
<description>&lt;b&gt;TQFP100&lt;/b&gt;&lt;p&gt;
Auto generated by &lt;i&gt;make-symbol-device-package-bsdl.ulp Rev. 44&lt;/i&gt;&lt;br&gt;</description>
<smd name="1" x="-6.7" y="4.8" dx="1.4" dy="0.18" layer="1"/>

But also within the section sheets

<sheets>
<sheet>
<plain>
...
<wire x1="-30.48" y1="-104.14" x2="-30.48" y2="-58.42" width="0.1524" layer="97" style="shortdash"/>
<text x="-27.94" y="-63.5" size="1.778" layer="97">Reference Voltage
2V5</text>
<wire x1="114.3" y1="-71.12" x2="193.04" y2="-71.12" width="0.1524" layer="97" style="shortdash"/>

And more. If you are looking for specific XML-tags, let me hear.

I’ll try to make a really dumb EAGLE file that replicates the problem …

Background story:
My initial goal was to get a 3D view of the board. Well, the board the import generates seems to be easy to fix. With a quick check it looks like the connections between the GND layer and some vias went wrong. Same for the 3.3 V layer. I have read the reasons here and I’m not complaining at all. The result is damned good!
But unfortunately, the links to the 3D data (wrl) seems to be broken. So no 3D view with components.
Maybe that has to do with the missing schematics?

Thanks so far!
Nick

7
8

That one should have been in 5.1.x nightly builds long ago, and OP didn’t have any more luck with them. So that’s not the problem here.

9

Oh forgot to ask:

Is there any way to get a trace output of the schematics import process?
I’d like to help in any way possible.

Nick

10

OK, looks like KiCAD can’t import EAGLE projects that are made out of hierarchical sheets at all.
Made something dumb and simple in EAGLE and the result looks like my initial more complex project.

Couldn’t find my license for EAGLE and so had to dig out an old hard disk to recover the license file. Also completely forgot how to use EAGLE. But realized how much more I like using KiCAD. :-))

I have attached that dumb project. Requires a premium license to edit it.

KiCAD-EHT.zip (57.4 KB)

11

The last time I played with KiCad (V4 ?) it was not possible to have more than one sheet at a certain level. EAGLE allows multiple sheets on the same hierarchy level. So does V5 or the latest build feature that ? If not I wonder how KiCad handles such structures.

12

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