My first KiCad PCB layout and I’ve immediately run into a (simple) problem.
Can somebody explain what the circle marked A is and how i control its diameter?
I need to be able to route a track between pins, marked B, but im being prevented from doing so.
Welcome to the forum.
The yellow circle shows the clearance around the pad. It is set in the netclass it belongs to (default, if you did not change that)
Violating that clearance leads to a DRC (Design Rule Check) error. Minimum clearances are required by board houses.
Thank you for the reply.
I’ve reduced the value of Net Classes > Default > Clearance but the circle diameter isn’t changing and i still cant route through between the pins.
Default is the only net class i have.
What’s your Board Setup > Constraints > Minimum clearance? No clearance can be smaller than that.
The footprint and individual pads can have their own minimum clearance, too.
To me it looks like you can’t route between those pad in any case. But it depends on the scale – it’s difficult to say what your dimensions really are there. If the track width is now 0.2 mm, clearance 0.2 mm and the manufacturer accepts 0.15/0.15, it might be possible to fit a narrow track between the pads.
Hopefully this will show what ive used. I can now route a 0.25mm track through the gap.
Learning as i go, so if i have any glaring errors with the constraints please let me know.
0.1mm translate to 3.937 mil. This is well below what cheap board houses can do. Their limit is 5-6mil for those $2-5/5 pcs. offers.
Even class D boards require 4.5 mil clearance. And that’s the highest, most complex and most expensive IPC class board houses offer.
If I increase the clearance to 0.16mm and then reduce the track width to 0.2mm then i can route between the pads.
Just found out that our manufacturer recommends 0.15mm min width and 0.15mm min spacing.
Its just a humble RJ45 connector.
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