THT DIP Socket

Layout Footprints
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I want to apologize, up front, if I come across as extremely frustrated, but in reality, I am, so here we go:

I can report that I’m working in KiCAD 8.0.0 (Downloaded in the last few days) and there are still no THT DIP sockets (at least that I can find) in the libraries that ship with the package.

Is anyone aware of a viable 3rd party library of THT DIP sockets that they could recommend?

I also have things like breakout boards that I do NOT want to solder directly to the board, so to use them, I also need inline pin sockets at 2.54mm spacing. I can find what I think are those parts in the shipping library, but it’s 100% not clear how to use them and associate them with the part that will plug into them. I’ve watched several hours of YouTube videos, read probably a dozen threads here, and what I’ve found is a lot of questions and few to no answers, at least ones that I can understand. I know that thru-hole parts aren’t “cool” any more, but they are still widely used for early prototyping. If I were a pro working for a company, and had a fully-baked design, at this point, I’d run off and use whatever AutoDesk sells for an EDA but as a prototyper, I’ve really appreciated that there’s an affordable tool (that’s not subscription based). If I bailed to some other package I’d have to pay thousands of dollars, learn a new package, and hope for the best. It’s my belief that these parts are a lot more common than the librarians apparently give them credit for.

The closest thing I’ve seen to an “answer” is to somehow find a socket part (not possible or at least non-trivial, in my experience) put it off in a corner on the schematic, and then wire everything as if it was directly connected to the part that will plug into the socket. This may add the socket to the BOM, but I can’t understand how it would explain to a PCBA (assembly) house in East Asia how these things actually go together. How do they know that the specific part that goes in footprint X is supposed to be the socket and not the thing that goes in the socket?

Sure. I could exclude all this stuff from the BOM and solder them all in myself, but if I’m doing that, it defeats much of the purpose of paying for PCBA services. Similarly, assuming I had a socket from the library to do anything with, what should I do? Just plop it into the schematic, in place of the part that plugs into it, wire it up as best I can without any annotations from the plug-in part’s datasheet, and hope for the best? I can’t even begin to emphasize how frustrating this is.

Could someone please kindly explain to me how to achieve a workflow like this, that will allow the use of PCBA services? Thanks.

Regards,
Ian

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On my install, the stuff in the Socket library appears to be all ZIF sockets.

Package_DIP seems more promising, although it has nothing pre-existing for my requirements (although it’s at least a starting point - I’m looking for a 2x12 17.78mm socket – I guess I can start with the widest 2x12 in the library and make a new footprint myself, but…

I think a lot of my confusion is that searching for 'Package_DIP" in the schematic/symbol editor reveals nothing. :confused: How am I supposed to put this on the schematic? As mentioned, I’ve seen people with DIP socket place holders on their schematics, but I can’t seem to find anything with these footprints associated with them. Am I missing something obvious? Or is the idea here that I assign the footprint to the part?

As far as the meat of the question, i.e. how would I indicate to a PCBA company on the other side of the world that I wanted this to be a socket and not the part that goes into it, and then which side of the PCB I wanted it to face out of (or alternately be soldered on? There are traces from multiple layers going to the PTHs/pads that this socket would go in, so it’s not like someone could be expected to infer which side it was meant to be mounted on.

Thanks for the pointer on the location of the existing sockets. I’m embarrassed that I couldn’t find these, but seriously, I spent a long time looking.

Thanks again!

Ian

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Sockets, like other parts, are associated with a side so you would indicate front or back in the POS file. And then there’s the silkscreen courtyard.

As for the chips, I think you could tell them not to install them but ship them to you. Their English isn’t that poor and there are translators.

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Yeah, kinda one of the hardest things is figuring out the naming conventions. Been there. Probably most, if not all, have. :wink:

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If I were using sockets (I don’t) and wanted them to be assembled then I would certainly have them listed in the BOM. If I would want to have socket soldered and IC inserted I would have two symbols at schematic and two footprints placed then one over another at PCB. One of footprints without any copper (only courtyard rectangle). I have done that way for shielding box containing of soldered frame and lid put on it. For DIP footprint (pads) for element alone is the same as for socket so may be I will left IC footprint as having pads and socket as not having pads. Thanks to that at schematic I have wires to IC pads (with their names) and not to socket pads (having only numbers).

I prepare documentation - courtyard rectangles with references inside against the background of grayed copper. If there are elements on top and bottom then I have separate picture for top and separate for bottom.
Since I moved to KiCad I also generate PCB 3D view (from both sides if needed).

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KiCad comes with a Footprint Wizard (in the Footprint Editor, create new with the red star in the icon). You can create an “S-DIP” and give the wanted parameters.

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This can’t be the first time this scenario has appeared for goodness sake ! so how do other ‘PCBAs’ and designers deal with this? don’t you just tell them that all IC’s need sockets or not to place chips but sockets instead, I have know idea but is this realy a software tool issue ? can’t you just place this as a build requirement on the BOM ? Can’t you just ring (Email) and tell them this with the order or am I missing something here and Kicad has a glaring omission in its functionality ? :neutral_face:
:mouse:

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This doesn’t depend on the footprint being THT or SMD. See Best way to assign two designators to a single component/symbol/footprint? and follow the link there to the other thread.

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The PCBA services don’t care about the footprint or 3D model. They only care for the part number associated with it. So if you add the part number of the socket, they will place the socket there.

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