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  3. unexpected DRCs after changing mechanical pads of USB-C...

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unexpected DRCs after changing mechanical pads of USB-C connector

Manfred1
Manfred1 over 2 years ago

I am refering to the USB-C connector JAE DX07S016JA1. It's symbol contains a non-plated hole and slot. presumably for improving mechanical ruggedness.

The symbol is drawn with imperial units, but our pcb manufacturer uses metric drills, which are avaiable in 50µm steps of diameter.

So I made a backup copy of the symbol (the .dra-file) from within the file-explorer. Then I opened it, identified the pad-files of the hole and the slot. I opened both pad-files, adjusted and changed them to metric units and saved them with a different name, refering to the metric units.

In the symbol, I replaced the hole and slot (pins) with the newly created pads and saved the .dra-file with the same name as before.

In the layout I chose "Placement edit" as application mode, selected the USB-C connector's symbol and in the context menu chose "Quick utilities" / "Refresh symbol".
But now a lot of new DRC errors emerged, even several Pad Soldermask to Pad Soldermask Spacing errors between pads that I did not even touch!

I tried to find out about possible reasons for new DRC errors in the documentation "Help" / "Documentation" burger menu "Allegro PCB Editor" / "Allegro User Guide" / "Creating Design Rules", but did not suceed.

Can you guide me into the right direction?

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  • steve
    0 steve over 2 years ago

    The Refresh Symbol command would automatically run the Update DRC's command so maybe you hadn't run that and DRC's were there all along or some new DRC checks were enabled. You may find if you have changed units from mils to mm you may see "rounding" errors unless you have allowed enough decimal places to make the changes, Check the values of what you have versus what the DRC is reporting which may help you decipher what's happened. 

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  • Manfred1
    0 Manfred1 over 2 years ago in reply to steve

    Thank you for your reply.
    No, the DRC check was up-to-date. I issued an "Update" - command with the old version of the USB connector. I did not enable new DRC checks intentionally. Are there possibilities to enable new DRC checks unintentionally, such as by simply exchanging or refreshing a symbol?

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  • Manfred1
    0 Manfred1 over 2 years ago in reply to steve

    The version shown at Help / About is 17.4-20019 S017.

    Updating seems to be impossible, because my reference key has expired.

    If I update the DRC before changing the connector, no DRC error pops up.

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  • steve
    0 steve over 2 years ago in reply to Manfred1

    You have to have a valid maintenance contract to get the latest release. Can you maybe post the filename.dra footprint here so it can be reviewed to see if there are any issues with it? 

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  • Manfred1
    0 Manfred1 over 2 years ago in reply to steve

    I would be happy to upload the file, but it doesn't work. Files ending in .dra are not accepted. Files ending in .png seem to work, but in reality do not.

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  • Manfred1
    0 Manfred1 over 2 years ago in reply to steve

    con_usbc24_dx07s016ja1_s_r_t.txt

    I changed the ending from dra to txt to be able to upload the file. The file content remained unchanged. Please reverse file ending from txt back to dra before trying it out.

    Kind regards

    Manfred

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  • steve
    0 steve over 2 years ago in reply to Manfred1

    I've placed the connector into a board file and I see a couple of errors related to the Mechanical Drill Hole to Pin Spacing which you probably can't do anything about if you have followed the manufacturers guidelines so I added a property to the symbol (open the filename.dra then Edit - Properties, In the Find Pane. change the Find by name dropdown to drawing and add NODRC_SYM_SAME_PIN, Apply and OK). Save the footprint and refresh this in the board file and I no longer see those DRC's. In regard to the soldermask errors I'm not seeing any so check the values you have set in either Constraint Manager - Manufacturing - DFF - Mask or Annular Ring or under Setup - Constraints - Modes - Design - Soldermask and see if that helps.

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  • steve
    0 steve over 2 years ago in reply to Manfred1

    I've placed the connector into a board file and I see a couple of errors related to the Mechanical Drill Hole to Pin Spacing which you probably can't do anything about if you have followed the manufacturers guidelines so I added a property to the symbol (open the filename.dra then Edit - Properties, In the Find Pane. change the Find by name dropdown to drawing and add NODRC_SYM_SAME_PIN, Apply and OK). Save the footprint and refresh this in the board file and I no longer see those DRC's. In regard to the soldermask errors I'm not seeing any so check the values you have set in either Constraint Manager - Manufacturing - DFF - Mask or Annular Ring or under Setup - Constraints - Modes - Design - Soldermask and see if that helps.

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