Panelization

Object CAM must be an add on? Not sure about that, but we use it to panelize where I work now. It's a bit quirky to use, and not real versatile, but it does do the job if all your after is panelization. Personally, I don't think Allegro is all that great a drafting tool, but that's another issue. What you do with Object CAM is create a new file called Panel and open it. Go into Object CAM and the file structure is converted to a Panel- there will be a pop up asking if that's the intent. Once that's done a link must be established to the .brd file(s), and the specific layers and technology must be defined. Once that's all done, the specific board loc coordinates must be provided. The boards can be rotated and mirrored if so desired. The boards then pop in at the coordinates, and your off to running your tooling files. It's important to note that the board files within the panel are not editable. They are simply photoplotable images. Panel data can be added- fiducials, bad board marks, etc. - but the .brd files cannot be edited. I thinl Object Cam would be better if the CAD tool (Allegro) itself was a better drafting tool- but it really lacks in that regard. What I've written above is very general and the real deal typically confuses the hell out of most people until they run it several times. As I said, it's a very quirky tool, and if one thing is wrong, it won't work correctly. The most common issue is missing data if the files aren't set up properly. You've got to spend some time with this one to get the hang of it.

Hope that helps.

Thank you for your reply.

We are looking at getting a CAM350 software program.

What we are doing now is creating the panel outline with all the necessary data in AutoCAD and then DXF that file into the board layout.

Then it becomes part of the Gerber Data sent to the Vendor.

It works ok but we would like to look at something else as well.

Thanks

carvey