panelizing

This is what we do at the company I work for.

After the board design/layout is complete we start to plan the best way to array the board.

We first start by trying several ways to array the board first using a 3, 4 boards or more in the original array.

We also get input for our Manufacturing Engineer, we assemble in house.

We do this in AutoCad, then starting with the normal 18" x 24" standard panel we see how many arrays will fit on the panel.

All the 18" x 24" is not usable area, we allow an 1" for the vendor which makes the usable area 16" x 22".

When creating your intinal array you must create the rouitng channels between each indivudal board.

This is normally .100" wide.

So for instance with a 4 board array we would have the 4 board outlines, the tooling hole locations, routing channels between the boads fiducial locations and dimensions for all of this.

Once all this is finalized we DFX out and import into PCB EDITOR.

You must create a class, subclass for this data first.

We use Manufacturing, Array.

Then create the Artwork for this to send to the vendor along with the other .ART files.

This will show the number of boards, how they are located in the array, the step an repeat dimensions that the vendor needs.

Try to get as many arrays on a panel to eliminate used material thereby getting the most array for the buck.

Hope this helps.

This is what we do at the company I work for.

After the board design/layout is complete we start to plan the best way to array the board.

We first start by trying several ways to array the board first using a 3, 4 boards or more in the original array.

We also get input for our Manufacturing Engineer, we assemble in house.

We do this in AutoCad, then starting with the normal 18" x 24" standard panel we see how many arrays will fit on the panel.

All the 18" x 24" is not usable area, we allow an 1" for the vendor which makes the usable area 16" x 22".

When creating your intinal array you must create the rouitng channels between each indivudal board.

This is normally .100" wide.

So for instance with a 4 board array we would have the 4 board outlines, the tooling hole locations, routing channels between the boads fiducial locations and dimensions for all of this.

Once all this is finalized we DFX out and import into PCB EDITOR.

You must create a class, subclass for this data first.

We use Manufacturing, Array.

Then create the Artwork for this to send to the vendor along with the other .ART files.

This will show the number of boards, how they are located in the array, the step an repeat dimensions that the vendor needs.

Try to get as many arrays on a panel to eliminate used material thereby getting the most array for the buck.

Hope this helps.