Single Sided PCB Design

Achieving professional printed circuit board (PCB) design results with AutoCAD requires a structured design approach. This design approach includes the use of AutoCAD layers, blocks, and attributes and conversion of AutoCAD data into the Gerber and Excellon data required by board manufacturers. With the exception of polylines, AutoCAD does not allow direct association of a line width parameter with graphic entities. AutoCAD blocks are used for all pads on the PCB. Pad blocks are in turn nested within part blocks representing the components on the PCB. Individual pads can also appear by themselves. The pad block comprises entities on two layers: PADS and DRILL. The insertion is the center of the pad. The green display outline is used during the design process and printing of check plots on a laser printer. AutoCAD attributes are used to associate drill size information with the pad block. The drill size attributes are used to associate drill size information with the pad block.