Issue link: https://resources.pcb.cadence.com/i/1310860
www.cadence.com 4 Allegro PCB Designer Manufacturing Option other. There is no limit on the number of elements that can be placed on a drawing. Fabrication and Assembly Drawing Tools The drawing tools include support for adding PCB views to fabrication and assembly drawings. You can drag and drop views of the board outline, top/ bottom side of the PCB, drill pattern, drill chart, integral parts list, component coordinate charts, and many others. Drawing detail templates automate the creation of detail views of via stack- ups, layer stack-ups, finger chamfers, V-score, and several other common drawing element types. Component- assembly PCB views can be filtered by variant, or can apply variant status in parts lists. You can also create assembly- process documentation for process- driven PCB assembly, and easily create color-coded drawings for each assembly process, process step charts, and process- based parts lists. Advanced capabilities also include drawing functionality for geometric dimensioning and tolerance (GD&T), coordinate dimensioning, blind/ buried via support in via stack ups, PCB views, and drill charts. Mechanical Component Support Documentation Editor understands that PCBs are comprised of both electrical and mechanical components. Users can define any drawing item as a mechanical component and store it in a "gallery" for re-use. Mechanical components can also be associated to electrical components to help automate correct parts list quantity calculations, particularly when assembly variants are also used. Documentation Editor can construct a mechanical component in a number of different ways: Manually using Documentation Editor's drafting tools, by importing DXF objects from a mechanical system, or by importing any digital image file (JPEG, BMP, etc.) that the user wishes to depict as a mechanical component. Design-Driven Documentation Documentation Editor drawing content is derived directly from the Allegro PCB CAD data. Components, pins, assembly mounting sides, layers, vias, nets, assembly variants, part attributes, drill holes and symbols, and other critical design data are imported to ensure document accuracy. External content such as JPEGs, BMPs, GIFs, and TIFFs can be imported and incorporated in the drawings. OLE objects, audio, and video files can also be imported and linked within the documentation and stored with the documentation release package. In addition, Gerber and DXF files can be imported and exported. ECO Updates Minimize Documentation Rework All drawing elements in Documentation Editor are derived from the source Allegro PCB CAD data. Opening the revised design in Documentation Editor allows you to perform lightning-fast engineering change order (ECO) updates by simply refreshing the source computer-aided design (CAD) data. When refreshed, all drawing elements, such as PCB views, tables, details, parts lists, drill charts, etc. are updated with the new design data. All user customization for each element is maintained during the refresh, further minimizing documentation rework. Pack and Release Users can select drawings and files and compress them with an integrated viewer for use with users who do not have a viewer or do not wish to install one. Template Customization Toolkit The Template Customization Toolkit allows custom template creation and enables template tool pallet and format template dialogs. Automation Toolkit The Automation Tool Kit enables VB scripting tools to automate the process of creating PCB documentation. You can reduce the process of creating documentation to a few clicks for a PCB. Panel Editor Electronics manufacturers often panelize single-board designs into arrays or sub-panels to facilitate their PCB assembly process. PCB CAD tools are very good at designing the single-board design or "one-up" PCB, but lack the necessary functionality to design the varied complexities and details that are required for panels. Documenting the finished panel and adding features such as pinning holes, fiducials, score lines, and breakaway tabs can be difficult and time consuming in today's CAD and computer- aided manufacturing (CAM) tools. The Manufacturing Option's Panel Editor module intelligently automates the complex process of panel definition and documentation, simplifying the design Figure 7. Drawing-detail wizards automate the layer stack-up, finger chamfer, and V-score drawing