DFM gerber tool

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I did a search for "DFM" and most of the posts were from the... - Aug 25, 2005 by Stephen

I suppose it depends on your layout software. My weak recoll... - Aug 25, 2005 by Steve Thomas

Stephen

#36308

DFM gerber tool | 25 August, 2005

I did a search for "DFM" and most of the posts were from the previous century. Is there a tool that is not too expensive that will check a board layout based on DFM criteria? I don't think there could be a good one to give the number of parts and spacings and such. I'm not even sure if there is a CAD program to check stuff like that.

Also what I"m thinking of doing is makeing an excel spreadsheet to generate a DFM score for assemblies. Does anyone else do this? One place I worked had a spreadsheet for quoteing purposes and it worked well.

I want to make a complete checklist including such things as no parts oposite parts that get X-rayed.

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Steve Thomas

#36317

DFM gerber tool | 25 August, 2005

I suppose it depends on your layout software. My weak recollection of what PowerPCB does is allow you to set up rules as far as spacing and where parts are placed, then you run the rule check, er something like that.

As far as "Also what I"m thinking of doing is makeing an excel spreadsheet to generate a DFM score for assemblies. Does anyone else do this?", I know I think about it all the time. At my last job we had a PCB design review team that assessed manufacturability upon the first build of any new layout (proto or any significant design change) and submitted findings/recommendations to design. Some fly, some don't. We didn't get to the "score sheet" level, but the idea was discussed. At this job, very few of our customers are motivated to make changes for dfm's sake.

Another company I worked for did keep score for new product design (an ME was assigned to the design team) and it did include PCB layout, but that was when things were simpler (large pth boards with no or very limited SMT) and they did their own pcb assembly.

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