AR0122 CAM Editor Apertures

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    CAM Editor Apertures

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    PCB layers are created from photographic film which has been exposed to light. Apertures are the physical openings through which the light shines on the film. CAM dataincludes aperture definitions (size and shape), plus instructions about where to flash thelight through apertures, and where to draw lines on the film by moving between locationswith the light beam still on. Different pad sizes will be created by flashing differentapertures on the film; thicker or thinner tracks will be drawn on the film by dragging thelight beam across the film through larger or smaller apertures.

    As technology evolves, physical apertures may drop out of the PCB manufacturingprocess altogether. Even now, many modern laser plotters transcend the need for

    physical lens apertures, simulating the corresponding shapes on the film with raster operations.

    So far, these advances have not changed the way we talk about CAM images. Every CAM file requires an aperture list,regardless of whether these images will ever really be transferred to the film through physical apertures. Every new CAM

    document you create will contain a blank Aperture Table. This table is filled automatically when you import CAM data withembedded apertures, such as RS-274-X Gerber formats, or ODB++ data. If youre importing a format that does not embedapertures, such as Gerbers RS-274-D, you will need to include an aperture list as well.

    Aperture Lists

    Gerber formats are standardized, but aperture lists are not. Every CAM exporter has its own format for aperture keywords andspecifiers, and this can make it very difficult to import aperture lists. The CAM Editor eases this burden by providing dozens ofaperture list wizards for the prevailing formats as well as many legacy ones that you may encounter. If any of these wizardsneed to be altered to fit the data you typically receive, or if you want to create a new wizard from scratch, you may do so by

    editing individual line formats.When importing aperture lists, you can set the detection toautomatic, which will search through all of the defined aperturewizards for one that will import your file without errors. TheCAM Editor gives you complete access to all of these wizards,should you need to make any changes.

    Aperture list wizards all have general settings and line formatinstructions. General settings include such information aswhere to start and stop reading aperture lines, what units andscale to use, and whether more than one aperture definitionmay exist on a single line.

    Individual line formats are defined by tags and keywords foreach shape. The CAM Editor contains an arsenal of intrinsicshapes, including all of those supported by the ODB++ format. Some shapes will have the same tags: diamonds, bullets,ellipses, rectangles and oblongs are all defined by width and height. Others are more complicated, and require additionalparameters. When you are creating new or editing existing aperture wizards, you must match the tag sequence and format withthose values that are provided in the aperture lists you want to import.

    For example, the CAM Editors own wizard, begins each line format with the D code tag: . Next, the shape is identified by itsname, followed by its dimensions. A space in the Line Format between tags translates to the space between one character andthe next, and so it could correspond to a series of spaces or tab delimiters. The string tag refers to any set of charactersisolated by such spaces.

    Failures to import an aperture list are reported. Although the list may continue to import, best practice would be to identify theerrors, update the wizard accordingly, then import the aperture list again.

    The following table is a complete list of the tags recognized by the CAM Editor. The latter portion of this article providesexamples of each shape supported by the editor and dimensions showing how these tags relate to each shape.

    SummaryThis article looks at theapertures, aperture listsand aperture tables asthey are used in AltiumDesigners CAM Editor.

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    D Code Spokes Angle

    Aperture Number of Spokes

    Width Spokes Width

    Height Air Gap

    Inner Diameter Ring Width

    Outer Diameter Ring Gap

    Diameter Number of Rings

    Square Size Line Length

    Base Line Width

    Corner Radius Rotation

    Corner Width Hole

    Corners String

    Aperture Table

    The Aperture Table (displayed in the Edit Apertures dialog) has the task of listing allapertures in a single table, which becomesdifficult since no tags are common to allaperture shapes. Instead, the aperture tableincludes a Size (X:Y) column, which only

    sometimes corresponds to horizontal andvertical measurements. Those shapeswhich only have one dimension, such assquare and round shapes, the Y value youenter in this table will be ignored andoverwritten with the X value.

    For all other shapes, the X value will be thehorizontal, or otherwise dominantdimension, and the Y value will be thevertical, or otherwise secondary value. Forexample, a Donut, has two dimensions:inner and outer diameters. The X value will

    be the outer diameter, since it constrainsthe inner diameter. Any additional tags willcorrespond to the fields in the ApertureData dialog, which is available for complexshapes by clicking within the associatedParameters column.

    Hovering the mouse over the Size or Parameters fields in the Aperture Table will display tool tip information, in which thevalues are associated with the corresponding tags for that particular shape, as shown.

    The CAM Editor offers two or four spokes for thermal objects Values for this tag range from 0 to 15, being a decimal conversion of a four-digit binary number, i.e. upper left = 1, upper right = 2, lower left =4 and lower right = 8. If you wanted to chamfer or round only the lower corners, then you would enter 12 for this value (1100).

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    Supported Aperture Shapes

    The following is a list of the aperture shapes supported by the CAM Editor. For each shape, the associated tags used to definethe properties of the shape are also shown.

    Bullet Butterfly

    Butterfly Square Diamond

    Donut Donut Square

    Ellipse Hexagon Horizontal

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    Hexagon Vertical Moire

    Oblong Octagon

    Rectangle Rectangle Chamfered

    Rectangle Rounded Round

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    Square Target

    Thermal Thermal Rectangle

    Thermal Rectangle Open Thermal Round

    Thermal Square Thermal Square Open

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    Thermal Square Round Triangle

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    Revision History

    Date Version No. Revision

    9-Dec-2003 1.0 New product release

    01-Jul-2005 1.1 Updated for Altium Designer SP4

    4-Mar-2008 1.2 Converted to A4

    26-Mar-2008 1.3 Filename changed.

    02-Aug-2011 - Updated template.

    Software, hardware, documentation and related materials:

    Copyright 2011 Altium Limited.

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