Bob;

Thanks for the opportunity to ask you some other design process questions.

Do you require your suppliers send you a set of photoplots before pcb fab?
Or have you become confident enough with your vendors to skip this step?

Do you remove or allow your pcb vendors to remove internal pads?

Do you send your gerber files in RS274X format?

Do you run a drc against your gerber files?

Our fab drawings that we send along with our gerber files calls for a max.
processing allowance of .003 .  I thought this meant +.000/-.003 . This
may be interpreted as +/- .003 by some fab shops. If it does mean +/- .003
then I would think your process allowance would be much tighter than ours.
Yet your vendors don't complain much.

We might be better off tightening our allowances than changing our standard
trace widths/spacings.

Thanks Again.


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I would also incourage others to respond.
I've talked to a few people who decline to submit Q&A's because they don't want
to be ridiculed because of poor spelling, bad grammer, or typing errors.

I'll be the last person to criticize others who are trying to learn more.