Gregg,

This would've been my first response, but unfortunately you might be
stuck with what you have, or you might not know which fab house might
do your boards. Couple of other suggestions:

1) Use the gerber 274X option, with the imbedded aperture file.

2) Get a CAM system (DFM) in house to verify what is going to the fab
house. I've used Valor, it the top of the line, and I've used Gerbtool to
verify my databases.

3) Make sure the fab house is getting an IPC-D-356 netlist to check the
database with. This will do a netlist check of the gerbers, and would've
caught the plane connections missing. If the fab house can't use the 356
netlist GET ANOTHER FAB HOUSE!

A good fab house should be calling you on most every job to verify
things with you. Especially if you're doing high density designs, they will
normally call and verify aspect ratios, breakouts, minimum annular rings,
etc.

Good luck,

Mitch Morey

>>> Steve Hawn <[log in to unmask]> 03/05/98 09:58am
>>>
Gregg,

Use another board house!  Any competent CAD operator at the board
house
should have caught the fact you had no power plane connections.  I
recommend finding a board house you can rely on to help you achieve a
successful PWB.

Steve Hawn
Precision Digital Images


Gregg Klawson wrote:
>
> We just had a couple of PWB types built incorrectly due to bad
electronic
> data being sent to our board houses.  Unfortunately we did not catch
either
> problem until we had fully assembled the boards.
>
> Problem A was due to the wrong aperture file being sent out resulting
in no
> power plane connections.   Problem B was due to an old design tool
which
> did not show a "filled in" power plane which was required.  No netlist
data
> was available for either design.
>
> We would like to continue with an all electronic process but need some
> fool-proof checks that will detect if we send some incorrect file(s)/data
> or our board house does something wrong.  I'm sure companies are
doing this
> sucessfully all the time (and all electronic).  How are people making this
> process work well for them?
> ---
> Gregg Klawson
> GTE Government Systems Corp, Taunton, Massachusetts, USA
> [log in to unmask], telephone +1.508.880.1822
>
> The views expressed are the author's and do not necessarily reflect
the
> official position of GTE or any of its subsidiaries.

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