topic Re: Generate csv NOT mnt/mnb files HELP PLEASE in EAGLE Forum

Generate csv NOT mnt/mnb files HELP PLEASE

davebullockmbe — Tue, 14 Jan 2025 12:17:35 GMT

HI experts

I am trying to generate csv pick-n-place files in EAGLE 9.6.2 free, to get my pcb assembled by JLCPCB.

Their tutorial says to select (in the board editor) EXPORT and then MOUNT SMD and the correct files will be generated suggesting that they will be in the required csv format.

However they are generated as .mnt and .mnb top and bottom files but not csv!

I am NOT offered the option to select csv format (as I am in the corresponding BOM schematic procedure)?

How do I generate the placement files in csv format?

Thanks in anticipation

Dave

Re: Generate csv NOT mnt/mnb files HELP PLEASE

jorge_garcia — Tue, 14 Jan 2025 20:50:38 GMT

Hi @davebullockmbe,

I hope you're doing well. CSV is a generic file format (character-separated values), which uses delimiters to separate the various data fields. The .mnt and .mnb files are csv files so you can just upload them as is. If JLCPCB complains just change the extension from mnt to csv and the same for mnb.

Let me know if you continue to run into problems.

Best Regards,

Re: Generate csv NOT mnt/mnb files HELP PLEASE

davebullockmbe — Wed, 15 Jan 2025 17:06:19 GMT

Hi Jorge,

Thanks for your reply .

Yes when I discovered that I could open the .mnt and .mnb files with Notepad, I could see they were in roughly the correct format.

I was struggling as my 'licenced' copy of EAGLE is 5.12 which I have never needed to generate 'board house' assembly files from in all the years I have used it.

All the boards I have made have been 'one-offs' and only now do I need to have a batch made containing lots of 0402 components which I don't fancy hand soldering.

Then, I couldn't discover if EAGLE 5.12 would even generate the files when attempting to follow JLCPCB's EAGLE tutorial.

So, in desperation... I migrated my board to my free copy of EAGLE 9.6.2 which I hardly ever use so was totally unfamiliar, making the file generation I needed

much harder...lol!

Finally I somehow managed to generate a ZIP file which seemed to contain 3 folders, Assembly, DrillFiles and GerberFiles which seems to have all the required files

Not quite sure how I did that?

Thanks......

Dave