Placing a hole on the edge of a PCB?

[steven.gazeley]

I have a super basic PCB to make and I've gotten from the 3D model to an electronics design but I'm getting stuck on the outline.  I actually had a friend make a previous version of this little board for me but when OSHPark made it, it didn't have the two little half circular cutouts along the edge.  Turns out the mill that cuts the outline is bigger than the little holes so it skipped them.  The way to do it, they say, is to drill the holes first and then mill it, so they need to be holes with their centers on the board outline.  But I can't get Fusion 360 to let me put a hole on the board outline.

I assume this is possible.

FYI, this board doesn't have any components on it - just two pads by the little cutouts that are connected by traces to two other pads on the opposite side of the board.  I'm guessing the fact that I don't have components, may cause me trouble as well but we'll cross that bridge when I have the outline working!

[jorge_garcia · Accepted solution]

Hi @steven.gazeley,

I hope you're doing well. In Fusion 360 at the bottom center of the screen there is a toolbar, the right most icon controls the violator modes. Set it to ignore violators. That will allow you to put holes on the edge of the board. These are called castellated edges in case you are ever discussing it with someone.

You can just use vias for this. Make sure to understand what your manufacturer needs from you to produce the castellated edges correctly.

Let me know if there's anything else I can do for you.

Best Regards,

[eintobii]

But how can we place it exactly? When I want to use the origin as a reference and place my castellated holes right on the edge I am being told that I cannot do this in the free version of fusion 360. 

[jorge_garcia]

Hello @eintobii,

I hope you're doing well. In the free version you can only place copper in the positive X and Y axis so make sure you are not trying to place holes there. You can place vias precisely by using the command line interface at the top of the editor. Activate the via command and then in the CLI you can type (x-coord y-coord) where x-coord and y-coord are your desired coordinates for the via.

Let me know if you continue to run into problems.

Best Regards,

[eintobii]

That was a quick reply! I appreciate it. It would be great if it would be possible to place selected items relative to one another, including the board frame. I hope you're doing well, too

[jorge_garcia]

Hello @eintobii,

I hope you're doing well. This is already possible using the Align command, this allows you to arrange components relative to each other. In a future release, the Align command will also be able to align relative to Construction lines sketched on the 3D PCB.

Let me know if there's anything else I can do for you.

Best Regards,