Altium Designer 19: Layer Standards

[maxpayne]

In the version 19, there are several options in the drop down menu while defining layers.

I wanted to know is there any standard that should be followed during creating library components . For example,

MECHANICAL - 8   for COURTYARD TOP
MECHANICAL - 9   for COURTYARD BOTTOM
MECHANICAL - 5   for TOP ASSEMBLY
MECHANICAL - 6   for BOTTOM ASSEMBLY

I didn't find any reference in this regard in Altium Documentation

[ajb]

AFAIK there's no functional change to the new layer types other than giving you more meaningful names (which is nice!).  I'm not sure how this affects things like rules and PCB filters that use layer names.

Here's what I've always used, which matches Altium's footprint wizard, so it's probably the closest thing to a standard out there: https://blog.mbedded.ninja/electronics/general/altium/altium-tricks-and-standards/#pcb-layer-standards

[Blue_Alien]

I decided to go with what the IPC footprint wizard creates for layer pairs. Layers 2 and 3 are Top/Bottom Assembly, 4 and 5 are Top/Bottom Courtyard, and 6 and 7 are Top/Bottom 3D body.

[free_electron]

you may want to read this : https://www.altium.com/documentation/19.0/display/ADES/((Working+with+Mechanical+Layers))_AD

There's a lot of implications with that. Especially if you are running a vault and a mix of versions ( some people still on 17, some on 18 some on 19 )
Editing 2000+ footprints to bring them into the new style is VERY painful.

[maxpayne]

I decided to go with what the IPC footprint wizard creates for layer pairs. Layers 2 and 3 are Top/Bottom Assembly, 4 and 5 are Top/Bottom Courtyard, and 6 and 7 are Top/Bottom 3D body.

Do the vault components follow the same sets ?
(I dont have access to vault)

[julianhigginson]

I decided to go with what the IPC footprint wizard creates for layer pairs. Layers 2 and 3 are Top/Bottom Assembly, 4 and 5 are Top/Bottom Courtyard, and 6 and 7 are Top/Bottom 3D body.

Oh no... have Altium changed the mech layer use for the IPC wizard?

I hadn't noticed this yet - but I haven't used 18 or 19 that much, and may have only used it with my existing dblibs, come to think of it.

had a quick look in my AD19, and it looks like the wizard has a dropdown list to select the mech layers to use for courtyard, assembly and component body info generation.. and mine seem set to what they have always been... So at least I can keep things inline with the rest of my parts lib for now, it's only using parts from other people using different settings to generate footprints that needs to be considered.

A shame that it seems these different settings are going to become the *default* for new Altium users, though. Will have to see how well the new layer types feature actually works, in keeping this stuff together. At at least it's pretty obvious when 3d bodies and courtyard layer primitives end up in the wrong layers.

If it happens to be a problem too often, it could be a good excuse for making a special Altium script, I suppose.

[maxpayne]

I decided to go with what the IPC footprint wizard creates for layer pairs. Layers 2 and 3 are Top/Bottom Assembly, 4 and 5 are Top/Bottom Courtyard, and 6 and 7 are Top/Bottom 3D body.

Oh no... have Altium changed the mech layer use for the IPC wizard?

I hadn't noticed this yet - but I haven't used 18 or 19 that much, and may have only used it with my existing dblibs, come to think of it.

had a quick look in my AD19, and it looks like the wizard has a dropdown list to select the mech layers to use for courtyard, assembly and component body info generation.. and mine seem set to what they have always been... So at least I can keep things inline with the rest of my parts lib for now, it's only using parts from other people using different settings to generate footprints that needs to be considered.

A shame that it seems these different settings are going to become the *default* for new Altium users, though. Will have to see how well the new layer types feature actually works, in keeping this stuff together. At at least it's pretty obvious when 3d bodies and courtyard layer primitives end up in the wrong layers.

If it happens to be a problem too often, it could be a good excuse for making a special Altium script, I suppose.

What layer setups you use for both pcb and library ?

[thm_w]