pcb manufacturing

[electros6]

Hi guys,
         
           i used altium designer to create my PCB of size 30mm circle. I create the gerber files and send to different manufactures , but they said not able to open my file. I created my gerber using the option
        file-> fabirating output -> gerber
 I also send HC drill files in the same format
  Please help

[mazurov]

Get yourself a Gerber viewer. Check Pentalogic - their Viewmate viewer used to be free, don't know about now. This is what most of boardhouses use to view Gerbers.

[KJDS]

GCPreview is another gerber viewer that I've used for years, though it does have an annoying user interface.

[poorchava]

Sometimes it's good to add some info to your production data regarding numeric format, zero suppression and measure system (metric/imperial).

[AndersAnd]

PCB manufacturers often have online guides for design rules and how to correctly prepare a PCB for manufacturing and what file formats they accept etc.

Example from Olimex:
How to prepare your PCB files for order? https://www.olimex.com/PCB/TechnicalInfo/

[calexanian]

Hmmmm.... I use eagle, but I assume Altium has the same bewildering amount of options in the CAM processor, and of course every PCB house wants things differently. I have my cheat sheet of all the file types our house wants and some houses are better than others are guessing what you really meant. For short run things advanced circuits is pretty good. Use the barebones PCB cheap option to try it out. you get a board in a couple of days for super cheap if you don't need mask of silkscreen for prototyping.

[calexanian]

Mechanical layer gets used regularly for the the stuff you don't know where else to put. Also CMP trace side is another place for "Where does this non trace thing go?" and a readme file to the cam handler on the other end explaining what you were trying to do.