Panelize

The Macaos Enterprise Panelization Module allows you to quickly step up a PCB board to a panel (array) suitable for assembly.

You can easily add features to the panel, such as:

• Break-off tabs
• Fiducial marks
• Tooling holes
• Break-off holes
• Bad marks
• Copper fill
• Text
• Bar code

A WYSIWYG viewer shows your panel just as it will be interpreted by the manufacturer. Once the panel has been "published" to the system it will appear in the Order Browser, ready for purchase.

Pick and place data (if included in the board product) is stepped together with the boards. Once the panel product is published, right-click on a Pick&Place layer to export pick and place data for the panel.

Features available with pro license

Multi-product panels

With a pro license you also have the possibility of making multi-product panels. You can put several different products into one panel, often giving a better price than when ordered individually. If the multi-product panels is specified without break-off tabs, then the factory will manufacture deliver the boards as separate products (rather than as a panel).

Add assembly masks to a panel

Often, the necessary data for assembly masks is missing from the Gerber files created by the board designer. Especially in cases where assembly is being done by an EMS provider, this missing data can be a problem. It is the EMS provider who knows the processes and needs to specify the masks, but getting this information to the board designer early enough to be included in the design is usually not possible.

With this feature, the mask areas may be specified by the production engineer while creating the assembly panel. Mask areas may be specified either to fill a rectangle drawn by the user, or to fill all solder mask openings within a rectangle drawn by the user. The following masks may be defined:

• Peel-off mask (Blue mask)
• Paste mask
• Glue mask
• Hard gold
• Carbon

By adding paste mask data to the desired solder mask openings of a panel, it is possible to create a solder paste stencil when paste mask data was missing from the designer. Although the solder mask openings are usually somewhat larger than the copper pads, this is easily corrected in the Stencil module, which adjusts openings relative to the original copper pad size (when available) rather than the specified paste mask pad size.

Move and rotate boards within a panel

Any board in a panel may be moved or rotated as desired.