The Drill & Slot editor is designed to allow you to review and modify your data before placing your order.

This is design ensure that the drill & slot data in order is “Right First Time for Manufacture”.

Examples

Defining slots

It might happen that your data set contains a file with slots, but the automated system did not detect it.

The first step is to make sure the layer containing the slots is defined as a Drill/Slot layer.

• Open the Buildup Editor.
• Select the “Detected Plated drills” or the “Detected Unplated drills” to verify if the slots have been detected.
• If not, then locate the layer which contains the slot definitions and change its assignment to Drill/Rout.

The second step is to make sure the plating of the slot is correctly defined.

• Again you can inspect the “Detected Plated drills/slots” or the “Detected Unplated drills/slots” to verify the plating of the slots.
• If the plating is not set correctly, you can open the Drill/Slot Editor by clicking the button next to the plated or unplated drill layers.

In case you made changes in the Buildup Editor, you first need to save them before the Drill/Rout editor is opened.

To change the category of a slot, select it by clicking on it. To select all slots at once, click the “+” button in the selection menu next to the entry “Slot”.

To define the slot as plated, click the “Set” button in the Define menu next to the entry “Plated”.

Save your changes by clicking the Apply button.

Forcing a drill to be unplated

In some cases there are drills that go through copper planes on top and bottom side, although they should be unplated.

The normal detection mechanism will define these drills are plated since there is an annular ring on both sides.

With the Drill/Slot Editor it is now possible to correctly store this information.

Open the Drill/Slot Editor through the Buildup Editor. Plated drills are shown in red.

Select the drill(s) that need to be defined as Unplated. This will add a yellow outline around the selected drill.

Click the “Set” button in the Define menu next to the entry “Unplated”.

The color of the drill will now change to green to indicate the drill is unplated.

Save your changes by clicking the Apply button.