In the attached file, I want the Polylines on layer PCB Holes to be actual holes in the PCB on layer PCB.

The problem is, there are a lot of holes.

I have been unable to select the holes for a Simple Extrude by any sort of 'group select' other than holding down the <Shift> key and manually clicking on each object.

How can I do this an easier way?


Jeff

I can't use the download, no 2019, but in earlier versions, quick pulling the face of the PCB upward will give a thicker board with blind holes.  I don't know if you've got lands and tracks that'll interfere with that, you might have to deal with them some way.  Pull a copy of the board object down to the face of the original and intersect the two, it'll  give you with a board with holes quickly, but no history. 

Quick Pull has not been working, for some reason, but only with the hole outlines I imported.  If I draw a 2D object, QP works fine.

At first, I thought it was the fact that the holes were filled Polygons with invisible edges, so I changed that.  I also made sure to place them on the top of the PCB (made it the Workplane), but I noticed that the displayed Workplane was flipping and moving when I clicked off the board, even though I had turned off Autoworkplane by Facet.

Aggravating.

Thanks for the tip, though; I'll keep that in mind for when I can use it.


Jeff

In the attached file, I want the Polylines on layer PCB Holes to be actual holes in the PCB on layer PCB.

The problem is, there are a lot of holes.

I have been unable to select the holes for a Simple Extrude by any sort of 'group select' other than holding down the <Shift> key and manually clicking on each object.

How can I do this an easier way?


Jeff

Jeff, you weren't kidding when you said a lot of holes. 
>Select holes by layer
> add thickness
> 3D add them
> Subtract from the plate
I can't imagine the Quick pull tool working, that tool is half baked, will probably freeze up TC.

Jeff, you weren't kidding when you said a lot of holes. 
>Select holes by layer
> add thickness
> 3D add them
> Subtract from the plate

I experimented with adding thickness, but it would not subtract.  3D Adding them all together did the trick (strength in numbers, I guess).

Thank you kindly.


Jeff

Why are they faceted?   

Because I could only export the Gerber file as a PDF and it approximated circles the way Deluxe does (lots of short lines).  The DXF Export from the PCB Layout software I use only exports unplated holes.


Jeff

That's probably at least part of the reason why quick pull would choke.  I don't agree with Dean that it's flaky, but there are limits to the number of faces to internal islands on a region, this very humble six-year-old 1.4 GHz Celeron with 8 Gb RAM would handle about 100 reasonably comfortably, things slow down after that.   Slicing and dicing to reduce the face count is simple with lines across the pull face though.     

Well, I finally got what I asked for, but not what I wanted.

After giving thickness to the holes and 3D adding them together, I did the same thing to the pads, then overlaid them and did a couple of 3D subtracts.

The resulting file is 409 MB.

I think I'll take a Drill file and place some properly-sized cylinders at its map locations.  With a cylindrical walls instead of faceted approximations, I should get something a lot smaller.


Jeff

Well, I finally got what I asked for, but not what I wanted.

After giving thickness to the holes and 3D adding them together, I did the same thing to the pads, then overlaid them and did a couple of 3D subtracts.

The resulting file is 409 MB.

I think I'll take a Drill file and place some properly-sized cylinders at its map locations.  With a cylindrical walls instead of faceted approximations, I should get something a lot smaller.


Jeff

What are you doing exactly with the pads, Jeff..
I haven't tried it yet but did you remove the brush pattern before adding thickness to the pads.

What are you doing exactly with the pads, Jeff..
I haven't tried it yet but did you remove the brush pattern before adding thickness to the pads.

The original exported data was polylines with a solid fill and invisible line.  I made the lines visible and removed the brush fill.  The size came from the round holes being composed of a couple dozen line segments each.

If I re-do the work, I will just keep the larger holes and make them smooth.


Jeff

Will the polygons convert to arc polylines?   They should thicken, add together and subtract from the board as cylinders without faceting. 

Will the polygons convert to arc polylines?   They should thicken, add together and subtract from the board as cylinders without faceting.

Arc Polylines were not completely cylinders, although I could experiment with the conversion parameters to tweak the results.  Converting to Curves wasn't any better.

However, I cannot invoke the command when I have all of the Polylines selected.

I was able to use the Select By Similar command (new to 2019) to select all the the same size/shaped Polylines, so that may be worth investigating.  There are a lot of differently sized holes, however (27, to be exact).


Jeff

A curiosity that I noticed with regular polygons created in TC, converted to arc polylines, is that the faces of the non-cylinders blend into each other, becoming cylinders, when the all of the parts are added.

It worked, a whole lot faster than the original technique and with a much smaller file size (10 MB instead of 440 MB).

Thanks for the guidance.


Jeff