Molded Interconnect Device (MID)
Design tracks on a 3D-body (Molded Interconnect Device, MID) |
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PCBs waste space, have weight, need to be mounted and cost money. If you only need something to hold and connect your electronics components, think about an MID. In many cases an existing plastic part could do the job. TARGET 3001! lets electronics developers work how they are used to: Create a schematic, import the MID as a STEP file, place the packages on the arbitrarily formed MID, see the airwires on the MID body and draw the tracks. The design rule check tells whether all packages are placed, all connections are established and no spacing violations occur.
Image: A 3D body carries the circuitry with all elements and devices
Shown is .
Image: A board game dice in 3D. The side walls of the body carry all circuit elements (tracks and components). No additional PCB is needed. The body itself is used as component and track carrier.
Image: The object in real. The inside of a dice. On touch it shows random pips.
Image: The object in real. The outer shape of the dice
Image: The object in real. You got five!
The width and spacing of the tracks can be determined by the constraints in the schematic. An automatic snap-on-pad and snap-on-track as well as the possibility to drag track corners help the designer to easily connect all nets. The spacing of each track is also displayed during placement and dragging. One swift click on a button lets the developer directly export the required 3D STEP file towards the LPKF Cicuit-Pro software. The pads and tracks can now be assigned to certain lasering poses and to the respective laser unit, if more than one are available on the LPKF laser machine. Now the working path of the laser structuring can be computed and the production can begin immediately.
TARGET 3001! also exports the centers of the pads and the appropriate normal angles to dispense solder paste or conducting glue. The bill of material can be output with the X/Y/Z coordinates of the components and their azimuth and zenith angle for automatic assembly.
In the non commercial editions MID functionality is given up to 10 pins/pads.
In the commercial editions MID functionality is given in growing strength. Please have a look at the editions overview.
