Creating a Powerplane

[Hallee]

I am trying to create a powerplane for a net labeled 2.5V. I can create it through the process of right click > place > powerplane and defining the copper inner layer 1 with the net 2.5V. However, when I autoroute my design nothing connects to the placed powerplance. Everything is still on the copper top. Any help on what I am doing wrong or how to get the nets labeled 2.5V to connect to the placed powerplane.

[Tayyab_R]

Hi,

You need to check your Routing Layers. In the spreadsheet view Nets tab, there is a column Routing Layers which says something like 1111. This would mean that routing is allowed on all layers. If there are 0s in the sequence, routing is not allowed on those layers. Select the column and click on any of the values under it. It will bring up a window to select the routing layers. Select everything and press Ok. Now the autorouter should route on all layers.

Hope this helps.

[Hallee]

I have tried this but just to clarify. Under the Nets tab for the row with the 2.5V that I want connected to the powerplane I created with copper inner 1 should I make that specific net specified as 0100 so that those nets labeled 2.5V only route to inner 1? I have tried multiple things but every time when I turn off the copper top layer all my traces disappear indicating that nothing is connected to the copper inner 1.

[Tayyab_R]

Hi,

I dont think you need to change the routing to 0100. After routing, click on the 2.5V net and see what the traces for the net are. If you would like us to take a look at the design, you can go to the link below and create a Service Request

https://lumen.ni.com/nicif/US/GB_SRM/content.xhtml?du=https://sine.ni.com/srm/app/myServiceRequests

[Tayyab_R]

Hi,

I dont think you need to change the routing to 0100. After routing, click on the 2.5V net and see what the traces for the net are. If you would like us to take a look at the design, you can go to the link below and create a Service Request

https://lumen.ni.com/nicif/US/GB_SRM/content.xhtml?du=https://sine.ni.com/srm/app/myServiceRequests

[_user32]

All - just an FYI on powerplanes in v12...

Just a quick note about powerplanes and Ultiboard v12.   In v12 the Place->Copper Area menu function has been removed (you can still create a Copper Plane the same way as before however).   To create a Copper Plane area (defined for different grounds, power, etc...) you'll need to select the layer and then go to the Place->Graphics->Polygon and create a polygon area and assign a net (basically this was the way the Copper Area function worked prior).

The nice thing:  Polygons work much better in v12 in that you can adjust each vertex graphically, move the polygon around as a whole, and there are many 'under-the-hood' enhancements that make working with polygons much better.

Regards,

Pat

[GenoPitt]

I have tried to change the Routing Layer column by highlighting the whole column.

When I right click the selection the only choice I get is Hide or Show Columns.

If I go into one of the blocks then the col highlight goes away and the row is selected.

How can I change the whole row or a select few at once?

Now by accident I just hide the Routing Col. How do I get it back?

[_user32]

Try left clicking - this will allow you to change the routing layer per net.  To select multiple nets hold <Ctrl> to select individual nets or click on one and press <Shift> on another to select a range of nets.  Then if you left click you should get the popup window showing layers.

If you lost a column navigate close to the top row and you'll see the cursor change from a single line (to move a column divider) to a double line (to expand a collapsed column).

Hope this helps.

- Pat N