- [Instructor] Now that I've created this more 3D
and mechanical design of my printed circuit board,
this can be very useful to make edits and changes,
let's say, on the mechanical end of things.
So very commonly, a PCB might be fitted
into an enclosure of some kind,
and we'd need specific clearances and tolerances,
and so on, to fit correctly into that enclosure.
So that might be the mechanical team's job
to make those edits and changes.
So what's nice about this is
instead of just jumping back and forth
through email or talking to your team members,
this board shape here is tied directly back
to my SOLIDWORKS PCB.
So as I make that change here and save it out,
it's going to automatically save out and update
on my SOLIDWORKS PCB side of things,
again, using those Push-Pull tools, as we'll see.
So let's take a look at this collaboration
and integration now going back to the electrical team.
So what I have here, if I take a look at my assembly,
is a very simple assembly file.
It's called, that name I just gave it, O3 LilyPad PCB,
and a whole bunch of components within it.
Right now it's just empty.
It has just as the one board outline.
But if I had a whole bunch of resistors, capacitors,
components, and so on, they would each come in
as individual parts as well here.
So what's nice about this is I can very easily make changes
to my board outline.
So I take a look in my Board Outline here.
I have a board feature.
And this board, Sketch,
was built directly off the dimensions
from my SOLIDWORKS PCB.
So I can jump into this sketch if I'd like.
And so we can see, here's my sketch.
It should be the same size as it was
in my SOLIDWORKS PCB software,
just about 100 millimeters by 100 millimeters.
Let's say I want to change the general shape of that.
And again, I can change it to any shape here.
I'm just redefining the board outline.
And what's really handy about this,
maybe we'll see later on, is you can use this
as a subassembly and a larger assembly.
So you can actually define it directly off of, say,
a mechanical enclosure, or something like this.
Make sure all the holes line up and everything else.
In this case, I'm just gonna do a very simple change,
I'm gonna say, instead of this size, rectangular
or squared board here,
I'm just going to make it a circular board,
and just draw a simple circle here.
I'm gonna try to get it dead in the center here.
So I'm gonna replace this rectangular board
with just a circular board here.
I could give exact dimensions here as well,
so let's try to say, maybe, 45, or so, millimeters.
And maybe I'll throw in this information here.
So I want the total diameter to be, let's say,
90 millimeters.
So I want this circular shape to be my new board outline,
let's say, so of course, I just wanna get rid
of the old board outline here.
So I can just delete my old sketch here.
And again, maybe as the electrical designer,
you won't be running through this.
This is more for the mechanical designers.
However, if you are doing both sides of the work,
it's still good to know, and it's good to know
just how the integration and collaboration works
between the two teams.
If I'm happy with that, of course,
I can jump out of my sketch here.
And now we can see I've changed the size and shape
of my printed circuit board.
Instead of being a four-inch, or so, square PCB,
it's now a 90-millimeter-or-so-diameter, circular PCB.
If I'm happy with that, I can save this file out of course.
And then I'll just want to push it back
to my electrical team once I'm happy with it.
So I can jump back to my SOLIDWORKS PCB Add-In here.
And it's just gonna be the same process,
that push-pull process here.
So I'm gonna open this up.
Again, this was the original note.
And as you can see,
this whole process is gonna be a lot of back and forth
between the two teams until you get the perfect board shape
with all your components aligned perfectly within,
say, an enclosure, or whatever it may be.
So now if I'm happy with this,
I would like to push this back to my electrical team,
so I'm just gonna click Push here,
and maybe give a memo or a note here as well,
say, mechanical team
has changed the
general board shape, or something like this.
Of course, add as much or as little detail
as you may need in these notes here.
And then I can just hit Post here,
and that's going to push that information
back over to the electrical team.
Now it won't hold and automatically make all those changes.
It's going to actually talk to the electrical team first
and say, "Are you sure you want these changes?
"Do you disagree with the mechanical designer?"
So you can accept or disregard changes, as we'll see.