pmonta / gerber2graphtec Goto Github PK

I'm not only using gerber2graphtec to cut stencils but to create mechanical prototypes for my PCBs before sending the gerbers to the fab - that is to take the mechanical layer and cut the countour of the board out of a relatively thick (1mm) paper. This way I can see whether the board will fit into the case that contains the board.

The next step would be to print the footprint of the components (and maybe the traces) with my inkjet printer then cut the contur with my Cameo. As a Linux user I haven't used Silhouette Studio but I've heard about the Print and Cut feature.

I'm interested in how could I make this happen on Linux, preferably with gerber2graphtec.

I'm also interested about how it works: Does the Cameo simply looks for a standard mark and sends the coordinates to the host or does it send the picture to the host and the host software looks for the registration mark? Are there any graphtec commands involved?

Thanks in advance!

The g2g worked like a charm on my debian testing so far.
Today, I wanted to plot another stencil and got this output for g2g_gui on the console:

 *** WARNING - the DELAYBIND command has been deprecated, and will be
               removed in the next version. For now you can restore
               the behaviour by using -dREALLYDEALYBIND but if you
               require continued use of this command you should contact
               the Ghostscript developers. Commercial customers of
               Artifex should email their support contact, free users
               are encouraged to talk to us on the #ghostscript IRC
               channel on irc.freenode.net.

Unrecoverable error: undefined in DELAYBIND
PostScript/PDF Interpreter finished. Return status 65280 executed command : /usr/bin/gs -q -dDELAYBIND -dWRITESYSTEMDICT -dNODISPLAY -dNOEPS "/tmp/psinJYnEC4"
The interpreter seems to have failed, cannot proceed !

Seems that something has changed on my system. Any ideas how to fix?

Has anyone tested this successful with this plotter?

What are the necessary steps to debug this?

Gerbv versions from the Ubuntu repository contain a dated libgerbv with a bug that severely impacts gerber2graphtec's function. This issue is already resolved in the main source branch as of 2.3.0. If a pad's width or height falls below a certain amount relative to the total size of the board, the pad is no longer rendered in gerbv's pdf export.

Bug produced on Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, 3.2.0-40-generic-pae i686 with gerbv 2.5.0-1 using the following file (http://gist.github.com/mabarnett0/5523393). Apertures D13, D14, D20, D21, D24, and D25 are no longer rendered in the pdf output.

This issue can be mitigated by specifying a large "--window" argument but this may lead to further complications, suggest recommending Ubuntu and possibly Debian users compile from latest sources.

Hopefully this will keep others from wasting Kapton on bad cuts.

In using test_forces.py, I discovered that it skips every 6th force value. The force is set with:

for i in range(0,6):
for j in range(0,5):
g.set(force=1+j+6*i)

But that creates a number order of: 1,2,3,4,5,7,8,9,10,11,13,14,...

The g.set(force line should really be (if the tested force values should be sequential):

g.set(force=1+j+5*i)

Hello!
I use silhouette portrait under archlinux, when i try to send anything to plotter they cut square.
https://fex.net/#!571842876182
this link include photo of result and video of work, i try cut example file test_0.5mm_0402.gbr with comand python2.7 ./gerber2graphtec ./examples/test_0.5mm_0402.gbr >/dev/usb/lp0

Greetings,

I came very close to getting this to work on my Silhouette Curio. But Ghostscript 9.22 depreciates the -dDELAYBIND flag which pstoedit depends on. The result is no output from pstoedit. pstoedit and this project haven't seen any development in while so I don't expect this will magically be fixed.

I'm testing this on a MacPorts and would love to find a solution.

Downgrading Ghostscript to 9.21 seems the logical answer, but it's not easy to do as MacPorts pretty much insists on installing the latest version of packages, and doesn't provide an easy way to downgrade.

I've already spent a lot of time troubleshooting and have become frustrated. I don't want to re-invent anything nor delve into debugging the open-source code any further. My goal is to get the stencil made, and I love the concept of going directly from gerber to the cutter that pmonta has developed. Has anyone else run into this or found a solution?

With such setting border is cutting with zero distance around gerber image.
Is it possible to avoid border at all?

Above is true for g2g_gui application.

Thanks for this great utility. I just installed it on a Mac (OSX 10.8.3) with MacPorts and followed the instructions in the Readme. When I then tried to send a file to the printer with file2graphtec, I got the following error:

$ ./file2graphtec tests/test_forces.out
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "./file2graphtec", line 12, in
import usb1
ImportError: No module named usb1

What I eventually discovered is that if you do not already have python-libusb1 installed, you need to download it from https://github.com/vpelletier/python-libusb1/tree/, unzip, cd into the new folder and do a 'sudo python setup.py install' to install it. Once I installed this python module, file2graphtec worked great. Just thought that I would pass along so you could possibly add to the README.

Nice work! This is an amazing set of tools for us into electronics.

I'm trying to use it with the new Sillhouette Cameo 2 (with the touch screen and USB stick port) on OSX.

I added an extra line for the new USB id:

0x0b4d, 0x112b) # Silhouette Cameo 2

to file2graphtec.py and it now detect and send the job to the cutter. However file2graphtech hangs until I kill it via Ctrl-C, but once killed the cutter starts cutting!

Then the output also looks wrong, it's super tiny and doesn't seem to match the design.

I guess the protocol has changed? Do you have any suggestions to try or will this be a case of starting over and sniffing for the new commands?

Cheers

Hi there! I recently wrote my own custom driver for the Silhouette cutters before I realized this project exists. I am interested in fleshing this driver out, and supporting the Silhouette's entire GPGL vocabulary. I've contacted Graphtec a few times, but the are tight lipped about these specifications. Most of my work is based on sniffing the USB communication between their bundled software and my Silhouette, along with scattered notes around the internet. I was curious if you had any technical documentation to share?

https://github.com/vishnubob/silhouette
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxYCJ1hTM2I

Thanks!
-g

In using a backing paper, I found the Avery 5353 too hard to remove, so in looking around, I found Avery 6470, 6465 with a removable adhesive, Avery 03383 project paper and LD Glossy Inkjet Photo Sticker Paper (lowest cost) with a similarity low stick adhesive.

thanks

tom...

When I run
/gerber2graphtec examples/test_0.5mm_0402.gbr >/dev/usb/lp
I get the following:

0 Traceback (most recent call last): File "./gerber2graphtec", line 117, in <module> strokes = pic.read_pic(temp_pic) File "/home/miguel/Desktop/gerber2graphtec/gerber2graphtec/pic.py", line 5, in read_pic f = open(filename,"r") IOError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: '_tmp_gerber.pic'

And the plotter just goes back and forth a few times

Used the g2g_gui.py file to convert a gerber file into a txt file. When I tried sending the file to Silhouette Cameo3 printer, the file said it was copied succesfully but nothing happened afterwards.