Questions tagged [ground-plane]
An area of copper on a PCB which is connected to the PCB's ground node in order to provide a return path for current from the various circuits on the board. The ground plane's area is typically made as large as possible (even occupying an entire board layer) in order to minimize its impedance, thus allowing it to conduct high return currents without a significant voltage drop from one part of the board to another. Use with related tags such as "pcb".
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Use earth as shield between high and low voltage on PCB
I have a PCB with both mains and low voltage.
The ground plane of the low voltage side is kept distant from mains (separation marked with a white silkscreen line), and separated with cutouts.
I am ...
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EAGLE PCB GND Plane not properly connecting to through hole pins
So I submitted this board design to PCBWay to get prototypes, but they kicked it back to me saying that there are very thin wires throughout the board. Upon inspecting the pictures they sent back to ...
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Understanding the basics of a ground plane and vias to it on a 2 layer PCB
I'm trying to learn the process of PDB design. I believe I've succeeded at placing my components and drawing tracks to their pads, but am having trouble adding the ground plane and connections to it.
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Should I fill free PCB space with ground?
I'm new to PCB design and I'm wondering if it makes sense in a two layer PCB to fill any free space on the top and bottom layer with a ground area.
My design:
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Helical antenna on PCB connected on ground?
I purchased the wireless bell that works on 433 MHz and would like to have an antenna with more gain in order to receive the signal a little bit far.
When I opened the device I found the helical ...
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PCB layout review: ground layout for CC step down converter
I'm laying out a step down converter based on the ST L5973AD being used in constant-current layout to drive LEDs, per Application note 2823.
My previous question was what is the datasheet telling us ...
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Split or not split the ground plane in a low-noise design?
For low-noise design, many component datasheets suggest dividing the ground plane into AGND and DGND and linking them with a star connection.
But my ten years of experience in EMC have shown me that ...
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Confining signal using stitching vias on a 2 layer PCB
I have read in some questions (for example: Via Stitching on 2 Layer PCB when top layer is not fully ground pour ), that stitching vias are useless when one's PCB only has 2 layers, however people do ...
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Additional ground area for thermal mass
My 2-layer PCB has a ground plane on the bottom layer and almost everything is routed on the front layer.
I'm using a MCP1501 Voltage Reference, its data sheet says:
Of particular importance is the ...
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EN55032 Conducted Emissions - 40cm From Vertical Reference Ground Plane
I've always wondered why we need to position the EUT 40cm from the metallic wall for conducted emissions testing. Does it have something to do with the EUT capacitively coupling the higher end of the ...
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Ethernet external magnetics layout
I am laying out a 10/100Mbps Ethernet PCB with discrete magnetics. From the magnetics to the PHY chip I have a system ground plane on the adjacent layer for the return path. From the connector to the ...
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Ethernet PCB layout: Ground
I am designing a Ethernet PCB with external magnetics on a 4 layer board. On the PHY side I have the system ground on the adjacent layer under the two differential pair for the return path. How about ...
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PCB design - noise and ground loop
I'm working on a electronic load and it's not very sensitive to noise, the questions are mostly out of curiosity.
On the PCB I have a fan control circuitry that I separated the ground and positive ...
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Long slots in gnd plane of 2 layer board
I'm trying to design a computer keyboard pcb (2 layer), and because of the placement constraints intrinsic to this situation, I have very long (spanning 80% of the dimension) slots (discontinuities) ...
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Copper fills in top and bottom layer from a cost perspective
I've seen low-cost boards from consumer electronics that have just tracks connecting the pins and they will have no copper ground pours. Since making these as cheap as possible is the goal, doesn't it ...
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How to correctly ground/isolate a grounded enclosure type thermocouple?
My K-type thermocouple (grounded enclosure type) connected to MAX31855 adapter connected to Arduino Mega gives me faults every few readings. It's really, really bad. I've tried swapping thermocouples, ...
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Where to connect two GND layers together?
I have a 4 layer PCB. The stackup is as follows:
SIG + PWR | GND | GND | SIG + PWR
Now I want to connect both GND planes with each other. EasyEDA Pro has this feature called "suture vias". ...
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Does separating DGND and AGND with two different layers for each make any sense?
In my last question I found out that having two different layers for Ground and Analog Ground may induce capacitive coupling. Now I want to ask more generally if the idea I had is worse than ...
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Does it make sense to connect the MAX6675 to a Analog Plane?
I'm currently designing a PCB with 4 Layers. The stack up is as follows:
Signal - DGND Plane - AGND Plane - Signal.
There are a ton of components connected to the DGND Plane, and I know that for ...
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How can I connect the ground planes to GND?
I'm trying to make a double-sided PCB in Proteus Ares. I added the planes using the Power Plane Generator tool, but there is no connection between planes and ground, if that makes sense. The only ...
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Chassis and digital ground in an eight layer PC motherboard
I have GNDC (chassis GND) and GND (digital GND) on my PC motherboard design.
All connectors in my design (RJ45, USB-TypeC, USB-TypeA, HDMI, DP, etc.) are connected to the chassis through the GNDC ...
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What's the intuition behind connecting a wire shield to the ground plane on a bare board?
I have an old (1970s) PCB that generates a (baseband, composite) NTSC video signal. It is a bare board without a containing chassis or case. I am using a shielded cable for the video output line and ...
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Stripline with coplanar ground plane?
I can't seem to find any impedance calculator that offers this configuration — not sure if it has a different name; I'm referring to a trace on an inner layer, sandwiched between ground planes on the ...
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Noise on PCB trace influences NTC measurement
I have a general question regarding noise in PCB-Designs.
The PCB I'm currently working on is failing some tests on the RF side. I have scanned the internet for information, but there are no concrete ...
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Why does this RF PCB have small holes in the ground polygon?
I usually pay attention to RF PCBs.
This shape is like a hole, but it is not, the ground surface is used in the form.
What is the purpose of making these holes?
How can I make them easily with the ...
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Is a ground plane useful in this analog PCB scenario?
I'm planning to make a DAC amplifier circuit on a PCB, with a schematic similar to the following example:
The PCB will be composed of a one quad op-amp, some resistors, some caps, and connectors for ...
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Multiple grounds on a small PCB
I'm designing a carrier board for an INS module. The carrier board is small (64 mm x 92 mm). Due to providing isolated GPIOs, I had to use 4 isolated power supplies on this small area, one for the ...
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What is the best way to route a two-layer MCU based PCB?
Considering we're designing a two-layer PCB with a 100-pin MCU, what's the best way to routing? As you can see in the image, many pins of this MCU are used (almost all.)
When designing a two-layer ...
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Which PWR routing strategy has the best return path for a SIG/PWR-GND-GND-SIG/PWR stackup?
I'm trying out the stackup SIG_ROUTE/PWR_ROUTE-GND_PLANE-GND_PLANE-SIG_ROUTE/PWR_ROUTE after reading of its advantages. How should I route power to components on the opposite side of the PCB?
Here is ...
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LTM4612: Power Ground and Signal Ground Planes
I'm trying to figure out how to create the GND layers for a PCB with an LM4612 buck converter module. The datasheet says a bunch of seemingly contradictory things:
"Place a dedicated power ...
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Power Supply PCB ground plane and thermal vias
I've been working on a light controller, GPS tracker, anti-theft, etc. board for my e-bike and I originally designed the 48V - 12V DC converter around a standard sixteenth-brick power converter (PS1):
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How to create thermal relief for multiple vias close together?
I've run into several situations where closely spaced vias are useful. Via stitching, reducing inductance, thermal vias in a pad, etc.
However, when I place power vias close together in software, the ...
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How to fully connect component pad with the ground plane
I'm trying to make a simple PCB board on eagle.
I've learned how to make a ground plane, and it worked great. But I wonder, why is the component pins/pads connected to ground as more like a plus (+) ...
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Could I use aluminum foil as a ground plane for 1.4 GHz antenna?
I'm currently attempting to make a radio telescope that works at 1.4 GHz. Would household aluminum foil work as a ground plane? I saw someone asking the same thing for a 900 MHz antenna and I was ...
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PCB design review: Questions about power/ground plane
I am designing a small four layer PCB with KiCad. The purpose of this PCB is to control and monitor the lights of a car (not for road use) and without having to resort to old relays and fuses.
I have ...
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Ground planing H-bridge and drivers
I'm currently routing a DC/DC converter using a controller that need an external H-Bridge. As I wanted to reduce the noise at the controller level (to preserve the measures it makes clean), I started ...
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Component Placement Strategy for Regulator and Controller
I am reading this interesting document from TI PCB Layout Considerations for Switchers
It explains the issue of the return path for high di/dt currents in regulators. To summarize my understanding, it ...
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Is it bad practice to connect a heatsink to my PCB's ground plane?
So, basically, I have this LED project which is going to dissipate lots of heat (I am assuming close to 50W) inside a case. The LEDs themselves are on a separate aluminum board which will be attached ...
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Point-to-point building of medium- frequency circuits, ground plane implementation
I build audio projects and small logic control circuits using point-to-point on perfboard (see pic of a recent build).
As you can see this allows me to select wire gauge in accordance to the currents ...
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How can I step down 24V to 5.5V and 3.3V with separate grounds?
I have a 24VDC 4A input that I need to step down to both 5VDC and 3.3VDC, but I need the 24V ground plane to be separate (isolated) from the 5V and 3.3V plane (these can have a shared ground).
What ...
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KiCad: Ground plane won't connect to pads
I am currently running into a problem in KiCad where the ground plane won't connect to some pads.
KiCad even tells me to connect them but doesn't seem to make the connection automatically.
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What is the name of this antenna?
I compared RSSI of several antennas including this one I found laying around:
It performed from all angles about 10 dB better than for example the quarter wave ANT-433-CW-HD-SMA (Mouser Link).
Tests ...
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PCB ground planes with isolated voltage
I have designed a PCB that I need to work in which a microcontroller drives a 24 V brushed motor. The input power to the board is 24 V, this is then lowered to 5 V by a step down converter, and this 5 ...
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EAGLE 7.7 do not fill GND polygon
Adding a polygon GND, but it not going to fill at all. Ratsnest - not helping. Orhans also not helping. Any idea?
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ESP32 Pad 39 - Where do I add vias?
I am building my first PCB ever with an ESP32. I want the PCB to be built by JLCPCB (or similar) and I am not sure what to do with the Pad39
I read these opinions:
Do not add vias in pad, and if you ...
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Questions about LED strip PCB and ground return currents
This question is about the PCB part of a double LED strip 'controller' circuit.
See the circuit at: Questions about LED strip circuit and current.
The arrow shows now the 5V GND pin (JST XH) pin in ...
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Mesh ground advantage over single rod ground
In high voltage laboratories, how do mesh grounds perform better than that of single rods?
Does frequency play a role here ?
Which one is more beneficial, using multiple single rods in lab for ...
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Where is the ground in this circuit?
I am designing a simple digital circuit on a PCB that includes a power supply that provides +24V and -24V, but there is no ground. I am assuming that the negative voltage (-24V) is ground? What about ...
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KiCad ground plane error or DRC glitch?
I have a PCB that when I run a design rule check in KiCad I am getting an error that an IC's earth pins are unconnected to a via which is also connected to earth. I don't get these errors a lot so I ...
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Form all your ground nets properly vs Ground Plane
I developed my project one more step and moved to the PCB stage.I will make a PCB for the first time with a microprocessor and SMD components.
I did my PCB design. Only the ground connections left. I ...
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