These are components I’ve created for Eagle3D.

You may also want to check out the tutorials on how to create your own components.  http://blog.everythingrobotics.com/tutorials/eagle3d-tutorials/using-google-sketchup-to-create-components/

Components

HopeRF RFM12B SMD 433Mhz/915Mhz RF Module

Microchip MR24J40MA FCC Approved 2.4GHZ 802.15.4 RF Module

Sparkfun SMA PCB Edge

PJ-326 3.5mm Jack http://www.switchcn.com/

900Mhz GSM SMA Antenna attached to PCB SMA Connector

Downloads:

Links

• http://www.matwei.de/doku.php?id=en:eagle3d:eagle3d
• http://www.volunteerlabrat.com/default.html?goto=eagle3Dguide.html
• http://www.instructables.com/id/Render-3D-images-of-your-PCBs-using-Eagle3D-and-PO/
• http://felixchenier.homelinux.com/doku.php?id=pcb:eagle3dnewpart
• http://download.matus.in/software/windows/other/eagle/Eagle%204.11/Eagle%203D/doc/Eagle3D_e.pdf

Disclaimer:

These are provided AS-IS and may contain bugs and or discrepancies and may not be to scale.

If you find any bugs or problems or make enhancements please feel free to contact me so I can update the downloads.

Integrating into Eagle3D

Now we have converted the file to work in Eagle3D we now need to tell Eagle3D how to use it.

1. Add your include file to the user.inc file

   #ifndef(__user_inc)
   #declare __user_inc = true;
   
       #include "MRF24J40MA.inc"
   #end

2. Now open and add the following to the end of 3dusrpac.dat (found in the Eagle3D install directory)

   PACKAGE_NAME:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:MACRO_NAME(::

3. To find the PACKAGE_NAME, first go back to your PCB editor in Eagle, click the info button, then click on the component we have just created the library for.
4. Replace PACKAGE_NAME with the Package variable. In this case it is MRF24J40MA Note that this is always in caps!
5. Next, we need to replace MACRO_NAME with the exact macro name we added to the file in step 2. In this example it’s MRF24J40MA.
6. The line should now look like this

   MRF24J40MA:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0:MRF24J40MA(::

7. Now run the Eagle3D ulp script and create the the POV file for the PCB.
8. Open the POV file and scroll down until and check that the component has been added to the file (line 3 below)

      1: #ifndef(pack_S1) #declare global_pack_S1=yes; object {SWITCH_SECME_1K2_RH()translate<0,0,4> rotate<0,180.000000,0>rotate<0,-180.000000,0> rotate<0,0,0> translate<41.910000,0.000000,1.727200>}#end        // S1  SWITCH-SPDT-SMD

      2: #ifndef(pack_U1) #declare global_pack_U1=yes; object {QFP_TQFP_32_080MM("ATMEGA168V","ATMEL",)translate<0,0,0> rotate<0,0.000000,0>rotate<0,-45.000000,0> rotate<0,0,0> translate<26.670000,0.000000,16.510000>translate<0,0.035000,0> }#end        //TQFP-32 U1 ATMEGA168V TQFP32-08

      3: #ifndef(pack_U2) #declare global_pack_U2=yes; object {MRF24J40MA()translate<0,0,0> rotate<0,0.000000,0>rotate<0,-270.000000,0> rotate<0,0,0> translate<61.569600,0.000000,15.240000>}#end        //MRF24J40MA FCC Approved module U2 MRF24J40MA MRF24J40MA

      4: }//End union

9. Now render your PCB, more than likely a couple of problems will show up.  The first is your component is very small.  so we need to tweak the scaling from within the component file we recreated in the previous steps.

I’ve been playing around with Eagle3D on and off (like most things more off than on lately).  Eagle3D in a nutshell is a bunch of scripts to generates povray files.  Povray is then used to render a realistic representation of the PCB file with all components included. 

The problem I’ve always come up against when using Eagle3D is missing components.  I first looked at this tutorial – http://felixchenier.homelinux.com/doku.php?id=pcb:eagle3dnewpart, however I took one look at how to make library components and thought no way, I don’t really want to generate a 3D component by long hand.

As an example this is the Experimental 2.4GHz version of triggr PCB rendered with default output from Eagle3D, you can see how many components its missing (indicated by the red cylinders), you will also notice that its also picked up the wrong component in the top left of the board, this should be a right angle header, and it’s not correctly aligned.

Well I spent a couple of hours last night playing with Eagle3D to see if I could a) learn to create custom library components using Googles free sketchup program to create a part then export to Eagle3D, and b) to get a better understanding how components are selected and put on the board in the correct orientation.

I finally had success in exporting a sketchup component to use in Eagle3D.  I imported an already existing component for the MRF24J40MA RF module from sketchup and incorporated it into Eagle3D as a part library.  Here is the result.  A lot better wouldn’t you agree?

Here is how I did it in a sparkling new tutorial….Using Google Sketchup to create Eagle3D components

This tutorial will show you how to use Sketchup to create and import components into Eagle3D

Requirements:

1. Google Sketchup installed – I’m using v6, but I’m sure it will work in the latest  version
2. su2pov plug-in – this is a sketchup plug-in written in ruby that exports the a sketchup scene into POV for more realistic rendering.
3. Eagle3D and POV installed and working.  You should be able to at least render a board, even if no components are working.

Steps involved:

1. Export Sketchup object to POV using SU2POV, and test.
2. Create the component include file ready for Eagle3D
3. Mapping the new component into the library.
4. Fine tuning the placement.

For those interested I found an RFM12 library for the Arduino  http://jeelab.equi4.com/2009/02/10/rfm12b-library-for-arduino/