Reference Planes

Components require their ports to be on open polygon edges. Reference Planes can be used to effectively move your port position away from the polygon edge. To accomplish this, em uses circuit theory to cascade a negative length of the line with the analysis results. If no reference plane is specified, then de-embedding the Component removes none of the feedline metal but the port(s) are still de-embedded. The use of reference planes is illustrated below.

All the Component ports on a side of a Component use the same reference plane. For a detailed discussion of reference planes and de-embedding, please see De-embedding.

The reference planes for Component ports are set in the Component Port Properties dialog box. This dialog box may be opened by double-clicking on a component port or by selecting the component, then selecting the command Object ⇒ Port Properties from the project editor main menu. For details on using this dialog box, please click on the Help button.

As with all Sonnet reference planes, the Component reference planes are snapped to the grid. It is important that you are working with a fine enough cell size to ensure the accurate placement of your reference planes. If the length is set to less than one half the cell size, then the reference plane will not be displayed in the project editor window.