I have used polygons to make ground planes also, I would just rename the polygon as GND same as all of my GNDs, I use a polygon around the whole bottom layer.
Actually, I have only done it twice but they have turned out nice.
--- On Fri, 7/11/08, alan00463 <alan00463@...> wrote:
From: alan00463 <alan00463@...>
Subject: [Homebrew_PCBs] Re: CadSoft Eagle pads question
To: Homebrew_PCBs@yahoogroups.com
Date: Friday, July 11, 2008, 10:40 AM
--- In Homebrew_PCBs@ yahoogroups. com, "Mike Young" <mikewhy@... > wrote:
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Harvey White" <madyn@...>
> To: <Homebrew_PCBs@ yahoogroups. com>
>
> >>> For mounting pads, try polygons.
> >>>
> >>> Harvey
> >>
> >>Not exactly sure what you meant by that tip, Harvey
> >>Do you mean mounting pads for connecting SMT parts?
> >
> > Yes, or anything else you want to solder to the foil directly. I also
> > use polygons for large ground planes.
>
> If you have special needs, sure, you could do that. For almost
everthing
> else, though, just place the part in the schematic, connect it up,
and the
> pads for the selected part show up on the board. If you selected, for
> example, a transistor 2N2222 in a TO92 case, the footprint for the
TO92 is
> placed on the board. If it was an SOT23 package, the SMD for that
would be
> on the board. You'll almost always find it easier to design special
pads as
> an SMD's in the library editor than as polygons on the board. Ground
and
> power planes, of course, are exceptions.
Although I don't need a polygon now, I have used polygon to
create a groundplane in the past. However, when doing so,
I could not figure out how to merge the filled polygon
with the adjacent ground trace. Eagle always left an etched space
between the two.
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