Welcome to the SeeMeCNC Community

I'm curious about something. If I down load a model from Thingiverse does it
come with all of the necessary information to 3D Print it, or do I have to go into
the Configuration (Slic3r) and set it up to print?

Thanks,

Norm77...

Norm77 wrote:I'm curious about something. If I down load a model from Thingiverse does it
come with all of the necessary information to 3D Print it, or do I have to go into
the Configuration (Slic3r) and set it up to print?

Thanks,

Norm77...

They are usually just STL files, so you need to setup the slicer configuration etc.
It's not really practical to post GCode, too many different printer specific variables.

Makes sense.

Thanks,

Norm77...

It'd be nice if they went one step even further back and included model files that were a little more generic. sldpart or whatever it is doesn't help if you haven't got solidworks.

Is there a genericy standardy equivalent in the 3D world to DWG/DXF in the 2D world? STL is great but only defines surfaces built of triangles.

Nope, but it'd sure be nice if a new printer oriented open standard file type was adopted though.

Read up on the AMF file format.

g.

AHhhh... Nice, well..I understand the desire for backwards compatibility for STL, I just dislike triangular meshes. I would have turned giddy if it was using sparse voxel octrees to force solid objects and give high res files that can let a slicer scale the detail to it's useful size easily.

Well hurry up and write one, we'll wait!

g.

geneb wrote:Read up on the AMF file format.

g.

I was waiting for you.

No, I wasn't talking about dream land standards (not knocking AMF here, by any means - just zero support for it). I mean a standard that people/app developers actually use in the real world to bounce between different modelling packages before we go to STL. Something that lets you define an object in Solidworks, then for me to pick it up and work with it in AutoCAD before bouncing it to my squishy pals who like Blender3D before sending it to a surfer who likes Rhino who does her bit and then sends it back to you to print.

There are a few interchange formats, but support is spotty and inconsistent between packages IGES, STEP, .......

I pass 3D models around for my suppliers quite often. I ALWAYS give them STEP files. Every major CAD system I know opens those well.