Using groups, this was MUCH easier to create, because I could make a piece, then turn it into a group, and start the next piece using the first as a template, but still keeping all pieces separate. So I select all, and then right click and explode. You may want to check out more software, such as eDrawings for SketchUp, 4D VB Light for SketchUp or Shaderlight For SketchUp, which might be similar to SketchUp STL addin. STL files will be imported to SketchUp as a group. It is made up of several different groups, and can not be edited in this format. With this plugin, you’ll find STL as a supported format within SketchUp’s Import command. This model was downloaded from Thingiverse (drew's) as an. To scale the model, I first make it a group, then click on the scale tool, and then click on one of the corners. As you get used to using groups, you'll see why this is useful.
If you choose "edit group" you can do exactly that, edit the stuff inside the group while still keeping it as a group. I selected it and clicked explode, now this model is no longer a group, and can be edited freely. I'll take a couple pics of what I mean and show you. Or if you don't want to explode it, and keep it a solid object, right click on it and choose "edit group" (or just double click on it) and you can now modify the model within that group, simply click on an open area of the window to close the group.
if you click on the solid object so it is selected, then right click on it and choose "explode" you will find that you can now modify the object. When exporting, it uses whatever scale you have selected in Sketchup, so no need to scale up or down inside the UP program if you use MM in scketchup (which you should be, ).Īs far as importing as polygons rather than a solid object, I think your problem is grouping. When importing, it will import on the inches scale, so if the model was built on the MM scale it is too large, but just follow the steps I mentioned earlier and your good to go. I honestly have never had a problem importing or exporting STLs using the Openscad plugin. Free Version for personal use and small applications Smooth/Unsmooth: Toggle smoothing on a model's rounded geometry Layerize tool: Easily move all geometry within components and groups to a layer 3D Print Visualization Style: A visual style that highlights problem areas in a model Resurfacer: Shrink wrap a model into one continuous, solid mesh The plugin also provides several tools to ease the process of preparing a model for 3D printing: This new STL file is a single, solid object, ready to 3D print. The CADspan engine uses your geometry to perform a virtual 'shrink-wrap' and outputs an entirely new STL file that describes the exterior of your CAD file. Rather than assume that the input data has been created with a solid modeling program and the file might need repair, repositioning, slicing or scaling, CADspan simply takes the approach that what you see on your screen looks like a model that should be printable. There is a "Tool > Export to DXF or STL" plugin that will export a subset of a model, but I forget where I got that one.The power of CADspan is the geometry resurfacer - a new approach to file preparation for 3D printing. One more caveat: this tool only allows you to export an entire model at once. This is probably the best tool to use to quickly validate STL parts generated by other cad software. Once I realized that you need to set your import options, it worked perfectly with both a model created in SU, and a much more elaborate part created with AutoDesk Inventor.
That's not the fault of the plugin, it's just the way STL files are. One caveat: STL files have no unit or scale information in them, so you need to pay attention to your export units and your import options. There's no documentation other than the README file, but usage is trivial: import via "File > Import." and export via "Tools > Export to STL". I'm sure you can do something similar under Windows. However, I found that by simply copying "/Library/Application Support/Google SketchUp 7/SketchUp/plugins/stl4su.rb" to "/Library/Application Support/Google SketchUp 8/SketchUp/plugins/" it worked just fine with SU 8.
Executive summary: A+ would download again.Īs distributed (at least for Mac), only supports SU 7. See what people are saying on SketchUp Plugins for 3D Printing.