Screw thread giving bad stl files
 

Hi , I'm having a problem with a screw thread that looks fine on CoCreate but the stl file is full of problems and can't be used . The main problem seems to come because the thread has been cut into laterally and the cut edges have corrupt facets. Any ways round this?

stl files of screw
 

I hope it's Ok to post here as well as PE forum - I'm having problems making usable .stl files of a cylinder that has a screw thread added and has then had chunk cut out of it .The model looks fine in CoCreate but the .stl file shows lots of corrupt edges , especially but not only where the thread has been cut. Is this avoidable ?

Re: Screw thread giving bad stl files
 

Without sample data, it's hard to answer your question.

Re: stl files of screw
 

One thing that I have found with stl files is that you need to refine the facets on the faces before you export. I have done b spline surfaces in the past that look terrible in stl until they have been refined. I've done the refinement in steps of factor of 4 and then redo the export and evaluate. the more you refine the larger the stl gets so you may not want or need to refine to the max allowed. try that and see if that helps.

Re: Screw thread giving bad stl files
 

STL data is not created from the actual 3D Model data. It comes from the faceted data. What you see on the screen is what is exported to the STL file.

That is why STL is the only export format available in CoCreate Modeling Personal Edition.

For a better STL file, you will need to refine the facets of your part before exporting to STL.

Re: Screw thread giving bad stl files
 

I merged the thread "stl files of screw" into this thread so we don't have two parallel discussions of the same topic with people answering in both. The other thread should now redirect to this one.

Re: Screw thread giving bad stl files
 

SHOCKING :eek:

If I have a poor resolution video card, my STL file will be junk compared to the 3D Model data. Screen displays are not at all acurate.

Re: Screw thread giving bad stl files
 

Nope. We're not talking about the displayed pixels, but about the graphics model internally calculated by CoCreate Modeling, which is the same for any type of graphics hardware.