I use Caligari trueSpace 6.6 for the things I design. It can import STL but it does have an issue with it and some other formats. It scales them so that the largest dimension in X, Y, or Z is 8 units long, in the currently selected unit scale, thus a large object will import able to fit within an 8mm cube.
To fix that I load the STL in the slicer to get the XYZ dimensions. Then in trueSpace I use the object panel to type in the numbers from the slicer and the STL is now proper size. I then save it in trueSpace COB format for further work on it. When ready to print, it gets saved in STL. A "feature" of STL is it only uses one measurement unit, millimeters. So in trueSpace I can model in millimeters, centimeters, or meters and as far as STL is concerned all three are millimeters. Ie a cube 20.453 mm^3 prints the same size as a cube modeled at 20.453 M^3 Thus if I'm designing something tiny I can model it in single digit meters so I don't have to zoom way in. If I'm making a larger object I can work in centimeters or millimeters so I don't have to zoom way out. trueSpace can of course work in Imperial/US units but then one must think of the conversion factor because when exporting to STL it ends up an inch (or other unit) = a millimeter. Some time ago, Microsoft bought Caligari and released the then current version of trueSpace 7.6 as freeware. Their intent was to challenge Google Earth with Bing Maps and Microsoft Virtual Earth, and that people would use the free trueSpace software to populate them with 3D buildings and other things. Apparently the public at large wasn't much interested and Microsoft soon cast TrueSpace adrift. It can still be downloaded in a couple of versions. One has both the new 7.6 environment and the old 6.6 environment in one package and it able to switch between them. The 6.6 system in 7.6 is pretty much 100% the same as standalone 6.6 so anyone familiar with prior versions will feel right at home. The later release shed the 6.6 system, much like PlayStation 3 dropped support for Playstation 2 games. The 7.6 environment is a lot different, more advanced in many ways and apparently better for animation, which is what Caligari was intending the software for since its origins on Amiga. There's an active trueSpace forum here, with lots of useful information. https://www.united3dartists.com/forum/ Would be nice if Microsoft would release what trueSpace source code they can as open source. Obviously they can't release parts like the Lightworks rendering engine. At the time Caligari made the deal to include Lightworks with trueSpace, Lightworks as an addition for other 3D software cost quite a bit more than the whole cost of trueSpace plus some extras. On Saturday, May 30, 2020, 3:28:59 PM MDT, Chris Albertson <albertson.ch...@gmail.com> wrote: On Sat, May 30, 2020 at 2:02 PM Thaddeus Waldner <thadw...@gmail.com> wrote: > OpenSCAD will not even open an STL. So it loses in this competition. > It does not matter if OpenSCAD can open an STL. Do NOT download STL models from the suppliers. They are nearly useless. Get the STEP files or whatever other format you CAN import. You are going to have to modify any gear model unless you are very lucky and you really can not modify an STL. Then after moding the gear save it as STL. You slicer can only use STL. I posted a picture of what is on my printer right now. Usually, you almost never want a standard part. Usually, gears are used to drive some other parts and make them move. If you have a printer you can make the grear and the driven part at the same time and it is much better then using fasteners like setscrews. A simple example is below. It is just a pulley with some places where bearing can be pressed in and some threaded M5 holes to hold another part. (This will take 6 hours on my printer.) Let's say you are making that BS1 drive. I bet something like this is needed. There would need to be bearing and a pulley so you'd want the pulley to have recesses for the thrust bearing and mayybe a way to attach the handwheel so you could stil use the BS1 manually. Then you think "Why attach a hand wheel when I can print it already attached? The part below is used to rotate a ball nut and transfer the load to a deep groove sealed bearing. [image: pulleyUpperFlange.jpg] _______________________________________________ Emc-users mailing list Emc-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/emc-users
