ALTERING STL FORMATTED PARTS

[toycept]

I often receive STL files to build parts on a 3-D printer. Many of the parts are bottles or some type of closed vessel. It would be good if I could split the parts in half and build the bottles as halves, so I don't have to go and fish out the support material from inside of the built part. (of course this would be easy if I had the native part file, but that doesn't often happen...I just receive the STL file).

I open the STL files in SW but have not figured out a way to split them in half....or remove half of the part. Can this be done.... ??

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks
John

 

[rfus]

You typically don't want to bring large stl's into solidworks. It brings it to its knees, its not a polygon modeler. The files take a long time to load, all the polys are treated as nurbs patches, and the program is very slow. If you were to do it you would need the body to import as a closed solid. Scanto3d module has given SW increased poly functionality but you must have premium.

To answer you question, Using a plane with the split feature, or extrude cuts and configs would be the way to do this with a solid. If you have a surface or surfaces I would use the trim function with configs.

On the fairly cheap end: Rhino3d (full functional demo)and Okino-Polytrans are good polygon modelers that will split your bottles with a plane, and can do a hole fill on the open boundries.

I use Delcam Trifix module in CopyCad for this. There are plenty of more advanced poly modelers out there.

RFUS

 

[rfus]

To follow up, I just saw your other post where you are importing your stls as graphics. A graphics body is just that, graphics. You cant do anything with it other than use it as an eye ref to create new sketches.

Do some hunting on polygon modeling and editing tools. There is a lot out there.

 

[Theophilus]

Just saw this for conversion stuff--not sure how useful it really is:

http://www.turbosquid.com/FullPreview/Index.cfm/ID/304675

Good luck. Please post back if you find a good solution. This is something I would be willing to pay for (software) if it's reliable.



Jeff Mowry

http://www.industrialdesignhaus.com

Reason trumps all. And awe trumps reason.