The 3D world is new for you, or
you have to work with 3D to reduce costs and increase your business profits, or
do you simply love it? But when you have designed and sent your file to some
company to print it, Have they told you that your file had some errors? It is
perfectly normal.
This article is going to help you
in your 3D design. Say goodbye to those sentences: “Sorry, you have to fix it”,
or “it´s not possible to print it”, or “your file has errors”.
Rapidsol will help you to improve
your knowledge about 3D design, and the most important thing is we will learn
together by making mistakes, in order to improve our services, we can also make
mistakes inevitably.
The mistakes can make us stronger, but
let's be better following some rules
1st rule: Follow the rules
To design well, it is necessary to follow the rules,
because each technology or machine has specific rules. Here we will explain you
the general rules, then you can understand better some important specifications
which never could be forgotten when you are designing.
2nd rule: All the faces have to be closed
All the faces have to be closed, because if your file
has any open faces when the machine is printing, the layers can´t be recognized
if they are inside or outside of the object. So, what can happen, are you
wondering? Just your sample will not have any form.
Your file might be solid, widely called “watertight” or
“manifold” which simply means the model is a complete enclosure. There is
another way to define solid: every edge in your model must be bordered by
exactly two faces. If you have more than two faces in your model, the extra
faces need to be deleted.
The most common errors are:
- Internal faces;
- Stray edges;
- Holes;
Solutions:
- Delete all internal faces or stray edges;
- Trace an edge to fill the holes;
3rd rule: Your parts have to keep minimum wall thickness
In 3D print industry we usually call this rule as the
fundamental key to make a 3D part or prototype. In one hand, your walls need to
be strong enough to work in real life, but in another hand, they need to be
minimized to reduce material costs.
Confused? We understand. At the beginning, this
concept can seem complicated so look at the images:
Imagine if your sample does not
have a minimum wall thickness of material, it will die before you see it.
Without a minimum wall thickness, your sample will be so weak that it will be
broken in your hands in a few seconds, and sometimes inside the machine. For
example, in our case, our materials and technologies may require minimum wall
thickness of 1mm.
4th
rule: Pay attention to the
scales
Sometimes you are using an
American design program, and their scales are different from European scales as
you know. But, a lot of people do not pay attention for that. So when we print
and send the part to your office or factory, you will notice that your part
does not have the size you wanted. In fact, sometimes it is necessary to cut
and divide the parts for printing just because you did not pay attention to the
format of the scales.
5th rule. The more material your model has, the more it costs
In 3D print industry we calculate the budget based on
the amount of material per cm³. To reduce costs, you can minimize your wall
thickness, and then you will reduce volume of your model. You can also create a
pattern of hole in the part, it can be another way to reduce material and your
quote.
6th rule: Know more about the print materials specifications and limitations
It is always better if you are informed about the
technologies and materials that you want to print. Don't forget what we have
written at the beginning of the article: each technology or machine has
specific rules. So, if know very well each one of them is better for you.
Last rule: Be careful when you exporting your
STL file
This is our last advice for you. First of all, pay
attention when you are exporting your file, because there are different levels
of quality. The higher quality your file has, the better appearance it will
have.
Export your STL with different parts, we will explain
why. Imagine if your part has more than one piece, but you have merged
everything at the same file. When you send it to us we are going to print your
STL as just one piece, so if your prototype is functional, it will not be as
you idealized.
Don´t forget another thing: export the file in binary
code and we would prefer it in millimeters.
Rapidsol wishes you a good job!
