Very, very new to SCAD. I do a lot of wood CNC router work. Will take an STL model and carve it on a CNC machine. There are times that I need to modify the model (make it thinner, thicker, cut parts out, etc). For that I use TinkerCAD. But there is a limitation of 25 mb file size to read into it. Is there a way to use SCAD for modifying an existing STL? I am experienced only with high-end javaScript. Never did Python.

On 12/24/2021 10:40 AM, Joe Weinpert wrote: > Is there a way to use SCAD for modifying an existing STL? Yes, with caveats. First, the STL has to be well-formed, and OpenSCAD is pickier than many tools about what that means. Second, yes, you can import an STL, and then you have the equivalent of a polyhedron.  You can operate on it like you could operate on any polyhedron - you can scale, translate, rotate, skew, do unions, intersections, differences, hulls, et cetera. But you cannot, for instance grab that one vertex and move it, or move one portion while leaving the rest alone.  (Of course, you can import it multiple times and do different operations on each copy.)

A non-well-formed STL can often be fixed in Meshmixer. Meshmixer's user interface is a bit tough to learn. Meshmixer tutorial <https://all3dp.com/2/meshmixer-tutorial-easy-steps-beginners/> & manual <https://help.autodesk.com/view/MSHMXR/2019/ENU/> On Fri, Dec 24, 2021 at 10:57 AM Jordan Brown <openscad@jordan.maileater.net> wrote: > On 12/24/2021 10:40 AM, Joe Weinpert wrote: > > Is there a way to use SCAD for modifying an existing STL? > > > Yes, with caveats. > > First, the STL has to be well-formed, and OpenSCAD is pickier than many > tools about what that means. > > Second, yes, you can import an STL, and then you have the equivalent of a > polyhedron. You can operate on it like you could operate on any polyhedron > - you can scale, translate, rotate, skew, do unions, intersections, > differences, hulls, et cetera. > > But you cannot, for instance grab that one vertex and move it, or move one > portion while leaving the rest alone. (Of course, you can import it > multiple times and do different operations on each copy.) > _______________________________________________ > OpenSCAD mailing list > To unsubscribe send an email to discuss-leave@lists.openscad.org >