Hi guys,

I came across Microsoft's "3D Builder" tonight thanks to Angus from Maker's Muse. I downloaded it from FileHorse.com because any time that I can avoid the Microsoft store a good thing.

BTW, I had never heard about FileHorse, what a pleasant surprise!

So how did it do? If you have a pesky .STL file that MeshMixer simply will not "fix" (as in make watertight with no concern whatsoever about cosmetics), it seems to do the job. The caveat is that with a defective .STL file there is a lot that can get messed up. Fixing the Pico Gamer cover created some oddities since the program doesn't know what it should look like. But it was printable. Fixing the Thorn gun gave me a technically correct .STL file that no one in their right mind would want to print. YMMV.

Is it going to replace MeshMixer? Probably not, but it will give you something that you can import into OpenSCAD.

I've always used the free version of NetFab.   It is a very good .STL viewer.
But it also does a very good job of fixing flawed .STL files.   And if you
choose to control the fixing process, you have a fair amount of control.

It is worth checking out.

https://github.com/3DprintFIT/netfabb-basic-download

I tried out the last opensource version, and it looks interesting. And it was a bit of a surprise to find that the source code is available as well :)

Ignore that, the source zip files are empty. So much for that...


Finding a tutorial or a video that features the old version is a challenge...

Autodesk seems to be winning. :(

Thanks for the tip!
Edited 2024-05-01 13:53 by SimpleSafeName