First time user, trouble understanding how to push shapes all of the way through

I just realized a problem. The parts I raised in the middle are grey, which I read means they are supposed to be the back and white is suppose to be the front. How did I mess that up? I also read that this can create problems when trying to use the file. Dang.

I think I found a way to fix it so that it stay/goes white possibly. Went back to an old file and I’ll try it.


Yep there’s a problem. First thing to do is get rid of the 3D Printer volume. It’s blocking your view of the rest of the model and you end up drawing the model in a way that makes it not work. The blue faces are back faces and as you can see, from below, there’s no thickness in the areas between the holes.

Is the outside face supposed to be flat?

We’ll see what you get. I’m about to leave for work so I don’t have a lot of time but does this sort of thing look right?

Or this?

Man! The first of the two you posted looks more correct. I don’t want to fins to get soooo thin that they are too brittle to be functional. I’ll have to see if I can figure out how to get a view of the underneath side still. When I flip it over, I always just get a plane that I can’t manipulate or view at all…

Thanks again.

It’s all the same thickness but flat is easier.

Maybe we can figure out a time for a little live demo. I expect if you see how I drew the thing, you’ll get the hang of it right away and see how easy it really is to avoid the problems you’re having.

How do you get a view of the bottom that you can do something with? When I flip it over it’s like I’m looking at it setting on a piece of glass. It’s there, but I can’t do anything to it and I don’t see through it like I do from the top view.

Delete the 3D printer volume component.

Sorry for my inabilities. I’m not sure how to do that and when I googled it, there were some instructions to click on places that I don’t have. Perhaps they are only in pro? I was able to do some tedious work and get this version. Not sure if it’s hitting the same problems still.air vent attempt #2.13.skp (1.2 MB)

In the Camera menu, find Zoom Extents and click on it. The with the Select tool, click on the 3D printer component–that big box thing. Hit the Delete key on your keyboard.

File currently says it is locked because another user is working with it (?) but I will give that a shot later. Thank you again.

Do you have it open twice?

Saved a new file that will open (the last one still says it’s read only now?). Camera menu zooms in on my piece but I don’t see a 3D printer component to delete. Maybe what I have is okay now anyway? I can see blue sky through the bottom now after some changes I made.

air vent attempt #2.14.skp (1.2 MB)

I’ll look when I get home from work.

You are getting closer!!

Two things to look at are reversed faces (all faces should be white in your mode - right click the gray faces and choose Reverse Face) and interior geometry (you have extra faces inside of what should be just a “shell”).

I would highly recommend downloading, installing, and running Solid Inspector. It can actually repair the issues with this model automatically.

1 Like

I haven’t heard of that but will find it and download it and use it. Point of clarification, if I flip the piece over (so it seems upside down to me) should everything still be white or should I sort of have a grey side and a white side? Thanks for jumping in TheOnlyAaron.

It should all be white like my images show.

1 Like

Okay. I just noticed in the picture the part that says ‘fix all’ and that sounds amazing. :blush:

It is amazing but don’t let the extension be a substitute for learning how to make clean models from the beginning. In all of my versions drawing your model, they were made solid and printable with nothing but native tools.

1 Like