Hello, there have been a couple of times when I get a non-solid without having any clue how to fix it.
Somehow I always manage to find a solution, but not now.
This is my model. There are three groups and one of them is not solid… I have to merge the three to make my peacock :-/
peacock2.zip (1.0 MB)
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There are a couple of problems I saw. I can’t explain why solid inspector didn’t flag them.
There are some internal edges here, visible in x-ray:
and there are reversed faces here:
Well, your file doesn’t look exactly like your screen shot but I see some internal faces that would prevent it from being solid.
There are also some reversed faces that out to be corrected.
Steve beat me to it.
When you add extra bits like the beak also ensure there are no internal partition faces, which will mess up its solidity again…
Use a temporary section cut to access the inside and make deletions etc…
Wow, that was fast ! Thank you both 
I restricted my file to the group with a problem, because otherwise the file was too big to post.
Hey, I have a new trouble on another model 
Once again, Solid Inspector did not find any trouble. Could you help me? (is there any other plugin than Solid Inspector to check the Solid status?)
TEST.zip (2.4 MB)
Solid Inspector is not perfect and in fact one can print with internal geo irrespective as it states. However; you model has many problem areas plus the fact it is too large for i. Materialize to print with out $$$$. Two suggestions:
- Scale up say by about 100, use Fredo’s edge inspector in his tool set, and fix all the problems it has. You may have to play with some the options,scale back down, up load to 3 d ware house, install the extension to support 3 d printing from extension ware house and check what it returns. .
- convert to stl, use netfabb to fix problems, back to su and scale to fix size for upload to i.Materiailze to check printability. You will have to open in SU using the stl file you fixed fist this second time to submit to ware house so it will upload to ware house from within SU. I do not like this step since this conversion can generate problems of its own but worth a try.
I. Materialize will accept model after some correction / scaling but print cost is too high
If you are printing yourself check your slicer and see what it reports.
Of course this is not the right scale I am not trying to print a giant sculpture.
Thanks for the tip, though it did not work to solve my pb :-/
I’m kind of desperate to have SU work properly
I said nothing about printing giant a structure. Printers have a limit on print size. and i.materialize flagged as to big to fit printer . You need to under stand what requiremnts the printer imposes on you; What material you want to use; what model size limits the printer requires etc. Printing is more than having a SU model and there is more than enough info on the web for you to read
The model you have posted and asked for help is littered with problems like short edges, quasi over lapping edges etc=> It is a bad one. You need to learn what a good one is…
SU is working ok IMHO but the modeler has some problems. Even if solid inspector reported as solid does not mean model is printable for reasons cited above. I followed the basic steps I outlined above then submitted it to shapeways and i.materialize and each accepted as ok even though solid inspector still shows as non solid. Your model needs to be cleaned up and hopefully you can get the print cost down…
Maybe these will help you ;
http://www.shapeways.com/tutorials/how_to_use_meshlab_and_netfabb . There is link in this for uploading to their cloud service free file checking app, MS based so you may have to create account with MS.
It is good idea to not use a stl file to reverse engineer model for SU. I think the links I sited do not require you upload to i.materialize or shpeways as SU vs in SU it has to be uploaded from within SU which means stl back to skp which I question that step.
Hi AgentPLE, hi folks.
I hid a couple of surfaces and found a very small edge inside your model, as well as some edges that don’t show properly, indicating superposed edges. See attached file.
I suggest that you redo the modelling trying to do the clean-up completely.
Also, I see that your model seems to be symmetrical. I suggest that once done, you cut it in half and do the clean-up on one half. Then you can mirror a copy and join these together and finally, smooth the junction line.
Just ideas.
Jean.
TEST.skp.zip (2.1 MB)