I drew the 1cm cube and exported in different units as .stl. Then with meshlab converted to .dae so I can see them in Sketchup again. The one exported as meters was the correct 1cm cube. When I exported directly from Sketchup as .dae it was the same as the CM export which was 100 times larger.
Under model info is the only place in Sketchup where units are choosen?
The software opens in meters, but I change it to centimeters.
I took my model and exported in meters even though it was designed in centimeters and in Repetier software it appeared tiny. I scaled it up there by 1,000 and it appears correct after that but wonât know till I print it.
The exercise that Box suggested with the cubes is to help you determine what the import settings for your slicer are. It sounds like you are using Repetier, the most likely guess is MM. A .stl file has no units attached to it, just numbers. So if you make an object that is 8cm tall, then export using CM (or just leave the setting as model units if the model is already in CM) then you get an .STL with the number 8 attached to the height, when your slicer imports this it applies MM to the number and you get something 8mm tall. If you take the same object and set your model units to M the object is .08 m tall so the .STL exports with a .08 height (no units) and the slicer imports in MM so you get an object that is .08mm tall. If the import units of your slicer are not adjustable (they may not be, they may be locked to MM, I donât know that software) then you must make your model so that the number of units will match the proper measurement in MM. One way to achieve this is to scale the object, take your stand and scale it up by a factor of 10, it now measures 80 cm tall, export .stl as model units and you get 80 âunitsâ , import to slicer in MM and the object will measure 80mm tall, or 8 cm.
The model units and the slicer import units do not necessarily have to be the same to get a proper result. A very common workflow is to leave your SketchUp model units set to meters and model as if they were mm. I make a cube 10m tall knowing that when the units get converted via .stl and slicer it will be 10mm tall.
Well even within Sketchup (and the export extension) it seems to change units between exporting and reimporting. I donât mind scaling on the fly when 3D printing, but it seems like Sketchup should maintain the same units.
The units that SketchUp uses to import the STL are set in the Import Options dialog (options button on the Import File dialog box. They are not automatically the same as your model units.
There must be some confusion. I have not experienced SketchUp changing units or dimensions unless I asked it to. For what itâs worth, I design and 3D print all kings of things and I never scale any models. I design with SketchUp set to meters, treating each meter as a MM (the only reason to do this is to avoid making very small geometry which can be a problem) then I export to .stl with units set to in model units. Then I import into Cura which imports as MM, ready to print.
If you want to model in CM try setting the export units to MM when you export the .stl and then send to your slicer, see if itâs the right size, then you will know your slicer default unit is mm.
Have you tried other slicing apps? There is a number of free ones out there. I go between Flashprint 5 and Cura. Never a scaling issue.
Technically I reimport as .DAE but I guess thatâs the same. I thought Sketchup does keep track of units though? In the same sense that working in millimeters can create issues that working in meters does?
No program can keep track of the units in a .stl file. There is no unit data included in that format. When you make a file in these formats there is no size data at all in the file.
And why do you do that? It is clearly the unnecessary route through Meshlab that messes up what you see. If you want to check your STL files, import them back but use the same unit to import that you used to export.
I can export as .stl with the extension. It doesnât import them.
You probably think you canât import it because you have the import dialog set to look for .dae files. Change the drop down to .stl
It does.
Hi. i import stl file into sketchup and scales are way off. can someone help. i cant figure it out. have latest sketchup
Probably need to set the correct import units. Click on Options.
This is a common point of confusion about stl files. The file contains just numbers; stl has no ability to specify what units are supposed to be used to interpret those numbers.
It is up to the app that creates the file and the app that imports the file to decide what units to use. If they donât match, you get size errors in the print.
When exporting stl from SketchUp the choice is in the exporterâs options dialog. Most slicers either have fixed units such as mm (in which case SketchUp needs to match that during export) or have their own units setting when loading the stl.
This is a few years later, but I wanted to say a big thank you! This issue has been plugging me for a while now, and I finally ran across your post. Thank you for pointing this out, it was driving me nuts having to factor by 10 (mm â cm) in my slicing software before I printed. Solved, thanks to you! Cheers, friend!
