MakerBot Industries

i though i was doing that. ill try it but first ill save this. how detailed can a bot get? im working in 1/8"

Well, in sketchup an inch will work out to be 1mm on the bot — so design it with that in mind.

You can always resize it later, but it's easier if you start from there. How detailed will depend on the tuning of your bot, and what face you are doing the design on.

How do I get my SketchUp designs into .stl format? It says I need a plug-in but I can't find it anywhere.

no idea…this is my first night playing with it.

A page for the plug-in is:

http://www.guitar-list.com/download-software/convert-sketchup-skp-files-dxf-or-stl

follow the directions and you should be fine. I got a file to export but have not attempted a print job from it.

Best of luck!

vnulk,

I don't have a plugins folder in my google sketchup folder. Is there another way to add plugins through the application? I am using GoogleSketchup 7 running on Mac OSX 10.6.4.

My Sketchup install on our MacBook did not have a "Plugins" directory under /Sketchup either but I created one, copied the plugin into the new folder and it worked fine.

"Mac OSX. The sketchup plugins folder is /Library/Application Support/Google SketchUp 6/SketchUp/Plugins"

Give it a try.

vnulk,

No luck there. I created my own folder on my MacBook and I still only have the option for .skp only.

Look for the .stl option once you click on the "tools" on the top task bar. It's not an option under "export"

Yup, its all there. Thanks alot for the help!

Good to hear. Let us know how you make out - I'm certain there are others who would like to do the same.

The plugin works as described. However, there is a scaling issue. No matter what I seems to make my dimension in (mm, cm, in, etc.) it doesn't translate properly. It might because I am creating such small object, 3-6mm wide. But in the new ReplicatorG we have a scaling feature so that straightens that issue. You just might have to do some guess work if your object needs to be precise. If anyone does not have that issue, with the scaling, please let me know. I will keep everyone posted if any other problems arise or is fixed.

Thanks again, vnulk.

Good to hear from you AT. Glad to see you're making progress. Accurate scaling seems to be a typical problem from what I understand and if you want to design an object that needs some accuracy, you either have to fiddle with scaling, as you have done, or use a more advance CAD software such as ACAD, Solidworks, or Alibre, none of which are free. Kudos to the guys for creating the scaling routines into ReplicatorG!

I think I mentioned the scaling issue above - 1" in Sketchup = 1mm in STL.

Passim,

Thanks for the reminder and clarification.