Which repository for STLs

There have been many problems with Thingiverse recently from being very slow to failing to upload objects. I know there are plenty of alternatives (https://all3dp.com/1/free-stl-files-3d-printer-models-3d-print-files-stl-download/ is one list), and I was wondering which stand out as the best. I'm thinking of downloading all my past projects and putting them somewhere else, and then using it for new projects in future. Right now I'm leaning towards either YouMagine (owned by Cura) or GradCAD (owned by Stratasys). The new Prusa repository is also a possibility, but I think it needs a while to mature. Any opinions welcome.

Maker's Muse had a brilliant video on this subject a month or two ago:
[www.youtube.com]

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http://www.marinusdebeer.nl/

I don't know how much experience you have at 3D printing, but after you've printed a bunch of stuff, you develop an understanding for what works and what doesn't, what's printable and what isn't. Then you look at designs on Thingiverse and Youmagine and start to realize how many unprintable designs are there. It's not too hard to spot the junk "designs". The first clue is that there are no photos of the printed part(s). The second clue is that the "designer" has 400 designs posted and 30 or 40 are all minor variations on a single "design" (and none of them printed). That is someone who is more concerned about quantity than quality. He wants the geek-cred of claiming that he has 400 designs posted on Thingiverse.

I occasionally search the on-line repositories when I need to print something for a specific purpose, but rarely find anything acceptable, so most of the time I end up designing my own widgets. I've taken to simply making a blog post and linking the Fusion360 CAD files for my designs. Almost no one follows my blog, and most of my designs are specific to what I'm working on, so almost no one sees or has much use for my stuff, but I'm OK with that. Quality is more important than quantity, and I'd rather not bury my designs under the tons of crap that is posted to the repositories.

The early description of the Prusa repository I saw indicated that it would be curated, meaning that someone is going to be filtering out the garbage before it gets posted. That may make it the repository site to use.

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Ultra MegaMax Dominator 3D printer: [drmrehorst.blogspot.com]

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the_digital_dentist
I don't know how much experience you have at 3D printing, but after you've printed a bunch of stuff, you develop an understanding for what works and what doesn't, what's printable and what isn't. Then you look at designs on Thingiverse and Youmagine and start to realize how many unprintable designs are there. It's not too hard to spot the junk "designs". The first clue is that there are no photos of the printed part(s). The second clue is that the "designer" has 400 designs posted and 30 or 40 are all minor variations on a single "design" (and none of them printed). That is someone who is more concerned about quantity than quality. He wants the geek-cred of claiming that he has 400 designs posted on Thingiverse.

I occasionally search the on-line repositories when I need to print something for a specific purpose, but rarely find anything acceptable, so most of the time I end up designing my own widgets. I've taken to simply making a blog post and linking the Fusion360 CAD files for my designs. Almost no one follows my blog, and most of my designs are specific to what I'm working on, so almost no one sees or has much use for my stuff, but I'm OK with that. Quality is more important than quantity, and I'd rather not bury my designs under the tons of crap that is posted to the repositories.

The early description of the Prusa repository I saw indicated that it would be curated, meaning that someone is going to be filtering out the garbage before it gets posted. That may make it the repository site to use.

Totally agree !

There are junks that get printed though. This for ex., it get reinvented twice a week and is still very popular :
[www.thingiverse.com]

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"A comical prototype doesn't mean a dumb idea is possible" (Thunderf00t)

@Ohmarinus - thanks for the link to the video, that was very useful!
@the_digital_dentist - I've been printing for about 4 years and most of what I print is my own designs or modifications I've made to other people's design. I find Thingiverse useful for three things: complex models by other people which are beyond my own design abilities (example: [www.thingiverse.com]); browsing existing designs when I am thinking through different design alternatives, typically for just one component of a design; and giving back to the community by uploading. A large site such as Thingiverse works better for both of the first two of these, through serendipitous discovery of interesting projects for the first, and through easy side-by-side comparison for the second.

I mentioned that GrabCAD is owned by Stratasys and Thingiverse is indirectly as well, as Stratasys owns Makerbot. So it makes me wonder if they've decided to let it wither in favor of GrabCAD which represents more of their core business.

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See my blog at [moosteria.blogspot.com].

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animoose
I mentioned that GrabCAD is owned by Stratasys and Thingiverse is indirectly as well, as Stratasys owns Makerbot. So it makes me wonder if they've decided to let it wither in favor of GrabCAD which represents more of their core business.

I'm not sure about this but agree that Thingiverse is hopelessly outdated. Sadly... A lot of the times the search function doesn't actually works but it still shows results making you think that the thing you're looking for simply isn't on there. But sometimes I run a search twice and the second time I get all the results I was looking for!!

GrabCAD had an amazing library of stuff, I prefer GrabCAD for when I want to design my own cases but don't want to measure up all my vitamins with calipers. So I download a model of the SG90MG servo and import the STEP into Rhino and can design my machine around the existing parts. Everything is there, the LCD2004, servos, stepper motors, Ramps 1.4 board, etc etc. Something that is missing on Thingiverse for sure.

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http://www.marinusdebeer.nl/

Totally agree with the_digital_dentist. If Thingiverse had an option for filtering out blue Things, it would be 100% better.

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Ohmarinus
GrabCAD had an amazing library of stuff, I prefer GrabCAD for when I want to design my own cases but don't want to measure up all my vitamins with calipers. So I download a model of the SG90MG servo and import the STEP into Rhino and can design my machine around the existing parts. Everything is there, the LCD2004, servos, stepper motors, Ramps 1.4 board, etc etc. Something that is missing on Thingiverse for sure.

Thingiverse has some too, but too often the model was created in 5 minutes by someone who didn't own a ruler, let alone a caliper. For stuff like this, a Google for e.g. "SG90MG 3d model" will often find a model, sometimes produced by the manufacturer.

I use OnShape for doing CAD, and they have a facility for searching other peoples' public models... e.g. the MKCad library of motors, sprockets, etc. You can use OnShape for free, but then your work has to be publicly shareable; a very fair trade IMHO. I've found some surprisingly good stuff that way, and then it's usually not an STL, so you it's easy to remix it if you need to.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/05/2019 04:32AM by frankvdh.

This is a great discussion folks. I did not know about a few of those repos that have been mentioned!

I too have noted that Thingiverse has a LOT of unprintable items or stuff that was started, but left unfinished.
However, it also has many good designs there that I have branched designs off of. I had to search for quite a while to _find_ these gems. Lots of the eNable designs are published on Thingiverse and these are usually _very_ sophisticated, so I will not paint Thingiverse as useless. There is just a lot of dross put there by enthusiastic amateurs.

IMO,
DLC

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