Clock STL

There's a zip file here: [www.instructables.com] that contains an STL of a clock mechanism. Here's what happened when I tried to use it:

- Opened file in RepRap app. Very small.
- Used the inch-to-mm scaler. RepRap app locked up. Killed app.
- Opened file in AOI. Scaled up to about 100mm long. Exported to STL.
- Opened new file in RepRap.
- Started build simulation.

This is where the fun started. My PC became completely unresponsive. Not even Ctrl-Alt-Del worked. Eventually, the PC switched to VGA mode and told me my video driver had locked up. I ended up having to power off and restart.

Now, this was on Windows XP. I'd be interested in seeing what happens with a more robust OS (i.e. anything else with the possible exception of Vista).

Hi Steve,

... i tried it too ...

The original file '3dp_clock2.stl' says it's a "Rhinoceros Binary STL ( Sep 10 2001 ) ... "

So i tried wit AOI, but got the error 'Not in GZIP-format'

Then i imported in soliddimensions SDview and re-exported as STL, so i got an ASCII-STL, but host and AOI won't read it anyway (other STL-importers do)

***
By the way i found another error in the host, what make messed up inputs with some files:
- some exporters write small values in scientific notation as '1.7E-5' instead of '0,000017'.

The host-software seems to mess up with this sort of coordinates (maybe Adrian can fix this?), but when importing in AOI i only got some warnings and when re-exported, the host was able to read it properly ...

So i try to 'clean up' the STL-files with open and reexporting in AOI too when they didn't work right.

For test i've attached an ASCII-STL of a mug in 'scientific notation' outputted by Lightwave and the running version 'corrected' with AOI ...

Viktor

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/11/2008 06:01PM by Viktor Dirks.

... update ...

I tried with reprap-host-0.8.3 and the "3dp_clock2.stl":

The original file in 'Rhinozeros Binary'-format is 3,3MB in size and didn't crash the host-software, but it slows radically down, so it needs half'n hour or more to import and render the clock! (i stopped after 10 minutes, when 3 parts were rendered)

The converted ASCII-STL-output from SDview is 10MB in size and wouldn't be processed - maybe size-limited in import?

The converted binary-STL-output from SDview is 3,3MB again and the host-0.8.3 reads and renders in two seconds!, but fails when building after some slices ...

AOI won't read any of the files "... not in GZIP ..."

Lightwave imports all three of the files (Rhino-binary, ASCII, SDview-binary) without noticeable difference and calculate 20 seconds before rendering ...

Viktor

Viktor,

I used to get the same error from AOI and someone said it was because I didn't have the right plug-ins for AOI or something. Never did figure it out. Just a lead for you.

Demented

im working on rewriting the rendering in JoGL which should at least boost rendering performance, the related topic is "Why Java3D"