I have been printing for a while and I had some “This needs repair” imports. i would hit yes.
I hit yes on my latest print. Set up and printed the entire object. Only after it was all done did i realize 2 entire elements (the hinges on a door) were entirely missing.
If I load the .form file up the hinges are missing.
If i look at the original OBJ export the hinges are there
If i import the OBJ with no repair the hinges are there
here is the kicker. If I import the obj with repair the hinges are there!
If I open the .form file. The hinges are not there.
So something happened… on the first time through something along the way decided to delete the objects entirely. I dont think I did it myself. I recall doing my basic import, scale, rotate, supports, print.
Curious about this and I will definitely be watching much closer now!
Upon closer inspection it stripped absolutely everything off the entire print but the base object and a small handle. I have no idea how this would happen. It would have to be inside PreForm. It deleted 2 window weather stripping objects. A cylinder on the door and 2 hinges all gone. All that was left was the base door object and a handle i had sitting next to it.
I do not remember this when I printed but may be I just sent it over really quick and didn’t look.
The only thing that occurred to me last night is may be I imported the OBJ in to Preform before it was finished exporting from 3dsMax. Basically while it was exporting. It is a light object so may be the program hung and I didn’t realize it? That would be possible. I should have thought of that, as I’ve seen it happen importing OBJ in to other programs like Zbrush.
That would be a really tight window with how small the little parts are that are missing. They were not high poly at all. But right now that is all I can think of. 3dsMax hung and then eventually completed after I imported in to PreForm.
I use SKetchUp Pro for all my 3D design work. I use both the internal check and also an add-on Cleanup3 to make sure the file is correct with no errors. I only export to STL files as I found they print better than OBJ files.
On a few occasions I get a “repair” notice from Preform. I accept that and then check the image over from all angles to see what Preform might have changed. In some cases I accept that and in others I reopen the file and turn down the repair. I haven’t had any issues doing things this way.
Thanks! I will look in to going right to STL. I might also do better to Boolean or Dynamesh in Zbrush. I’ve done some that way (plus cleaning up in Max) and that has done well with no warnings. The ones that I’m getting warnings on are usually non-contiguous meshes (clipping parts and pieces) for non-hollow printing. All the ones i’ve used MeshMixer to hollow I think I’ve done a ZBrush Boolean or Dynamesh+Decimation on them.
Printing with out those passes is awesome though. Feels like an exotic luxury to have a properly editable piece -> printer workflow. But also I’ve been worried what issues could arise there as my 3d modeling is very video-game High Poly style and so subject to certain abuse(?).