I’ve used Sketchup for years to create designs for laser cutting. In the past I’ve used a plugin that worked wonders. But that plugin doesn’t work on the latest downloadable version of Sketchup. The most current version that it does work on won’t run on my laptop. I have an ancient laptop that I would load the file on to and export my SVGs. But now I can’t find the power cord for it.
So I found a new plugin on Github called FaceSVG that claims to work. But when I export it appears to be exporting text files. So then I found a video on YT with a method for the web based Sketchup. You export an STL which you import in to Tinkercad. Then you can export the shape in to an SVG. I thought I had it solved. But only one shape from my design exported.
Is there something I’m missing? Or is there a free 3d design program that I can open my Sketchup file in? One that will allow me to export my faces to SVG?
In the past with the old plugin I would export the SVG and then import it in to Inkscape. Then I would modify the line weight to work with the laser cutting service I use. But the SVGs that this new plugin are creating, Inkscape can’t open correctly. The new plugin takes care of the line weight for me. But the folks at the laser cutting service I use said the file format wasn’t correct.
That’s tricky… SVG is an open standard (Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) 2) so if the plugin doesnt conform to that it is not a lot of use.
which is why I suggest opening in a web browser; it’s a w3c standard, browsers support it pretty well.
Can you export as a PDF from sketchup? PDF is also a vector format, and Inkscape usually imports it well.
If Sketchup is locking you in by not allowing exports to common formats, my personal suggestion is to bite the bullet and move away from it. At least for new designs.
Inkscape itself is a very nice tool to use for simple designs. Or doing simple changes (text, etc) to existing svg’s.
OpenSCAD and FreeCAD generate good SVG outputs and can handle dimensioned and parametric designs.
So I’m having three different materials laser cut. Cold rolled carbon sheet steel, MDF, & acrylic. All for the same design. The acrylic is being cut so that it will fit tightly inside the holes of the MDF. The metal will then be attached to the outer surface of the MDF in some fashion I haven’t determined yet. Possibly glue.
Both the metal parts and MDF parts have outer laser cut lines that bound the whole thing. So in Tinkercad they are treated as one whole shape. Apparently even if you tell Tinkercad to export everything in the model to SVG it will only do one shape. Obviously for the acrylic I don’t want the sheet like I do for the MDF and metal. I want the parts that fall out after the cutting. So I just put a cut line boundry around the parts. That made Tinkercad treat them as one whole shape. Then it exported them properly.
The extra cut lines will add to my cost but probably not enough to worry about. If I could remove the border in Inkscape though it would allow the laser cutting people to nest the design tighter on the sheet of acrylic. But the shape opens in Inkscape as one object. Inkscape won’t let me explode the group in to individual parts for removal.
Dumb question, but have you tried to select all and then ungroup? I mean, I’m surprised Inkscape won’t let you edit it. Alternatively, perhaps the node editor would help split it up?
Yes, tinkercad will only give a single path/object in it’s SVG output (same as OpenScad…) and this cannot be ‘ungrouped’.
As @SirGeekALot says; In inkscape: select the object then use Path->Break Apart and Path->Split Path to sperate the paths into individual objects. Then you can recombint the paths into unique cut objects as needed.
The ‘Node Tool’ and the layers and object ‘tree view’ are really useful to see what is happening. In particular you can ctrl-select objects in the tree view and group them with the context menu. Often easier than trying to select the in the main view.
So that worked and it removed the border. when I opened the image it was empty shapes represented by lines with nodes. Now it’s solid shapes but with nodes. Is that going to effect how it cuts? I assume the nodes are what the laser cutter cares about.
I have a classroom of kids I want to get using the laser cutter for building mousetrap car parts but the laser cutter is clunky and not all SVG files work. So having found SVGedit( GitHub - SVG-Edit/svgedit: Powerful SVG-Editor for your browser ) your post caught my eye. Not so much using Sketchup but instead TinkerCAD since that’s what they use for the 3D printers. Turns out TinkerCAD is too clunky too and currently adds a header to the file even Inkscape doesn’t like.
Anyway, I ran across this which might be of interest for you and your use of Sketchup - In Version 6.0 | OpenCutList
I can’t afford to buy my own laser cutter. I also don’t do enough projects that could use a laser cutter. Hence why I outsource my laser cutting every few years. But I’ll look in to that plugin.
Of course this leads to the argument that if I owned my own laser cutter I’d do more projects that use laser cut materials. But the service I use has a much greater catalog of materials then I have access to. At least not without ordering them off the internet first.
Yes, it is the Nodes+Paths that the cutter software cares about.
What you are seeing as solid shapes are ‘filled’ paths, each path has three attributes; fill color, line color and line style. For cutting jobs it helps to remove fill and make lines visible; there is a tab at the left end of the icons where the tree view sits.
Select all the paths, select the fill tab and remove fill, then select the line tab and make all lines the same color and width. With a bit of care in selecting paths you can group them by color etc…
For engraving jobs the fill is important, but cutting jobs it just makes everything hard to see.
, not a binary bitmap.
