It would be great to have 3D models of the boards in order to design enclosures and, more generally, devices/products.
There are user-generated models all over the web but they're approximations. They're really not good enough for designing and building a compact and slick-looking device/product. For example, I'd like to CNC or 3D print (SLA, not FDM) a body to house a board and other components for a device. But I don't want to waste time or money trying to machine/3D print a body to fit approximate components.
Instead of approximate, user-generated models, I'd like to have accurate models from the source of truth (i.e. Arduino).
Arduino seems to already have the models available, at least for those boards that have Altium 365 viewers embedded on their webpage. But the viewers are coded with the attribute "data-hide-project-src" which prevents downloads (see attached screenshot and "Controlling Downloads" section on Altium docs).
Removing this attribute could be a quick and easy way to enable downloads of 3D models, no?
I had to build an enclosure around a mega 2560 not to long ago and that would have been nice. I found one online somewhere but it had issues and wasn't accurate, but close enough.
Thanks @DaveX. I was just using the Uno as an example of a board where Arduino clearly has the model available. I'm hoping they can make it available for download. Seems like low-hanging fruit but I might be missing something.
Thanks @paulpaulson. Really I'm looking for models from the source of truth: Arduino. I didn't make that clear in my original post, so I just revised it.
Often found that CULTS, GRABCAD etc. have had better offerings for almost all boards.
Many include extra height to allow shields and such which would probably not be the case with Arduino offerings if there were any.
@noobmastha and @Ballscrewbob, you guys are saying that Arduino's models wouldn't be very accurate? Wow. That's really unfortunate.
I'm not challenging you, I'm genuinely surprised/disappointed. This morning I remembered that I created my first Arduino project with a laser-cut acrylic case more than 10 years ago. There weren't any models back then so I had to measure everything with calipers. Guess I'll be doing the same thing for my latest project.
By the way, have you looked at the models Arduino has in their embedded viewers on some of the board's webpages? They look pretty comprehensive to me. You think they're not better than what Grabcad, et al has?
No, it was funny the way you say it... "the true".
Btw there are lot of wrong 3D models on the Thingverse, just in case, check the measurements before printing...
Cheers.
@noobmastha lol. "single source of truth" or "system of record". They're data warehousing expressions. They basically mean there's one place that has the official and accurate data (in this case model).
Since Arduino designs the boards they should be the source of truth. Relying on other sources (e.g. Thingiverse) is risky because, as you said, they're often wrong.
@sterretje the website currently has 3D model downloads disabled. I'm proposing the site enable this.
Much of the discussion has veered off from the original post to workarounds (e.g., use Grabcad). But I think the original post is very much related to the website (specifically the interactive Altium viewer). I intentionally framed the post that way.
I defer to your judgement of course but I fear this topic and a solution will get lost in General Discussion.
Presumably this is one for the Altium team to do, but I would assume that the .brd file is part of that process, where the file can be used cross platform.
I have been using Autodesk Fusion360 for case design, which imports Eagle PCB designs into it via the .brd file.
You can also use other programs to go into Fusion 360, even Kicad.
@latedev Altium supports downloading whichever file formats are available from the user (i.e. Arduino). Since Arduino's Altium viewer has 3 views (schematic, PCB, and 3D), a proper 3D model (i.e. one that hasn't been auto-generated from the .BRD) is clearly available.
I'm hoping Arduino's web developers can change the embed code on each board's webpage to allow downloads of the 3D file (e.g., .STEP) by removing the "data-hide-project-src" attribute in the HTML, as explained in the Altium docs:
FWIW, I have tried generating a 3D model in Fusion360 using the Eagle files but it's mostly flat. Have you had success generating a higher fidelity model?
I tried at one point got similar results to you then decided to revisit it at a later data,opting to create cases for bare PCB's.
I did read somewhere that it was possibly the .step files possibly being in the wrong place and something about allowing substitutes.
I will revisit at some point when I am not juggling
I did bookmark some stuff off I thought may be relevant given I use Kicad at home.
These may or may not help, given there is always some crossover between packages, where there are similar issues.
p.s. You did use push to 3D ctl+2 from your 2D model, didn't you?
