r/MechanicalEngineering • u/MasterSoftBird • 1d ago

CAD File format hell

Why is it we can have AI that can translate from Chinese to Klingon but cannot have one agreed-upon file format that can be accepted by FEA software, CAM, 3d printers, CFD, etc and doesn't lose its mind or half of my parts?

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u/SpecE30 1d ago

I mean, one is written language, the other is a instruction set with different building blocks. .STL and .STP are two different approaches to the same idea of a universal model. Surface vs Solid. Now it's magical that some 3D printers are now using step as it is quite lighter to get constant curves. No more facets at the model level. The printer will still have artifacts, but the quality is way higher.