Hello, I am trying to upload a model but it keeps saying there's a manifold error. This model is a sizable model I use for a ring and I only changed the diameter. I have printed this model before so I am not sure why I am facing an error now. Can you assist? Thank you so much for you time. -Tomer
Try checking your model with (free,cross-platform) netfabb studio basic from netfabb.com - there are lots of small holes around the attachment points of the spherical ends - probably slight coordinate mismatches from numerical inaccuracy that show or hide depending on scale. A single run of "Repair Part" with "Close all holes" appears to be sufficient to fix this.
I hate to reopen this thread but I am getting more and more of these errors lately. I used to be able to upload horribly messed up models and get no errors except thin walls. Now models that I meticulously built from the ground up and checked manually, plus models that uploaded (and even printed) fine before are getting these red boxes of death (lol). What's even weirder is that models that I group together will sometimes get errors if I increase the quantity. For example, if I upload a 5 pack of a model car, I might be fine, but uploading a 10 pack (by doubling the 5 pack) will give the error. Is this an increase in sensitivity, a bug, or just a measure to not let people upload in groups and have to pay more? Also I put the files in netfabb, which shows small to medium red spots no matter what, and I check the areas in Sketchup and find nothing wrong. And I won't use the netfabb fix because it looks horrible.
Sounds more like you were lucky with the autorepair choices that shapeways' version of netfabb made in the past, and perhaps small numeric changes by changing the overall scale when grouping more objects together (both in sketchup's export and shapeways' import checks). If you see red areas in netfabb studio basic, the "Standard analysis" should show you what is wrong with them (if all seems fine in Sketchup, I'd hazard a guess you have overlapping faces, or lines drawn across faces). Finally if you cannot use netfabb's repair mode because the result looks horrible, there must be non-trivial errors in the mesh if automated software cannot decide what to keep and what to change. Did you try the Solid Inspector plugin for Sketchup ? It is supposed to do most of what netfabb does, but on the native Sketchup representation level of the model.
Very strange, I grouped the multipack again in virtually the same configuration, and it worked fine. I'll definitely give solid inspector a try next time i get the error.