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I actually modified the geometry to match the PCB and not through the mesh modifier panel on the footprint editor. I was thinking about doing the pins for the panel though, so it'll mean redoing the whole deed.

I REALLY wish the developers had chosen STEP support instead of VRML...

EDIT: Ouch, the pins are in the model but to export them into Wings you'll need to export and import them one at a time. times sixty.

I really, really, really, really wish the developers had went with STEP

Well what do you know, friends in low places to the rescue!

As it's impossible to export a multi-body part as STL, I had to have the STEP converted into 3DS first (by a former colleague) and then into VRML. He also got the polygon model optimized by a great deal! And another thing: when you convert the model into 3DS and not STL, the scale is *exactly* right for the KICAD!!!

I modified the footprint a bit, yet again. The mounting holes are now lined exactly on the X-axis, and the board is centered on the Y-axis. This is because now the enclosure panel can be aligned right in the modeler and it'll work always right in KICAD.

EDIT: the switch into Lightwave format was a less successful choice. It seems LW treats the X-axis in reverse. The object is mirrored... in this case though it's not a problem.

Great to hear the 3DS path. When I get the next step, I'll post it and let you run with it. I should have noticed the pins got lost, sorry about that. I'm also curious about the tools used to convert to the wrl using 3DS. In my process I opened up the step with Solidworks, which allows export to STL, which I can import into Wings3D, which then allows me to make the .WRL for KICAD. As noted the scale ends up all wrong, and not at a known scale. Seems the scale is often 10. Perhaps the decimal wonders for some reason, not sure why. Perhaps it's one of those mundane details.

I don't know why WRL was chosen by KICAD, I thought that format died back in the late 90's. I was surprised to see it used by KICAD.

The software to create the 3DS was Rhino3d, which I imported to LW and then sent to Wings as LW Object. I had to do the intermediate LW step because for some reason Wings wanted to rotate every part around it's own axis instead of common or origin and that messed up the pins pretty good. There must be a setting to fix that in Wings, but it took me less time to load the thing into LW than to read the manual, so, yeah...

Anyway, it's now WAY easy to import new 3D modules into Kicad, even though without geometry export I find it's usefulness limited.

FYI, newer versions of kicad can export the whole board to .wrl. This allows to model connector board, main board and even the enclosure all together.
Also, the resulting model can be imported into Blender.

Good work guys!

I just grabbed KiCad-2011-03-30-BZR2932-WinXP_ blah blah, And it only allows picture export. Can't wait until it will do that wrl export. That copy was put there 31/3/2011, and is much different than the copy that was installed. Seems they are making rapid progress, and I'd bet we'll see that wrl export option any day now. Thanks for the note, I'll keep an eye out for it.

Yeah Kicad developer crowd seems to be picking up pace. I wonder if the WRL export is in one of those overnight Linux builds?

KW1252 wrote:Yeah Kicad developer crowd seems to be picking up pace. I wonder if the WRL export is in one of those overnight Linux builds?

Yes indeed, it is.
I'm using the Ubuntu ppa by Philip Axer ( https://launchpad.net/~paxer/+archive/ppa ) with nightly builds. Never had a problem with the new versions, although I also don't use kicad that often.

Concerning the conversion of 3D data into VRML: I've had good success importing a STEP file with FreeCAD, although I have not checked if it produces the correct scale for kicad.
A good tool to reduce the size of VRML files is "Chisel". The GUI stinks, but it does its job well.

FYI: The official successor of VRML is X3D and can be displayed with browsers, once HTML5 is done and supported. Kicad will probably more likely switch to X3D than to anything else I guess.

The only thing I care about in the 3D module is to be able to reasonably import them into a CAD program for case/installation design. To have an arbitrary unit non-engineering format is simply absurd.

Click the thumb nail for a larger version. I'll post the step when I get home.