5 Things to Check Before You Send Us Your File

Most delays on a first print job aren’t about the printer — they’re about a file that wasn’t quite ready. Five checks before you hit send:

1. Wall thickness

Thin walls (under ~1mm) can warp, snap, or fail to print at all depending on material. If a wall is load-bearing, it usually wants to be thicker than it looks on screen.

2. Tolerances on mating parts

If your part needs to slot into something else — a bolt, a bearing, another printed part — say so, and give us the target fit. Printed dimensions vary slightly by material and orientation; we can compensate for it if we know it matters.

3. Orientation-sensitive features

Overhangs, bridges, and fine text all print differently depending on which way the part sits on the bed. If a specific face needs to be smooth or a hole needs to be perfectly round, flag it.

4. File format

STL and STEP both work. STEP (or another parametric format) is better when we might need to make small design adjustments — STL is a fixed mesh with no editable history.

5. What the part is actually for

“It needs to be strong” means something different for a drone frame than a desk toy. Tell us how it’ll be used and we’ll match material and print settings to it — that’s usually more useful than guessing tolerances yourself.

Send us a file with these covered and you’ll usually see a working prototype within a day or two of approval.