How to align tight at one axis?

Feature requests
1

When exporting to STL it is imperative that all items (that should) fit together as one unit. In a more complex project, it is even needed to union everything, or the STL can be completely beyond repair.

As an example, in one project I have hundreds of screws and nuts. All just ‘markers’.

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Placing them by-eye will under the building phase is visually OK for rendering, but not for STL. It is possible to do all screw heads and ‘nuts longer’ so the by-eye error is irrelevant. But that is not always easy with thin targets, and I lose the ‘cartoonish’ look that I love to shear (that I also wish I could keep in Publish).

More than often I also have nuts and bolts correct in two axes, but ‘hoovering’, so how do I get screws, nuts and other items tight to union?

By measurement
I select the opposite faces and get a readout in mm with four decimals. I then select items to move and input the distance. Besides, doing this for hundreds of items is error-prone (transferring the non-copyable numbers manually), is a lot of work, and I am also uncertain if four decimals are enough to get a working union. A -0,0001 blocks the union.

By Align
This can only be used if I use it in combination with Project or I will lose one or two axis alignments. Besides, this is also a lot of extra work, and worse, at a Project outside the target Align will not work.

By Translate
Will not work as long as I do not have a specific center from and to target that aligns to two axes. Though it will work if Projecting (even a free form) and then connecting vertices. Numerous extra steps.

By Axis
Does not work with Align or Translate

By grid
Of course, this would work, but it would limit the project in its entirety.

I have found no way to easily manage this; maybe I am missing some obvious way?

If none, I could see that the Align or Transfer tool could have an option to move only perpendicular (to the selected/clicked surface) or by a specific world axis or construction axis.

Edit:
Btw, the new (otherwise very usefull) Enhanced selection visibility makes performing by-eye alignment even harder.

2

Can you share this project? I just want to play with the problem you’ve described.

3

Actually what is the feature request? I’m wondering what feature concept would help better align in one axis. Also what was your final solution or what did you do finally?

If the surface was flat I guess I would just sketch a circle and use that to align.

4

Sure, here is a part:

Screenshot 2025-06-11 at 15.57.18
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export_2025-06-11_15h55m.shapr (1.8 MB)

5

To lock a movement to a an axis related to a flat surface. (Eg rotating the coordinate system to my liking)

As I mentioned I can project or sketch a circle but that is many extra steps when all I want is to align and by one arbitrary axis. I believe it could be smoothly solved, as an example, by connect the movement of Translate to an created axis.

There are also other instances when it is troublesome to attach larger flat or irregular shaped imported projects (S3D cant handle my lager projects without splitting up). There is always work-arounds, as creating attachments works with Translate. But I still believe in a simpler solution.

KISS:

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Finally? Well… eyeballing all screws :slight_smile:

6

Ya the thing that confused me was you have to mark where the screw goes, to mark it you have to sketch it and align to that.

So you want to align but make no marks to where it go? Just eyeball 2 other angles?

Irregular shaped would be a better example for the 1 axis align concept, but even with this you have to mark where you want to to go?

7

In this kind of situations a prefer next approach:

  • Align only one part
  • Use pattern tool as much as I can, even if after that I will move some of them
  • Use move tool dragging only one arrow.
  • And most important put pivot point in appropriate line so parts stay on surface all the time
1 Like
8

If you need strict placement you must draw a sketch with measurements and align to it. I doubt even one axis alignment will solve if you need precise placement.

1 Like
9

You could aligning to one corner and create the pattern that would be accurate.

10

Yes, of course, but you still need a sketch even to align to one corner

11

Ya that was the point i was making and why I was confused if you are going to eyeball it, just align and move it.

12

Have you watched the video?

13

Yes, you manually aligned the first piece, or I didn’t catch it.

Here is my recommendation about aligning to corner.

1 Like
14

Yeah, that’s because that wasn’t the point. What I want to show that you can very quickly align a lot of similar parts on the surface and they all stay tightly connected to that surface.

15

But this assumes that the X Y placement is arbitrary.

16

Yes I get that and I like that approach better than drawing sketches. I also mentioned about reason for marking. You can use the corner to mark and create a pattern around it.

17

If you need precision more then 0.0001 mm then yes it is arbitrary :slight_smile:

18

0.0001 will do :slight_smile:

Say that I have (as in your demo) exactly measurement for the screws, need to get them watertight to the cover.

19

But I agree there are a lot of situations then axis lock for alignment would be useful

20

And they do on my video :slight_smile: