Problems with parts authoring.

[Paul Treble]

I have just started investigating parts authoring and have read the tutorials that are available. I have found how to enter lines, triangles, quadrilaterals in MLCAD and can see that the primitive parts (e.g. Stud.dat) are available in the \p directory. How do I find them in MLCAD as they don't show up with the other parts? I have checked the MLCAD.INI file which says that the \p directory is automatically scanned and the the line 1 = HIDE P is commented out. I am at a loss but I am sure that it must be something simple that I am missing.

Hi Paul,
Welcome in the wonderful world of parts authoring

In order to "see" primitives in MLCad they need to be listed in file parts.lst. You need to regenerate this list with LDmakelist using -m option (https://wiki.ldraw.org/wiki/LDMakeList). You may also need to add new categories in parts tree.

...or use the good old method that was the only one for years: click on "add part" button in the toolbar, check "custom part" and key in the primitive file name (eg. "4-4cyli.dat")

...or (highly recommended!!!!) use a modern tool rather than MLCad: LDPartEditor (http://nilsschmidt1337.github.io/ldparteditor/). Granted, the learning curve is rather steep, but once you're used to it, it's much more convenient and powerful.

Hi Philippe,

Many thanks, I will give it a go.