Struggling with reverse engineering for 3D printing. What are your go-to tools?

I've been working on some 3D printing reverse engineering lately, mainly trying to replicate parts that don't have existing models.

For simple parts, measuring with calipers and modeling in Fusion 360 goes pretty smoothly. But once I encounter irregular surfaces or need to perfectly match existing components, it gets really tricky.

I've also tried some photogrammetry tools, but the results are never stable, and the process is pretty tedious. It feels like something is missing. Now, I'm considering whether I should get a 3D scanner to improve efficiency.

By the way, I saw that Revopoint recently launched a tool called Trackit, which supposedly allows scanning without needing markers. I'm a bit interested, but I haven’t seen much user feedback. Has anyone used their equipment? How’s the performance?

What tools do you all use for reverse engineering? Especially those that work well with 3D printing and help improve efficiency—feel free to share your experiences!

3DWhiz said:

I'm considering whether I should get a 3D scanner to improve efficiency.

Click to expand...

3D scanners are not great, unless you spend a kings ransom on it, try using a normal camera and make a PNG from the photo and try that, turn the image white and the background black, O’ and keep the file small.. Import the Pic into your Slicer..

I use my digital calipers a LOT!

If it's something really tricky, I'll take a photo from very high up, then zoom in (for least distortion) and follow these videos for onshape:


Also:

Creality are producing a little relatively inexpensive scanner called the Ferret Pro which is getting some very good reviews. The thing you need to consider is how long you are willing to invest in processing the scanned file as they do noeed a lot of time to get them cleaned up into a usable file.