A STEP file, opened without CAD software.
Open a STEP or STP file in your browser with nothing uploaded: turn the part round, see its parts and colours, and measure it without a CAD program.
By Suraj Kumar4 min read
STEP (.step or .stp) is how CAD programs hand a part or an assembly to one another, and the file a supplier sends with a drawing. Opening one usually takes a CAD program. KeepSimp opens it in your browser, and the file stays on your device.
Drop the STEP file.
Open the STEP viewer and drop the .step or .stp file. It is read by OCCT (Open CASCADE), the open-source CAD kernel FreeCAD is built on, compiled to run in the browser and downloaded from KeepSimp the first time a CAD file is opened (about 2.6 MB).
An assembly keeps its parts, their names and their colours, a face's own colour too, and Parts lists them as the file groups them.
Choose how fine its curves are.
A STEP keeps exact curves, and a screen or a printer needs flat triangles, so the curves are cut into them. Fine suits most parts; Very fine follows curves more closely and makes a larger file; Draft is quicker and coarser. Measured on a 20 × 30 × 40 mm block with a 10 mm hole, the triangles held 0.22 % more volume than the exact solid at Draft, 0.059 % at Fine and 0.012 % at Very fine.
At the size it was drawn.
A STEP says its unit, so the part is shown at its real size, standing on Z as CAD programs stand it. Its box is measured at once, with its area, and its volume when it is a closed solid; press Measure and two points for the distance between them.
To pass it on to someone without CAD, choose Change the format: GLB opens on the web and on phones, STL in any slicer.
Further reading
Topics: open step file · step viewer · stp viewer · open stp file without cad · step file viewer online
A little less theory. A little more doing.
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