Hollow edge after plane cut

[essential3d]

Hi, when I perform a plane cut on an stl, it leaves the edges of the cut open - not solid or flat. Then I export it and open it in cura, I get a manifold error. If I try to slice the model, it does all kinds of weird things. 

When using plane cut, I keep both halves and use remeshed fill. 

I have tried the make solid tool but I cannot seem to get the sharp corners to stay. It gives me jagged edges. I’ve tried playing around with the sliders, adjusting one at a time but cannot seem to get it to work. 

The other half of this file, I was able to make solid and it worked perfectly. This half of the file just doesn’t want to cooperate. 

Any help would be appreciated. 

[Anonymous · Accepted solution]

Possible reasons why PlaneCut isn't able to fill the cut:

• The cutting plane hits a mesh error. To solve this issue check the mesh using ANALYSIS/Inspector and repair red and pink issues clicking their pins before running PlaneCut.
• The cutting plane hits an open boundary. You might fill open boundaries using ANALYSIS/Inspector too (blue markers)
• The cutting plane hits a region where the source mesh intersects itself. There's no decent tool in MM to repair such self intersections without modifying the triangles' structure of the mesh. MakeSolid is an option to construct the exterior surfaces via voxelisation which gives a completely new mesh. Its quality depends on the set cell sizes ( smaller = better). Also there's a SharpEdgePreserve mode in the tool's SolidType. Another option is to detect such self intersections using PlaneCut and checking the open boundary if the infill fails. Knowing such locations one can Undo the cut and use SCULPT's SmoothBrush to clean those issues manually.

Often a slightly different position of the cutting plane which doesn't hit one of the above problems is the easiest way. Look at PlaneCut's preview if it is able to fill at this very location.

[essential3d]

Thank you,

After I hit the Inspector button, I was able to go in and fill the edges (blue markers) using minimal fill for the hole fill mode and worked great.

I will definitely be using this tool more often.