I am new to both SnapCad and 3D printing. My son lost one piece to his kit and I am trying to figure out how to print it for him. I found the piece on SnapCad, but am having problems figuring out how to get it to the slicing program so it can be printed. Can you help me with this?
This post appeared to be about IQ parts so I moved it to VEX IQ CAD Discussion.
If you download the .STEP file from this page, you can then convert the .STEP to a .STL, which is the format that most slicers will want. You can use this tool, or your favorite CAD program (Solidworks, Inventor, Fusion 360, etc.), to do the conversion.
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dhmmjoph beat me by 30 seconds! But if you post to the community what part you need, someone might just convert it for you and send you the stl.
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Note: “Parts created using 3D printing technology are not eligible for use in the VEX IQ Challenge.” Hard to find small print in the middle and at bottom of:
Create Your Own Parts
I think that page could use the info you are getting here, as well suggested workflow. I understand this is not their core business, but people creating new parts designs could stimulate VEX to release useful, salable categories. (Curved beams, outside corner connectors in various angles [angle brackets], other twisted connectors)
Further Note: “(except as a non-functional decoration [edit: or to hold team plates])”.
From Rule Clarification - #2 by B-Kinney. If this applies to IQ, Should be added to above page…
What slicer, printer do you have?
And for fun: 3D printed parts
Do we think the forum needs separate CAD and/or 3D print categories? There is this one for IQ, but don’t they use CAD and 3D print more in EDR? Am I missing seeing that category?
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The part my son lost is Vex Axle 3.5 M Plastic with stop at 0.5. The piece number is 228-2500-094 on SnapCad, but in his Vex Robotic Offroad Truck guide, the piece number is 228-5561-094
Any help is much appreciated.
Private Message me your address and I’ll mail you one (assuming you’re in the USA)
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For reference, 228-2500-094 and 228-5561-094 are functionally the same part** .
This plastic motor shaft might be a tricky part to 3D print successfully, depending on what printer and filament that you have., as this is a small part that transfers a fair amount of torque. But I’m not one to discourage experimenting with 3D printers for science. 
If this doesn’t work out, we’ll gladly replace missing parts from our kits. For HEXBUG VEX Robotics kits like the Offroad Truck, please contact us and we’ll send you replacement parts.
** For VEX IQ elements, we assign all of them a 228-2500-xxx or 228-2500-xxxx part number. This part number simply refers to the part without any color necessarily associated with it. We release the CAD (STEP) files of VEX IQ elements under this 228-2500-xxx part number.
Parts that are only available in one color (such as metal shafts), keep the original 2500 in their part number.
Plastic parts that can be molded in any of the available colors in our library get the “2500” in the part number swapped out to a new number to designate the specific color. “5581” simply denotes Bright Green, so 228-5581-094 is the Bright Green version of the colorless 228-2500-094.
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