First practical project
Make a Mounting Plate with Bolt Holes
Draw a 60 × 40 mm mounting plate, add thickness and bolt holes, then export an STL from Super Simple 3D.
Make a plate in 3D- 60 × 40 × 5 mm practice plate.
- Preview bolt-hole placement before clicking.
- Export the selected part for a slicer.
1. Draw a 60 × 40 mm face
Open 3D Design and choose Rectangle. Click on an empty area of the ground plane, move diagonally to show the rectangle preview, type 60,40 and press Enter. Keep this practice part separate from the starter block. The example dimensions teach the workflow; choose dimensions to suit your actual mounting hardware.
2. Pull the plate to 5 mm thick
Choose Push/Pull and begin pulling the rectangular face outward. Type 5 and press Enter. Orbit to check that the flat face is now a solid with side walls. If you pull in the wrong direction, undo the edit and try again.
3. Place two M4 clearance holes
Choose the Top camera view, then Hole and M4. Move over the plate and check the circular preview and dashed offsets from the marked corner. For this example, place centers 10 mm from each short end and 20 mm from a long edge, so they are 40 mm apart. The M4 normal-fit hole is 4.5 mm across. Check the highlighted reference corner: the nearest corner may change as you move.
4. Check or change the hole sizes
Select a hole to inspect its size. Change the chosen bolt size if necessary and use Undo to reverse an unwanted edit. A clearance hole lets a bolt pass through; it does not model a screw thread. Counterbores are optional wider recesses for a bolt head. Keep their depth below the plate thickness and size them for the actual head.
5. Export and inspect the STL
Select the plate component and choose Export as STL from its context menu. Open the result in your slicer, confirm the overall size is 60 × 40 × 5 mm, and check that both holes remain open in the layer preview. Material, print orientation and fit affect a finished part; this tutorial does not establish a load rating.