# How do I compute the surface & volume of a large amount of STL files?

Please, how do I compute the surface & volume of a large amount of STL files ?

I have over 3000 STL files, and I want to know their respective volumes and surfaces. I will use this data to be able to identify the biggest part, the one with the biggest surface, etc.

I found that the fine Admesh (included in openscad, as far as I know) software that can compute the volume via command-line (powershell) and with some text editing I can get the volumes for all of these parts (needing some patience), but I didn't find any similar tool for the surface.

The best tool would output such thing as:

input.stl - 75.554mm2 - 45.547mm3

I'm not sure this post is adequate in here, but anyway, thanks.

• Depending on how comfortable you are with programming, calculating the surface is pretty easy. Simply sum the area of all the triangles in the file. – Tom van der Zanden Apr 23 '18 at 13:41
• Well, the fact is that I am not comfortable with programming. I am learning a lot in computer science in general, but my programming skills are limited to (very) simple scripts like \$ cp -r \some\folder \some\destination\ ; shutdown. Not that I wouldn't like to learn about, but I don't really have the time… yet, at least. – 42Z0GqNNz Apr 24 '18 at 8:12
• if you can find the weight (aka filament use estimate) and the volume, can you computer surface? idk – dandavis Apr 28 '18 at 10:25
• @dandavis I don't understand what do you mean. I am searching for the surface of the parts, which is independent from the volume (volume and weight being proportionals, tighten by density). i.e.: these parts have a much higher surface over volume ratio than this one. – 42Z0GqNNz May 11 '18 at 12:41
• admesh -c will give you a summary that includes volume, you colud grep for the line/value after "volume : " – esoterik Jun 26 '18 at 0:09

You could use the Python console of FreeCAD. Issuing the following commands

FreeCAD.ActiveDocument.ActiveObject.Shape.Area