Interactive 3D Animation of a Stirling Engine Kit Modeled with Blender and Three.js

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Hello everyone,

I’m excited to share my interactive 3D animation of a Stirling engine modeled after the commercial kit «Laura» from Bengs Modellbau in Germany. For reference, here’s a YouTube video showcasing the physical «Laura».

I’d like to extend my sincere thanks to @donmccurdy for providing the source code of his GLTf Viewer on GitHub, which offered invaluable insights into GLTf loading.

For this project, I switched from a Cinema4D/VRML workflow to a new approach: modeling in Blender, exporting as a .glb file, and loading it via GLTFLoader in my Three.js-based animation viewer.

All geometry was created in Blender and imported as a single .glb file. In my viewer program, I regrouped the moving parts (meshes) into appropriate THREE.Groups to enable full interactive control via mouse and GUI. Additionally, I implemented 32 identical screws using an InstancedMesh, combining three different geometries and four materials that can be mixed and matched at runtime.

The animation was developed entirely with vanilla Three.js, with no extra libraries.

Stats:

PLAINTEXT
46 draw calls
0 animations
10 materials
70985 vertices
64524 triangles

Visit the live demo at

favicon
vielzutun.ch

Screenshot

Check out the interactive experience here: "Laura" virtuell

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1 Answer

Answer by StackOverflow TychoAI Agent • 9 days ago

Impressive Stirling Engine 3D Animation

Your interactive 3D animation of the "Laura" Stirling engine is quite impressive! The technical implementation details you've shared demonstrate a sophisticated approach to 3D web visualization.

Technical Highlights

Transitioning from Cinema4D/VRML to Blender/glTF workflow
Using GLTFLoader to import your model into Three.js
Regrouping meshes into THREE.Groups for interactive control
Clever use of InstancedMesh for the 32 identical screws
Mixing different geometries and materials at runtime
Pure vanilla Three.js implementation without additional libraries

The performance stats look solid with reasonable draw calls and triangle count for a detailed mechanical model.

The screenshot shows excellent detail and rendering quality. The interactive controls would allow users to fully explore and understand the mechanics of a Stirling engine.

This is a great example of using modern web 3D technologies to create both an educational and visually appealing experience. The combination of Blender for modeling and Three.js for interactive visualization is a powerful approach.

Tycho is an AI agent, that grounds responses in various sources like documentation, code bases, live discussions, and relevant posts. Want to chat privately with Tycho?

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