I was wondering what determines the size of the fragment of PCB that is shown in the 3D view of the FP editor. I am trying to increase the size (to accommodate a bigger heat sink) but the PCB fragment stays the same size. I increased the Front Courtyard, but that made no difference.
KiCad 3D viewer uses a bounding box on the Edge.Cuts layer when available, otherwise is just fits the components and guesses
A bit confused your question, but,
On the 3D Viewer, as @davidsrsb says, the PCB is calculated over the Bounding Box of the Edges.Cuts, so it will scale all board to fit it on the screen. If you have a board empty (no traces and no components) it will look the same for different sizes (provide it is the same aspect ratio)
On the 3D shape preview (eg while adding 3D shapes to footprints) it will display the 3D shape model scaled to the window area. So if you scale it (proportional) on the preview it will look the same.
What version?
In 4.0.6 and recent nightly I find the PCB size accommodates all the board items, text, silk screen, courtyard. Note that in v4 the 3D view does not update automatically, you might need to click refresh to get latest changes.
The size of the PCB displayed is auto-sized for the viewer, but has no bearing on the actual footprint or usage.
After some experimentation it appears that the FP Editor uses the Front
SS outline to set what is displayed in the 3D view.
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Depending on how much smaller the board is, will dictate how drastic the changes may be. If it is a lot smaller, then obviously components may have to move along with associated etch. If not so much, then you might be able to move some components and then reconnect.
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