diff --git a/io_mesh_ply/import_ply.py b/io_mesh_ply/import_ply.py
index 8e5db68ec75cdfbb5f0a85f4fc889c3f756f94f8..fc87e66ed80b63f2d74bce4a798f5d7118cd814b 100644
--- a/io_mesh_ply/import_ply.py
+++ b/io_mesh_ply/import_ply.py
@@ -156,7 +156,7 @@ def read(filepath):
         return None
 
     while 1:
-        tokens = re.split(r'[ \n]+'.encode("ASCII"), file.readline())
+        tokens = re.split(br'[ \r\n]+', file.readline())
 
         if len(tokens) == 0:
             continue