Working with 3D printing replacement early A-body parts

-
MadScientistMat

MadScientistMat

Well-Known Member
Joined
Mar 6, 2008
Messages
688
Reaction score
295
I've found a service that can do print on demand 3D printing, and I'm working on making some reproduction parts based on measurements off my '66 Dart. First one out the gate is dash vents, given how easily they break. I've also made ones to fit the 2.5" stock hose and also 2.25" hose. I can't be the only Dart owner who had a previous owner size the hose to match the heater core outlets and cobble it onto the dash vents as best they could, can I? Well, maybe not, but since they're print on demand parts I can make both.

If you're interested, I have them listed here. I've skipped PLA - that stuff is going to melt if used as a dash vent - and have listed them in polyurethane and resin cast. The print farm could also do stainless steel, but I'm not sure anyone would want to pay several hundred for a dash vent. :)

Standard '63-'66 A-body dash vents

2.25" hose '63-'66 A-body dash vents

Anything else you'd like to see that would lend itself to 3D printing? I cracked the glove box insert getting the dash vent out to measure, so that might be a natural next step. But I've been thinking things like armrests, or maybe the center section of the dash that the previous owner always chops up to put in a radio.
 
The world of 3D printing has the ability to change the restoration hobby if we can model the parts to start.

I have seen guys making front signal lenses and tail light bezels for 66’s. I might be interested in the radio trim depending on overall cost. They offer a few versions on the 66 the 170 version ended at the radio and the 270/GT extended over to the passenger door, then factor radio or heat delete.

I have a 170 that’s supposed to be radio & heat delete but someone cut it for both and have only been able to find a radio delete replacement
 
I would be surprised if the 3D printed parts are going to hold up all that well. The materials that are 3D-printable make it difficult for them to hold up long term in automotive environments. I could be wrong, but don't get too hopeful.
 
I got a printer at work and it's been very useful for stuff like this. I'm going to try doing a tail light lens and see how that goes. Finally got one orginal one to work with
 
jos51700 said:
I would be surprised if the 3D printed parts are going to hold up all that well. The materials that are 3D-printable make it difficult for them to hold up long term in automotive environments. I could be wrong, but don't get too hopeful.
Click to expand...
ABS filament
 
jos51700 said:
I would be surprised if the 3D printed parts are going to hold up all that well. The materials that are 3D-printable make it difficult for them to hold up long term in automotive environments. I could be wrong, but don't get too hopeful.
Click to expand...
Some stuff absolutely can be more durable than factory. I got a Kevlar nylon mix I can print in.
 
go-fish said:
ABS filament
Click to expand...
That may be, but 3D printed parts have stratified seams, inconsistent weld between layers, and 3D printed parts often require design considerations due to the nature of manufacture that makes them an apples and oranges replacement part for pieces that were originally manufactured via other methods. I'm not saying that can't be good parts, but it's rare for them match in longevity or quality.

It's like buying counterfeit stuff from China, it might LOOK the same (well, at least similar) but that doesn't mean it is the same. It doesn't mean it's a bad part, but, be aware of what you're getting into before blowing a bunch of coin.
 
DumpsterFire said:
Some stuff absolutely can be more durable than factory. I got a Kevlar nylon mix I can print in.
Click to expand...
Again.... Print em up, leave em in the sun, expose them to 140 degree and -20 degree interior temps and subject em to countless vibratory cycles of various amplitude and frequency for 1500 hours, and we'll talk about it in twenty or thirty years.
 
jos51700 said:
Again.... Print em up, leave em in the sun, expose them to 140 degree and -20 degree interior temps and subject em to countless vibratory cycles of various amplitude and frequency for 1500 hours, and we'll talk about it in twenty or thirty years.
Click to expand...
Yeah it's very good stuff that holds up better than plastic from the 60s. That's honestly not a very hard bar to hop over
 
jos51700 said:
It's like buying counterfeit stuff from China, it might LOOK the same (well, at least similar) but that doesn't mean it is the same. It doesn't mean it's a bad part, but, be aware of what you're getting into before blowing a bunch of coin.
Click to expand...

I look at it this way. My son owns a filament printer and a resin printer. If they don’t last but 5 years I’ll reprint a pair every 4 yrs, 11 months.
Minimal coin needed.
 
jos51700 said:
I would be surprised if the 3D printed parts are going to hold up all that well. The materials that are 3D-printable make it difficult for them to hold up long term in automotive environments. I could be wrong, but don't get too hopeful.
Click to expand...
The blind 3d printer hate is weird. You can literally print in inconel. You can use damn near any material
 
jos51700 said:
I would be surprised if the 3D printed parts are going to hold up all that well. The materials that are 3D-printable make it difficult for them to hold up long term in automotive environments. I could be wrong, but don't get too hopeful.
Click to expand...
Was thinking the same, with plastics its difficult to say but if the right stuff is used etc. High heat it warps wrinkles in the cold cracks etc.
 
DumpsterFire said:
Yeah it's very good stuff that holds up better than plastic from the 60s. That's honestly not a very hard bar to hop over
Click to expand...

Let's see how it looks in twenty years of comparable environment.
DumpsterFire said:
The blind 3d printer hate is weird. You can literally print in inconel. You can use damn near any material
Click to expand...

The blanket '3D printing solves every problem and has no drawbacks whatsoever!' mindset is equally weird and ten times more ignorant.

You clearly haven't been in charge of R&D products where some dipshit committee decides, 'oh hey, my kid got a 3D printer for Christmas, let's just start making parts using that process!" and then tells you that's how parts get made these days, despite your protests and logic. So you spend six months designing parts, re-designing parts to accommodate shear lines, dimensional incongruities, supply-chain QC issues, and performing endless failure mode analysis, so the committee can decide 'oh crap, it's not apples to apples like the 3D printer salesman told us it was, and we spent way more on R&D than we ever would have spent if we'd just used what works!' even though that's what engineering told them in the first place.

It's great for keychains. It's fantastic for prototyping. It's even great for functional parts if they're designed properly.

But you know what I noticed on my Ender 3? Not one 3D printed part on the thing. NOT ONE. That should tell you something....it's not perfect.

Make something with posts for thread cutting nuts. The 3-D printed part is going to struggle. Applied stress? Struggle. A part that originally needed to be Acetal? or ABS? Or Polystyrene? Struggle struggle struggle. It's not 1:1, no matter how much you want it to be. "It's got additives" you say? Well, Brawndo has electrolytes. There's a million different plastics out there because there's no one 'solves it all' plastic, and there's no one 'solves it all process'.

You can't just say, 'hey this part is great in plastic, we can make it using 3D printing instead' any more than you can say, 'Hey, this crankshaft is great in steel, we can make it using aluminum instead' or 'hey this deep-sea submersible is great in steel, we can make it in Titanium and Carbon Fiber instead!'.

I when I see blind love for something, anything, without consideration for the engineering behind it.... I know where that logic is headed.....


Now, go print me some lower control arm bushings, if 3D printing is so flawless.
 
Last edited:
DumpsterFire said:
The blind 3d printer hate is weird. You can literally print in inconel. You can use damn near any material
Click to expand...
3D printing in Inconel is not extrusion printing, it's 3D welding, a process that's been around for some 1500 years.
 
Low volume plastic trim pieces are where printing shines pretty Damn bright. You can't get a mold made to run 20 parts
 
jos51700 said:
Let's see how it looks in twenty years of comparable environment. You have the burden of proof here. Prove that no 3d printed material is as good as original in longevity and durability.


The blanket '3D printing solves every problem and has no drawbacks whatsoever!' mindset is equally weird and ten times more ignorant. Who the hell said that?

You clearly haven't been in charge of R&D products where some dipshit committee decides, 'oh hey, my kid got a 3D printer for Christmas, let's just start making parts using that process!" and then tells you that's how parts get made these days, despite your protests and logic. So you spend six months designing parts, re-designing parts to accommodate shear lines, dimensional incongruities, supply-chain QC issues, and performing endless failure mode analysis, so the committee can decide 'oh crap, it's not apples to apples like the 3D printer salesman told us it was, and we spent way more on R&D than we ever would have spent if we'd just used what works!' even though that's what engineering told them in the first place. You are making up scenarios and fantasies about fictitious companies and committees. It's a little delusional.
Click to expand...


Dude, go take a break. You are ENTIRELY too spun up about 3d printing. We're talking about dash vents, MAN!


Did I read you correctly, you were not able to print anything on an ender 3? Did you install or update the splicer? Use AutoCad? Control bed and extruder temps? I'm struggling to figure out how you can't print on an Ender3.
jos51700 said:
But you know what I noticed on my Ender 3? Not one 3D printed part on the thing. NOT ONE. That should tell you something....it's not perfect.
Click to expand...
 
jos51700 said:
Again.... Print em up, leave em in the sun, expose them to 140 degree and -20 degree interior temps and subject em to countless vibratory cycles of various amplitude and frequency for 1500 hours, and we'll talk about it in twenty or thirty years.
Click to expand...
It won't take20 years.

ABS filament isn't uv safe. ASA is a little better but the overall problem with ABS is it's designed for molds, not FDM printing. When ABS cools it shrinks away from the mold aiding in it's release.

If anyone is going to use ABS, that shrink needs to be taken into account. In fact all FDM filaments shrink to some extent, but the ones that shink the least, PLA etc, are also the ones that melt/deform at the lowest temps.

Dash vents are not going to survive the heat for very long.

I printed my badge holder work out of PETG and left it on the passenger seat once, it warped pretty bad, lol.
 
DumpsterFire said:
In 500 ad... okay
Click to expand...
Forge welding, also known as fire welding, is a solid-state welding process that has been used since ancient times. It involves joining two pieces of metal by heating them to a high temperature and then hammering or applying pressure to them. Unlike fusion welding, which involves melting the metals at the weld interface, forge welding joins the metals without melting them. This method of welding falls under diffusion welding and requires the metals to be heated to a high temperature before being forced together.
 
go-fish said:
Did I read you correctly, you were not able to print anything on an ender 3? Did you install or update the splicer? Use AutoCad? Control bed and extruder temps? I'm struggling to figure out how you can't print on an Ender3.
Click to expand...
LOL point taken. The 3D printer is not manufactured using any 3D printed parts LOL

I used Cura for slicing and it makes parts just fine. No AutoCAD....2D drawing programs suck for 3D modeling. I use Inventor (regretfully) and Solidworks for 15 years now.
 
I can understand the concerns here. That is why I'm not using PLA (although the PLA shift knob in my daily driver has held up for over 2 months in Atlanta sun so far, dash vents will be subject to more heat), ABS, or PETG. The low end option I have is a polyurethane, and the higher end is a SLA resin that uses light curing rather than melting and forming it. The print farm I'm working with could print these in nylon with a 600 degree F melting point or even stainless steel, but I doubt anyone's interested in paying what that would cost. (If you are, let me know! A stainless version would have the threads cut instead of relying on the nuts' teeth, so it would need a new CAD model.) The design also has a few anti-sag features built in - the vanes are taller than stock, for example, and curved instead of flat to better resist warping.

I expect the TPU version is going to have the striations you usually see in 3D printed parts, but it's meant to be a functional, cost effective version while those more concerned with the best appearance can go with SLA resin. Resin printing has a much smoother appearance. Some of the things I intend to print, the only competition out there is going to be used parts that have had 50 years of temperature cycles and are already quite brittle.
 
MadScientistMat said:
I can understand the concerns here. That is why I'm not using PLA (although the PLA shift knob in my daily driver has held up for over 2 months in Atlanta sun so far, dash vents will be subject to more heat), ABS, or PETG. The low end option I have is a polyurethane, and the higher end is a SLA resin that uses light curing rather than melting and forming it. The print farm I'm working with could print these in nylon with a 600 degree F melting point or even stainless steel, but I doubt anyone's interested in paying what that would cost. (If you are, let me know! A stainless version would have the threads cut instead of relying on the nuts' teeth, so it would need a new CAD model.) The design also has a few anti-sag features built in - the vanes are taller than stock, for example, and curved instead of flat to better resist warping.

I expect the TPU version is going to have the striations you usually see in 3D printed parts, but it's meant to be a functional, cost effective version while those more concerned with the best appearance can go with SLA resin. Resin printing has a much smoother appearance. Some of the things I intend to print, the only competition out there is going to be used parts that have had 50 years of temperature cycles and are already quite brittle.
Click to expand...
Let me know when you want to Print some rear quarters. I'll try them out for you!

qtr.jpg
 
MadScientistMat said:
I've found a service that can do print on demand 3D printing, and I'm working on making some reproduction parts based on measurements off my '66 Dart. First one out the gate is dash vents, given how easily they break. I've also made ones to fit the 2.5" stock hose and also 2.25" hose. I can't be the only Dart owner who had a previous owner size the hose to match the heater core outlets and cobble it onto the dash vents as best they could, can I? Well, maybe not, but since they're print on demand parts I can make both.

If you're interested, I have them listed here. I've skipped PLA - that stuff is going to melt if used as a dash vent - and have listed them in polyurethane and resin cast. The print farm could also do stainless steel, but I'm not sure anyone would want to pay several hundred for a dash vent. :)

Standard '63-'66 A-body dash vents

2.25" hose '63-'66 A-body dash vents

Anything else you'd like to see that would lend itself to 3D printing? I cracked the glove box insert getting the dash vent out to measure, so that might be a natural next step. But I've been thinking things like armrests, or maybe the center section of the dash that the previous owner always chops up to put in a radio.
Click to expand...
I think if you're going to do this, you're going to need to put pictures of the actual product instead of a pic of the model use to create it. Show people what they are actually paying for.

Good luck
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
-

Back
Top