3D printing for extreme tuning, thoughts?

[davidalone]

I work in biomedical. my institution is setting up a massive in house 3D printing project ( US$300 million involved) which will be up early next year, and chances are good I can get a job there. I'll get to play with some truly state of the art metal printers ( if I recall they have printers costing in the millions) .... I'm looking forward to what I can cook up during work downtime....

[andreszucs]

I work in biomedical. my institution is setting up a massive in house 3D printing project ( US$300 million involved) which will be up early next year, and chances are good I can get a job there. I'll get to play with some truly state of the art metal printers ( if I recall they have printers costing in the millions) .... I'm looking forward to what I can cook up during work downtime....

Now you are just trying to make us all jealous kkk that would be a dream job to me...I would not have a life anymore...24/7 on Solidworks making stuff ...forever!


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[FilmAt11]

Nice article on development of a 3D printed Titanium seatmast topper:

http://pencerw.com/feed/2015/8/6/3d-pri ... om-success

[andreszucs]

Nice article on development of a 3D printed Titanium seatmast topper:

http://pencerw.com/feed/2015/8/6/3d-pri ... om-success

Wow...impressive finish for a printed part! I'll definitely read the entire article later with more time. Looks like there is a lot of good details there to learn. The huge down side is still the price...not eving looking at the article and I'd say it took about $1500 to print this one piece, something very out of reach is you don't have privilege access to the tech.

[FilmAt11]

Below is a recent print of a top cap design done in carbon fiber PLA material. It's a bit stiffer than the PLA and ABS material used in my other prints. It looks similar to the composite plastic in a Selle Italia SLR saddle. Cost is still minimal - US$6.50 for (2) pieces. I also inquired whether a smooth surface was possible. The printer said he was able to compress the surface just after printing the layer and it came out very nicely - a smooth, shiny top surface.

While these prints are nice enough to use, I'm going to continue experimentation and create a 3d-printed, 2-part compression mould for producing a carbon fiber part. Any tips on mould tolerance would be appreciated (e.g. measuring the carbon fiber thickness, allowance for epoxy, etc.).

[prendrefeu]

Hey there -

long time no talk/see around these parts! Are you still riding the Cuneo?

Quick question about these prints: where did you have them made? Did you send over an sls file or 3dm or what?

Below is a recent print of a top cap design done in carbon fiber PLA material. It's a bit stiffer than the PLA and ABS material used in my other prints. It looks similar to the composite plastic in a Selle Italia SLR saddle. Cost is still minimal - US$6.50 for (2) pieces. I also inquired whether a smooth surface was possible. The printer said he was able to compress the surface just after printing the layer and it came out very nicely - a smooth, shiny top surface.

While these prints are nice enough to use, I'm going to continue experimentation and create a 3d-printed, 2-part compression mould for producing a carbon fiber part. Any tips on mould tolerance would be appreciated (e.g. measuring the carbon fiber thickness, allowance for epoxy, etc.).

[FilmAt11]

Hi Prend, after trying basic GUI tools, now I use OpenSCAD for development and produce an STL file. I use the 3dHubs service as mentioned earlier in the thread. I've worked with two "hubs" in San Diego to do the printing.

Cuneo is hung on the wall, I'm currently riding a Cipollini Bond

http://weightweenies.starbike.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=129594&start=75#p1187192

[WheresWaldo]

@FilmAt11, I just got a sample of some new filament as a beta test, it is carbon fiber filled nylon filament. Of course all the previsos dealing with nylon filaments in FDM printers apply, but it comes out a lot less brittle than CF filled PLA and much stronger CF filled PETG (Colorfabb XT20-CF). I don't know when it will be released but it does seem to make very strong parts with a Tg significantly higher than PLA based filaments. Now if only someone would make a CF filled polycarbonate filament.

[andreszucs]

Below is a recent print of a top cap design done in carbon fiber PLA material.

I remember you posting these printed on plastic before. So this one is the same parts but now with carbon fiber PLA? Finish looks good indeed. Any chance you can take another picture with some light reflecting on the surface for a closer look?

[Werking]

The XTC colorfabb its a fake CF filament the pla is probably stronger bit a little bit heavy

[WheresWaldo]

@Werking, the colorFABB XT-CF20 is PETG based carbon filled. It also happens to be the filament of choice from all those companies that want you to believe that a robust really rideable bike can be 3D printed. For small parts it is okay, stiffer than PLA without being brittle, less prone to environmental factors like wet weather than PLA. PLA is just not a good choice for parts, no matter how small, you want hanging off your bike.

ABS or some other composite of nylon are to two that you will usually see coming from OE manufacturers. None of them use PLA. For those that don't know what PETG is, just buy a bottle of water and you will be holding a PETG container.

[Werking]

I know how its Made XT CF 20 I have write a full review text on stampa 3d forum.it the most viewed 3dprinting italian website that I have founded with other two guys.

http://www.stampa3d-forum.it/test-colorfabb-xt-cf20/

I have test also 2 CF filaments both with nylon based. I dont like this type of filamenti because the fibre it s very very short, so the best quality of a CF is the lenght of the fiber.

[mythical]

Just out of curiosity, what's the sentiment here regarding a 3D printed titanium crankset?

[tmr5555]

YES PLEASE!!!

In seriousness, setting the prohibitive cost aside, having printed in Ti before the material tends to be a little porous at times, this could cause friction at the crank spindle which would need to be machined along with any bolt threads/holes.
IIRC due to the nature of the 3d printing process the end item ends not being as strong as a similar part cnc'ed from billet. (Maybe an engineer can comment, industrial designer here).

It's possible of course but we need to look at the possible advantages of using 3dp over more conventional methods.
Having honeycomb internal structured arms would save weight. But you would need to leave holes on them to allow for the unused/unfused Ti dust to escape, etc etc etc. Covering the arms with a cosmetic layer of carbon would solve this.

Exmple:

[mythical]

Can you further define what you meant by porous? And what did you print before in titanium and which additive manufacturing process was used for it? In my own investigation I came across research that shows it varies between all the different manufacturing methods, such as SLM, SLS (DMLS), EBM, etc.