Ours don't, ford seemed to have changed the composition of the plastic for the 1980 model year. I was talking about 1970 - 1979. For example my '78 Mercury, same cluster from the '77-'79 Tbird, they crumble and fall apart with age. I had to find a replacement for mine but even then the tabs were broken off.


There is no reproduction for theses and T'bird sanctuary told me if I located the original mold and purchased it for them they would start reproducting the housings. I think 3D printing could be an excellent alternative for this as you can print them out of better plastics and they don't have to have a perfect finish as they are not visable.

 

Ahhh! Now I understand. Thanks.

 

The vapor booth can go a long way towards making a presentable finished product.
Evidently it also helps fuse the layers, making them stronger.



From, Building an Acetone Vapor Bath for Smoothing 3D-Printed Parts - Sink Hacks

 

wow that looks terrible in the before.

 

Huge difference. The write-up helped a lot. Thanks.

 

I have to say that looks quite a bit like the tiny space shuttles I got from my Uncle on open house day at Nasa back in the '90s. Makes me wonder now if they were 3D printed themselves.

 

I see now that Acetone and MEK work with ABS, but not the PLA filament that Makerbot uses.
You need methylene chloride or ethyl acetate fumes to melt PLA.

The dissolvable polystyrene you mention is used as an armature to support parts as they are molded.

Doing a Google search yields some great results.
In fact Gary, I see someone has a 3D object in a Dillion FL-series vibratory case polisher.


from here; Finishing prints? (Page 1) ? 3D Printer Discussion ? SoliForum - 3D Printing Community

 

Makerbot also uses ABS in addition to PLA. But, the reviews I've read on Makerbot haven't been all that good. But there are some out there with very good reviews.

Yes, that is a vibrator polishing a 3D object, although I don't know what the media is. Do you?

And, I've also see some very interesting things printed. So it should be quite doable for the smaller things we've discussed. But, the resolution/ridges worries me for larger things. I've found one printer that has the resolution down to .0004", but even then there are lots of ridges in their demo products. So, I'm not sure if it is time, yet.

 

I posted the source link.
The media is angle cut porcelain rod.

Like I said, this process is like building something up out of beads of weld.
There will always be ridges in the finished product.

If you were laser sintering metal or using UV lasers and a tank of liquid monomer to model your object things would be different.
And perhaps you would have the resolution to replicate the grain of your door latch bezel.
But the file size would be huge and the equipment cost well into six figures.

Hey!
FabLab Tulsa is on South Lewis Ave.
Hardesty Center for Fab Lab Tulsa
It's almost calling you there...

 

RepRap, Cube, Utilimaker, Formlabs, even Dremel at Home Depot!

Makerbot just gets -seen- a lot more because they sold out to Stratasys.
The Maker/Hacker/Crowdsourcing community didn't take this well.

There is a company in Asia using robotic control and concrete pumps to "print" buildings.

Maybe inkjet and powder is the next big thing?
IDK

 

That's actually the lab I was thinking about. And, they have a 3D scanner. It isn't far from the shopping center where my wife likes to shop, so I think I'll go visit them. And perhaps take a door lock bezel to scan. Then maybe I can either have them print it as a trial run, or bring it back to edit if that is required.

As for the ceramic rod, I'd missed the link. Thanks, I'll go read that. But the more I read the more I think 3D printing isn't all it is cracked up to be. One guy wrote that it is great for prototyping, and his business has helped 100's get their ideas into a three-dimensional object that they can take to a manufacturer. But, the products aren't strong as the layers don't bond all that well to each other. And, there's the layer of welds you mentioned, which he said takes a lot of post-processing to get smooth - which people don't mention in their "look what I made" claims.

 

Oh yeah, not high strength composites for sure, but you could sure save on your material costs by creating a honeycomb section inside. Finish both ends of the hollows with an egg carton shape or half sphere to build back into the solid structure.

I hadn't seen small scale vapour degreasers used to smooth off the finish - nice one

 

The solvent vapor 'smoothing' does a lot to strengthen the object by fusing the layers together.
Just like steam gets in your pores, the fumes get into any little voids and melt the print into a monolithic object.

As I mentioned to Brad in the first few page of this thread, the strength isn't there for structural items with thermoplastic extrusion.

Still, I think it's a great way to make something like a door latch, drawer slide or other noncritical item.
The ability for people to share ideas and modify them in a creative online community like Thingverse is good or bad depending on how you feel about things like printed firearms.
THAT got a lot of press recently!

As you can see, I Geek Out about things like this.

 

Years back, in my rocket geek days while the ISS was coming together, I wondered why they carried trusses into space instead of carrying a roll of roving, a tank of UV curing resin and a simple ex/pul truder?
You could make any length and shape of beam.
The filament would be plenty strong in zero gravity and the matrix would cure instantly without the ozone filter of our atmosphere.

I think an inkjet printer (maybe gel, for body?) and a UV chamber would be another direction for this 3D printing to go.
You could easily do clear lenses like was suggested earlier.

Inkjet has the speed and certainly the resolution for much more detailed objects.

Thermosetting (or UV curing) plastics have the ability to keep their form under more stress.

 

Ahh so it smooths and "case hardens" them as well, nice.

The printed gun got a lot of hype here as well, really overblown IMO.