I was wondering if anyone has used a 3D printing service to make some new plastic parts for the interrior plastic pieces. I have plenty of brittle pieces of plastic holding in the window switches, ashtray, glovebox......

It seems to be advancing in popularity and becomming affordable to get something, "printed" using one of these machines. (basically a CNC machine for virtually any shape of plastic)

Ive been thinking of getting a few replacement parts made up as I feel like if i were to find some off another car, they may be just as brittle and break in a short time. But with the new technology of printing with these plastic printers, you can recreate any part you want with new plastic.

It probably wouldnt be suitable for any part subject to high heat, abrasion or chemical exposure, but for the plethora of little plastic things around in a car I thought it may be perfect.

Anyone try it already?

I previously did do rapid prototyping in high school and a little bit a year ago. The machine we used was a Dimensional BST in school and in the prototype lab we had a Dimensional DST. BST = break away support type DST = dissolve away support type

Both machines used ABS plastic to print the parts from the CAD file. The quality was superb and worked great for prototype work and mold casting. The parts would not be 100% smooth so for mold casting we would do some minor bondo work.

For the idea you have its ideal, however the costs of the machine outweigh it. If you were to have a place with the machine CAD the part for you and make you a few, sure it will be good but still expensive due to labor/costs. The material is cheap, its ABS for petes sake.

Search google for Jay Leno 3d printing. It not as expensive as it seems and can reproduce internal moving parts.

The machine in the video and scanner are the machines we had. The owner of the place where I worked won them in a charity auction.

3D printers have many promising areas of potential future application. It has become more popular and useful, especially to auto industry. 3D printing is about the coolest thing in the universe, as a “printer” layers together to produce a physical object. It was not long before someone used one to create transportation and a 3D printer car from Belgium was recently clocked going from 0 to 60 miles per hour in 4 seconds.

The "Milk Bath" that the parts magically emerge from --is that just a way to keep people from seeing whats going on when the plastic is formed? how the heck does it work?

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