Home Made Bikes

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Posted: Oct 6, 2014 at 7:44 Quote
Arnoodles wrote:
acboyd656 wrote:
Mini-Pinner wrote:
$5 per cubic inch is way off unless your printing solid instead of honeycomb in which case your biggest problem will be the 5 day print time not the cost. IMO 3d printing is not worth it unless you have your own so that you can change the model and reprint until your satisfied that you are ready to make it out of metal . I would say that a mill would be helpful but is not necessary as long as you use a little creativity and you don't mind if your bike looks a little extra homemade. A lathe would be hard to go without but you could easily pay a local machinist to do the small a mount of lathe work necessary if you can't access one. As for welding. Tig is considered the best however on a steel frame you can't go wrong with fillet brazing. Plenty strong and I think it's easier to learn as the heat is much lower so you just take your time. Also, you can see exactly what your doing. For mitering tubes, you can either get a special jig for the lathe or use a file and a Dremel. There is free software which lets you print out a cutting template called tubemitre.exe I believe.

It's still $5 per cubic inch whether you print solid or honeycomb. You are paying for material not the size of the part.
Honeycomb is hollow, so less material...

Those are fun to play with as long as you have your glue is dry and table is level. At least for the type we have at work. We can work with abs, pla, and nylon when they start shipping it. Neat tool, expensive to get in too however. There are a couple of major pro's and con's with it though. you can fit these things just about anywhere, and you can go from your imagination to your computer to your hands in a few hours. The materials are expensive at the moment, but in time this will decrease. The quality of parts really depends on the material and printer type you select as is printing vs rapid prototyping (some guys might say these are the same damn thing but in my eyes they are different and the output is much different quality). The mill and lathe combo are bigger tools, but they will produce production parts every time, they can last forever when you maintain them, you can essentially get both for the price of a single "professional grade" printer. plus the material is cheaper and they are way more bad arse. ok thats my 2 cents, have a nice day fellas.

Posted: Oct 6, 2014 at 11:26 Quote
Not used in high stress applications? Boeing uses 3d printed parts in their wings and airbrakes.

Honeycomb or not the price is still 5$ per cubic inch. Just the size changes if you honeycomb it.

Posted: Oct 6, 2014 at 12:48 Quote
bonfire wrote:
Not used in high stress applications? Boeing uses 3d printed parts in their wings and airbrakes.

Honeycomb or not the price is still 5$ per cubic inch. Just the size changes if you honeycomb it.

I have a feeling the writer may have misunderstood the cost comparing the print cost to material cost, no big deal. And you are spot on with the high stress applications of 3d printed materials. Boeing is using 3D printed titanium all over the place and they actually had to test it in industry for quite a few years prior to using it in planes. I can't recall the name of the company by their are several bike saddles that use 3D printed frame structures. Pretty cool stuff.

Posted: Oct 6, 2014 at 13:15 Quote
joose wrote:
bonfire wrote:
Not used in high stress applications? Boeing uses 3d printed parts in their wings and airbrakes.

Honeycomb or not the price is still 5$ per cubic inch. Just the size changes if you honeycomb it.

I have a feeling the writer may have misunderstood the cost comparing the print cost to material cost, no big deal. And you are spot on with the high stress applications of 3d printed materials. Boeing is using 3D printed titanium all over the place and they actually had to test it in industry for quite a few years prior to using it in planes. I can't recall the name of the company by their are several bike saddles that use 3D printed frame structures. Pretty cool stuff.
Isn't empire making 3d printed frames as well? It'd definitely be cool to see more development there. It's amazing the kind of shapes you can create that can't be made otherwise.

Posted: Oct 6, 2014 at 14:16 Quote
Charge is 3D printing dropouts. Link

Posted: Oct 6, 2014 at 16:20 Quote
3d printing stuff is still waaay cheaper than milling it. i dont see why it would not be strong enough to use on a functional bike if it's printed in appropriate material- i plan on testing it out next season on a few of mine.

Posted: Oct 6, 2014 at 19:28 Quote
madm3chanic wrote:
3d printing stuff is still waaay cheaper than milling it. i dont see why it would not be strong enough to use on a functional bike if it's printed in appropriate material- i plan on testing it out next season on a few of mine.

At the moment does anyone have a real confident quote on the cost of printing metal parts? Metal printing in industry in still somewhat in its infancy so their aren't a lot of companies doing job shop style prints in my area (Midwest USA) But I would be very interested in seeing the cost, as it would be very useful on my frame I'm designing now. Titanium is preferred for prints.

Posted: Oct 6, 2014 at 21:38 Quote
joose wrote:
madm3chanic wrote:
3d printing stuff is still waaay cheaper than milling it. i dont see why it would not be strong enough to use on a functional bike if it's printed in appropriate material- i plan on testing it out next season on a few of mine.

At the moment does anyone have a real confident quote on the cost of printing metal parts? Metal printing in industry in still somewhat in its infancy so their aren't a lot of companies doing job shop style prints in my area (Midwest USA) But I would be very interested in seeing the cost, as it would be very useful on my frame I'm designing now. Titanium is preferred for prints.

you ever worked with ti? its not easy...

Posted: Oct 7, 2014 at 7:41 Quote
madm3chanic wrote:
joose wrote:
madm3chanic wrote:
3d printing stuff is still waaay cheaper than milling it. i dont see why it would not be strong enough to use on a functional bike if it's printed in appropriate material- i plan on testing it out next season on a few of mine.

At the moment does anyone have a real confident quote on the cost of printing metal parts? Metal printing in industry in still somewhat in its infancy so their aren't a lot of companies doing job shop style prints in my area (Midwest USA) But I would be very interested in seeing the cost, as it would be very useful on my frame I'm designing now. Titanium is preferred for prints.

you ever worked with ti? its not easy...

I havent used it for welding, but i would most likely be working with someone who has. I have machined it a few different times however, never from a printed form though so it would be an experience. The ti is just the preferred material if i would be printing part of my frame from it. If i were to use it for a frame i would probably start with the upper and lower links for the suspension.

Posted: Oct 7, 2014 at 14:38 Quote
joose wrote:
Arnoodles wrote:
acboyd656 wrote:


It's still $5 per cubic inch whether you print solid or honeycomb. You are paying for material not the size of the part.
Honeycomb is hollow, so less material...

Those are fun to play with as long as you have your glue is dry and table is level. At least for the type we have at work. We can work with abs, pla, and nylon when they start shipping it. Neat tool, expensive to get in too however. There are a couple of major pro's and con's with it though. you can fit these things just about anywhere, and you can go from your imagination to your computer to your hands in a few hours. The materials are expensive at the moment, but in time this will decrease. The quality of parts really depends on the material and printer type you select as is printing vs rapid prototyping (some guys might say these are the same damn thing but in my eyes they are different and the output is much different quality). The mill and lathe combo are bigger tools, but they will produce production parts every time, they can last forever when you maintain them, you can essentially get both for the price of a single "professional grade" printer. plus the material is cheaper and they are way more bad arse. ok thats my 2 cents, have a nice day fellas.

I think we might be on a different page. I assumed he meant he wanted to print a scale model of his frame in plastic by the way he asked how much it would cost to print his 'model' but i may be wrong. I was not comparing a mill and a lathe to a 3d printer. As far as im aware 3d printing metal is still a very new technology that is not readily available to the public but again i may be wrong. As for the cost thing, i can see that acboyd is talking about a cubic inch of filament not a cubic inch print. In which case, that sounds about right for the cost and that's not particularly expensive as that amount of filament could go a long way. I was confused as filament is normally bought by the reel based on weight not volume.

O+
Posted: Oct 7, 2014 at 15:57 Quote
Mini-Pinner wrote:
joose wrote:
Arnoodles wrote:

Honeycomb is hollow, so less material...

Those are fun to play with as long as you have your glue is dry and table is level. At least for the type we have at work. We can work with abs, pla, and nylon when they start shipping it. Neat tool, expensive to get in too however. There are a couple of major pro's and con's with it though. you can fit these things just about anywhere, and you can go from your imagination to your computer to your hands in a few hours. The materials are expensive at the moment, but in time this will decrease. The quality of parts really depends on the material and printer type you select as is printing vs rapid prototyping (some guys might say these are the same damn thing but in my eyes they are different and the output is much different quality). The mill and lathe combo are bigger tools, but they will produce production parts every time, they can last forever when you maintain them, you can essentially get both for the price of a single "professional grade" printer. plus the material is cheaper and they are way more bad arse. ok thats my 2 cents, have a nice day fellas.

I think we might be on a different page. I assumed he meant he wanted to print a scale model of his frame in plastic by the way he asked how much it would cost to print his 'model' but i may be wrong. I was not comparing a mill and a lathe to a 3d printer. As far as im aware 3d printing metal is still a very new technology that is not readily available to the public but again i may be wrong. As for the cost thing, i can see that acboyd is talking about a cubic inch of filament not a cubic inch print. In which case, that sounds about right for the cost and that's not particularly expensive as that amount of filament could go a long way. I was confused as filament is normally bought by the reel based on weight not volume.

Ya I was talking about material not part size. That's how I have seen it priced, but I'm super well informed on commercial practice. This has all been in academia.

Posted: Oct 9, 2014 at 5:32 Quote
What would be the minimum amount of gear you would need to build a steel frame?

O+
Posted: Oct 9, 2014 at 11:18 Quote
dingus wrote:
What would be the minimum amount of gear you would need to build a steel frame?

hacksaw
files
tube blocks
vise
brazing torch set up
some aluminium channel from the hardware store
bike stand to hold things

With just that list above I've built this.

photo

Posted: Oct 9, 2014 at 13:27 Quote
i like the bike, good job on it! how does she ride? looks like it would have a inward axle path though probably just because it is sitting on the stand at the wrong angle.

O+
Posted: Oct 9, 2014 at 14:48 Quote
It's not done yet, I will have it built up for it's first test ride on Saturday.


 


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