My first of many 3D printed Jeep parts

[Cspence]

What material? I think PLA will break down in UV fairly quick, making ABS better but harder to print. I get alot of warping with ABS even with an enclosure.

It's PETG, thats what I use most of the time. Very little to no warping, no smell and from what I gather good with UV exposure. That said, if it does deteriorate, I'm only 12 hours away from having a new one lol

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[OldSarge]

Good to know about petg. I’ve made some pla radio mounts that wither quickly in the Texas summer

 

[Outback_Joe]

Very interesting parts and following.

 

[scotticus]

I've been using PETG for parts on my Front Runner racks, mostly to hold the Wolf Packs. Also molle nuts on the SmartCap. love solving problems with the 3D printer!

 

[Stan H]

A thingamajigger for a watchamacallit !

 

[Blackjeepjk]

Great work! What program are you using for the initial drawing? I’ve tried all the free stuff, tinkercad and sketchup anyways and can’t seem to get much flexibility. Looking at autocad inventor but pricey.

 

[Cspence]

Great work! What program are you using for the initial drawing? I’ve tried all the free stuff, tinkercad and sketchup anyways and can’t seem to get much flexibility. Looking at autocad inventor but pricey.

Thanks!

I use FreeCAD, fantastic (and obviously Free) software, just took a little time and several YouTube videos for me to get familiarized with it. I'm sure some really savvy designers and engineers would find limitations in its capabilities, but I've done some pretty intricate things with it.

 

[Blackjeepjk]

Thanks!

I use FreeCAD, fantastic (and obviously Free) software, just took a little time and several YouTube videos for me to get familiarized with it. I'm sure some really savvy designers and engineers would find limitations in its capabilities, but I've done some pretty intricate things with it.

thank you very much! Will dive into that one tonight. I’m not that savvy or high level of expertise but proficient with autocad industrial. Just need one that you can actually draw in and not just use predefined shapes.

Thanks again and keep your creativity flowing and sharing your results with us.

 

[scotticus]

you can use Fusion 360 for free for hobby use. There are lots of great how-to articles and its pretty intitive. There is also Blender which is a 3D modeling application, more artistic than CAD based applications, but completely free. Its definitely a bit harder to use.

 

[DirkG]

Me be like when I see someone print something cool with a 3D printer...

 

[Cspence]

Me be like when I see someone print something cool with a 3D printer...

You should dive into the hobby! Its way more intimidating than it actually is. First my concern was the cost of the printers as a few years ago they were all thousands of dollars. Then I learned I could get a really good capable printer for a few hundred bucks. (I opted for a Prusa Mini which I 1000% recommend to everyone for reasons which I won't bore you with here). Then I was nervous about learning how to "program" and use the printer. With Prusa Slicer, it honestly takes 90% of the guess work out of getting consistently good prints. All you need to do is export your model out of your CAD software (any one of your liking) as an STL, drop it in Prusa Slicer, rotate / reorient the part if necessary so the most appropriate side is facing "down", select the type of filament material (PLA, ABS, PETG) and then hit "go". The software does everything else. Of course there are infinite paramaters you can tweak to fine tune to achieve the results you desire (and there is a lot of trial and error happening there if you need something super precise or perfect), but its really not too bad. I'd like to think that I'm a very intelligent person, but the reality is I'm just a average Joe, if I can do it, you most definitely could too!!

 

[djthumper]

you can use Fusion 360 for free for hobby use. There are lots of great how-to articles and its pretty intitive. There is also Blender which is a 3D modeling application, more artistic than CAD based applications, but completely free. Its definitely a bit harder to use.

They have crippled the free version to 2D.

 

[scotticus]

They have crippled the free version to 2D.

im still doing 3D stuff with the Hobby license. Not sure if I got grandfathered in. They didn’t make it easy.

 

[djthumper]

im still doing 3D stuff with the Hobby license. Not sure if I got grandfathered in. They didn’t make it easy.

I had to rebuild my computer and when I reinstalled Fusion it was crippled.

 

[BooBoo28]

I had to rebuild my computer and when I reinstalled Fusion it was crippled.

I use the non-commercial version and it has very few limitations (e.g. 10 editable designs open at once) so I would uninstall and reinstall.

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