New LED Dune Buggy Signal Lights Project Part 2

Things are going well this week with the LED dune buggy signal light project.  I have managed to get through all of the 3D printing that needed to be done and have started smoothing out the parts to get them ready for paint.  So with all of this progress I thought I should show you how it all looks at this point.

This part which is one of the LED light housings for this project took 35 hours to 3D print.  I am very pleased with how it turned out.  The vertical wall that you see in the part above was a support wall only used during the printing of the part.  It was removed very easily after the print was completed. 

With the two housings that I need for the project, I also needed to 3D print the mounting plates for the lights as well.  This added an additional 16 hours of 3D printing.  After having completed this portion of the project I am also more and more impressed with my Creality CR-10 S4 3D printer as well.  A real workhorse to make such nice parts for this project. 

Here are the two LED light mounting plates for the project.  The one on the right is still in primer and glazing putty and the one on the left has had all of the sanding completed along with a couple of nice coats of glossy red paint.  They will look great when both are completed and installed in the final assembly.

After the light housings had been 3D printed I decided that I should strengthen them by coating them inside and out with several layers of fiberglass.  The housings were only printed with a 20% infill (honeycomb webbing on the inside walls of the part) which kept the print time down to 35 hours.  If I had doubled the infill to 40% then the print time per housing would have doubled to 70 hours time per part.  Not something I really wanted to do.  So the fiberglass layers seemed like a smart choice.  

After the parts had cured overnight the housing now are strong enough to stand on.  Not that I would want to do that but it's nice to know that the strength is there just the same with very little additional weight gain.

Next the housings were coated with a layer of fiberglass resin and micro-balloons.  Micro-balloons are microscopic hollow glass balls which looks like a fine powder.  This is mixed with the fiberglass resin to form a thick putty.  This putty mixture is then spread on to the parts to fill the weave.  In the photo above the part on the right has the putty mixture on it just after it has been spread on.  After this putty has cured overnight it is sanded down to look like the part on the left.  A much smoother finish that is a good base to prep for primer and later paint.

Here you can see a big difference after one of the housing had been sanded smooth and painted with primer.  Not a hard task to do but it does take some time to get all of the flaws out that the primer shows in the part after it has been sprayed on. 

In order to get a perfect fit of the housing to the body of the dune buggy I first clamped one of the housing to the body just to see how close I was in designing the part.  From the photos above I am pretty happy with how it look and fits but I know it could be much better. 

I removed the housing from the dune buggy and covered the area where the housing will be mounted with a 3mil layer of plastic.  I then cut a hole for the housing so that it again could be re-clamped on to the body as before.

Here the housing is once again clamped into place.  The reason for the plastic covering the body is so that I can use my putty mixture once again to get a perfect mating surface created on to the housing that will match the dune buggy body shape and then be able to remove it without causing any damage to the body itself. 

In the photos above you can see the putty mixture has been spread on to the housing and plastic covered body where the two part meet.  This will give me a perfect copy of the body shape so that there will be no gaps between the body and the tail light housing once it has cured and been sanded smooth for paint. This will give me a perfect fit when I mount the housings once they have been smoothed and painted. 

I left the putty cure overnight and this morning I was able to remove the housing from the dune buggy with very little effort.  As you can see from the photo above it also left very little of the putty on the plastic as well. 

This is what the underside of the housing looked like once it had been removed from the dune buggy.  The micro-balloon and resin putty had fully hardened and actually tapers down toward the center of the part from the outer perimeter. 

I then used additional putty to finish this putty edge taper so that it feathers out thinner as it gets closer to the large opening in the center of the apart.  I will let this cure again overnight and then start sanding the part once again on the outside surfaces to get it as smooth as possible for painting. 

In this next week I hope to have the housings smoothed and painted and then I can begin final assembly of the tail lights for the dune buggy. I also tallied up all the hours that I 3D printed parts for this project including the housings for the front signal lights.  The grand total came up to 101 hours.  I'm very happy to have all of the parts turn out as well as they did so I can keep the project moving right along.  I'll make sure to let you know how it all turns out in my next post.  Good luck with your latest project!

New LED Dune Buggy Signal Lights Project

With all that has been happening here at the shop over the past few weeks I was not even sure I was going to find time to get this post out to all of you.  So with the few minutes that I have free while making parts for this project I put everything else aside that needed to be looked at around my house to let you know what has been happening. 

The big delay in getting any of this out on the blog has been having to put a new roof on my house along with correcting a good portion of the wiring that either did not work in the house or had no switches to turn things on and off where it was convenient. Plus now I've found out that a very large tree in my front yard needs to be cut down.  So finally here is the project. 

I had thought that I was done with all the projects that I wanted to do on my dune buggy until I found out that the rear signal lights in the little beast simple were not working or were barely working depending on how you look at it.  The front signal lights worked fine and this was the good news.  The bad news was that the rear signal lights barely worked on the driver's side and not at all on the passenger's side. On  top of this the running lights and brake lights were not as bright as I wanted them. So it was decided to replace all of the signal lights (front and rear) to LED light setups. 

Here are a couple of photos of the signal lights that were on the car when I bought it.  The front signal lights as I said were working fine and they looked OK so I was happy with them at that point.  The rear signal lights shown in the photo above are the ones that I have issues with. From what I can tell the rear lights are what are used in a trailer and the bulbs in them cannot be replaced.  They are a sealed beam setup.   This plus the fact that the rear portion of the body tips forward and makes the lights shine upward as well as out to the side of the car.  Not a good thing for dim lights in the first place. 

I started with the front lights as this was the simpler of the two sets to replace as I knew that they worked and it was just a matter of finding some nice LED lights that would look good to replace the old ones.  I tracked down the new lights that I thought would do the job only to find out that the original hole for the old lights were to small to fit the new lights.  So some design work needed to be done to create a housing for the new lights as I did not want to try and cut larger holes into the car body. 

This is what I came up with.  I designed the new LED light housings so that they would be inserted into the original holes that were already in the body and also use the existing smaller bolt holes for the housing that were already in the body as well.  The new 3D printed housings turned out very well as you can see and only needed to be smoothed and painted gloss black to be ready for mounting.  I also designed the housings so that the new LED lights would point directly forward for the best visibility while driving.

Here is the new LED light with the housing, rubber mount for the light, as well as a small foam rubber gasket that is mounted between the body of the dune buggy and the light housing.  This little gasket I made using my laser cutter.  The foam rubber I had found at my local Walmart store in the craft isle and it is exactly what I needed for this project. 

Here is what the new LED housing looks like just after I mounted it to the body using 6-32 bolts and lock nuts. Already a big improvement over the old lights. 

 The LED light at this point is held in place with a rubber mounting ring that is slid into the housing first.  This rubber mount locks itself in place and looks good as well.  The LED light and it's wiring were then fed through the housing to the underside of the fender where it was wired up to make it all work properly.   A simple task as the wiring is easy to get at. 

Here's how it all looks with the headlights on.

Again another look with the signal light flashing.  A much brighter setup than the original light that I had in the dune buggy.  So the project is half done at this point. 

To get an idea of what was needed for the rear tail lights I started simply by laying out a foam core box that fit up to the tail end of the dune buggy.  I know it looks crude at this point but it gave me the information that I needed to work out the design for the new rear LED tail lights. 

The foam core box layout gave me the dimensions of all the sides of the housing for the new LED lights.  Each side was a different shape and dimension and this was the simplest way to figure all of that out short of being able to 3D scan the rear end of the dune buggy.  Something that would have been nice to use but not in my budget to own.  

The new tail lights that will be installed into my dune buggy are for a 1965 Mustang.  I really like the looks of the lights and an LED insert was available which made the setup an easy choice for this project.  

After working with my brother who owns an auto body shop we tracked down the problem to the original tail lights. To put it simply the dune buggy had a bad ground or at the very least a poor ground.  To solve this issue I ran a test wire directly from the negative side of the battery to the new lights.  I tested this setup and turned on lights, stepped on brakes, and fired up signal lights and it all worked perfectly!  So that is the plan of action.  I will run a new ground wire to the tail end of the dune buggy to make everything work the way it should. 

To get the tail lights pointed in the right direction I have designed a new housing (shown above) for the lights that will be mounted to the body. A much smoother design from the foam core box to be sure. This was a trick in itself as the housing could not be mounted to the body with the light already installed into it. Or the light could not be installed into the housing already mounted to the dune buggy.  

To solve this problem I split up the assembly so that the tail lights could be mounted as shown in the image above. The Light Cowling is first attached to the Dune Buggy rear end using four small nuts and bolts.  Then the Light Bucket is attached to the front of the Cowling Face Plate.  The LED Assembly and Bezel are next and they are attached to the front of the Light Bucket.  Once this is done the Cowling Face Plate is attached to the Light Cowling using two small nuts and bolts on each side of Light Cowling.   

All that is needed after this has been accomplished is to hook up the wiring and I will have new LED tail lights on the rear of the dune buggy.  At that point I will be able to breath a sigh of relief knowing that I will be seen when I want to drive the dune buggy and make a turn or stop and not have the worry so much about having an accident because of poor lighting.

I have a bunch of 3D printing to get at for this project yet so I will close for now but will post more about my progress once I get a bit farther along with all that needs to be done.  

1/6th Scale 3D Printed 1927 Bugatti Type 35 Model Project Part 5

I've spent at least a couple of hundred hours these past few weeks in the designing of this Bugatti Type 35 model and am finally getting to making parts for it on my 3D printer!

I am also very pleased with the images shown above that I created using Fusion 360 CAD software. Looks pretty much like the real car so that is a good start anyway as far as getting a model of the car built that looks as correct as possible.  At least as correct as I can make it without having the engineering drawings to make it absolutely perfect. 

Shown above are the components that are needed to make up the frame along with the floor and lower section of the engine compartment. The four long pieces at the top of the photo are the rails for the frame.  I needed to each of the two rails in two sections as my 3D printer could not make them all in one piece without making the entire model in a smaller scale.  Not something I wanted to do from the start. 

Here is the floor of the car with the center hump for the driveshaft and the mounting holes for the seat supports.  I was happy that this part turned out so well as it will be one of the main features to see in the model once it has been completely assembled.  The larger hole in the floor will be needed to mount the dual mufflers in the model.  All of these holes will be covered up by the seats so they will not be seen again after assembly.

Here the frame and floor have been test fit together to make sure everything lines up correctly. The panel setting next to the frame is the underside view of the engine compartment.  The model's engine compartment will not have the capability to be opened up so I did not bother with trying to design the engine for it.  The underside of the engine compartment had to be simplified to fill the space where the engine would be along with a mounting area for the dual exhaust.  This part will be installed on to the frame once it has been glued together.  

Here is another look at what the frame will look like once the axles and wheels have been add to the build. Total time to 3D print the parts I have shown here came to around 79 hours. This seems like a lot but the best I can estimate to 3D print the entire model will be right around 200 to 300 hours or more.  Then add in another 200 hours or so for the design work and your now looking at a 400 to 500 hour build. 

 It all takes time both on and off of the computer.  Hopefully in the coming weeks I will be able to get more 3D printing done on this 24" long Bugatti model. It should be a nice display piece when I get it all put together. 

The Indian Motorcycle Logo Sign Project Part One

Way back when I started this blog I put out a post about something I had created in Blender 3D software.  It was of the Indian motorcycle logo sign. I thought after all these years that now was the time to actually make the sign I only dreamt about all those years ago.

This is a copy of the image that I had used to make my Blender 3D creation way back in 2011.  I wanted to make a very large sign at the time but never got around to either finding the time or the money or the space to build it or display it properly.  So I settled for the Blender 3D version.

Here is my Blender version of the sign and I am still very proud of what I created.  It would make an impressive sign in chrome plated steel on a wooden base as you see here but it probably would be very difficult to make as well as expensive on top of it all.  I simply do not have that type of talent when it comes to shaping metal so I never attempted to make it this way.  

With this project in mind I recreated the sign as you see it here using Fusion 360 CAD software. Instead of chrome plated steel I thought I would try and make the sign smaller and the intricate parts by 3D printing them on my 3D printer.  The sign would be 16.5" x 8.5".  I would make it bigger but my 3D printer would not be able to make the Indian head perimeter that large.  As you can see from the image above the perimeter is all one piece so that is the issue with making it on my 3D printer.

In the image above I used a wooden base which looks very nice and being smaller in size would not be a big issue with trying to hang I on a wall when it is completed.  It will be easy enough to cut a piece of wood to that size and varnish it.  The real trick is how to attach all of the pieces to make up the sign once the wood has been cut and how to locate all the piece in the correct orientation that you see in the image.  Something that I will have to work out further before I actually start making parts. 

I also thought about having a gloss black base instead of a wooden one.  But after comparing the two images that I have here I am leaning more toward the wooden display due to cost as well as the over all look of the sign.  I think the wood looks a bit warmer than the all gloss black display.  Both have their merits so it is something else that I will have to consider further on this project. 

I did manage to track down some very nice gloss brass colored paint today.  I took one of my reject parts from another project and painted it to see how it would turn out.  As you can see from the photo above it sure looks like brass to me.  So to paint all of the parts for the sign with this paint has got my vote to continue on with this project so far.  

All of the parts for the sign would be sanded smooth so that the finish would be even better than the un-sanded part that you see above.  In the mean time I will start tracking down the wood that I want to possibly use for sign as well as the gloss black acrylic.   The plus side to the acrylic base it that there is no need to sand or varnish this part for the sign.  It would save time but not sure if it will keep the cost down just yet.  Will have to do my homework on all of this before I decide my next plan of attack for this project.  So far it looks promising though just the same.  Stay tuned for more on this project in the coming weeks. 

Dune Buggy Wind Deflectors Project Is Completed!

Another banner week here at the workshop with putting the finishing touches to the dune buggy wind deflectors project upgrade and completion. No major issues with the changes that I had made to make the deflectors stronger and smoothing everything out to give all the parts a nice glossy coat of black paint.

As before with my earlier version of the wind deflectors the new upgrades that I had made did not detract from the look that I was going for with the design.  In the photo above the deflectors are pretty much invisible.  

The mounts now are much stronger because of the internal brass rods that I installed into them and they are thicker as well.  I had originally thought that I would paint the mounts red but with them being glass black they blend in very well with the rest of the cars interior roll bar and seats. 

Here's a good look at the lower mount for the driver's side of the dune buggy. I am happy that I took the time to smooth the 3D printed parts out and primed and painted them.  The 3D printed parts have a 60% infill so they are very solid and should hold up very well.  The fact that I painted the parts also will protect them from being in the sun as unpainted 3D printed parts will fade over time.  So again it was worth the effort. 

When I first tested the original mounts I had high winds (28 mph) to deal with and both of the lower mounts had failed and needed to be removed from the dune buggy.  I was driving 55-60 mph and then add another 28 mph and now we're talking 88 mph winds on the deflectors.  I am surprised that they even stayed on the car at that point.  So with the lower mounts failing and having to be redesigned I decided to also upgrade the upper mounts as well.  This only made sense to me as now to beef up the design on all of the mounts.  The upper mount pictured above now matches the lower mount and is just as strong.   

The maximum that I could angle the deflectors outward comes to right around 40 degrees. To get a larger angle on the deflector I would have had to move the deflector farther out from the windshield. This in turn would have made a larger gap between the windshield and the deflector.  Something I did not want to do with the design. As of right now the deflector is only around an inch away from the windshield.  I think it will do the job nicely.  

From any angle the dune buggy is a looker so the wind deflectors will only add just a little more to the looks of the car and a lot more to the comfort of driving it down the road. 

I was fortunate enough today to have the enough bright sunshine, no gale force winds  or low temperatures to contend with so I was able to finally put my seal of approval on the new wind deflectors.  The wind that I did have while driving down the road was no longer hitting me in the face but rather was directed around me and was now coming from the rear. Which is normal for a convertible. Something I remembered from years ago when I drove another small convertible that I had owned.  Good memories renewed with my little test drive. 

The wind deflector modifications that I had made look to be the right solution to the design as there is little if any vibration with the deflectors now while driving down the road.  The mounts feel more solid as well so the deflectors should serve me well in the coming years of cruising.  Plus the fact that the cost to put the wind deflectors together was half the cost of buying ready made ones. ($150 instead of $300) So smiles all around for this addition to the little car. 😁