Thought I would start a thread to see if anybody is printing parts for their boat. I printed some jib clips for a buddy of mine who has a Capri 14.2. His old ones were worn out, so they would fall off the forestay as he was trying to snap them on. The clip screws onto the jib and clamps the bolt rope. To get it on the forestay you twist the clip 90 degrees, pop it on the stay, then rotate it back.
My $100 Snark came with a door hinge for the plywood rudder. I am not going to buy $300 worth of parts to put it back, so I printed this gudgeon for about $8 worth of filament. I'll be making a new rudder, rudder bracket, and tiller as well.
My buddy with the Supercat 17 says he had been having a hard time finding batten holders, and thought that was a good candidate for printed parts.
I designed all this stuff in Freecad and printed it on a Flashforge Finder printer.
Edited by waiex191 on Nov 17, 2020 - 03:36 PM.
what material?
It's PLA. For the machine we have, that's the only option.
PLA is very unlikely the only option for that machine. You should be able to print in ABS, in which ASA is an option, and the best choice for boat parts or anything that lives outside as it is UV stabilized.
waiex191 wrote: Thought I would start a thread to see if anybody is printing parts for their boat...
That's very cool Bryan! Can't wait to see what else you come up with.
Anyone else doing boat parts this way?
____________
Damon Linkous
samc99us wrote: PLA is very unlikely the only option for that machine. You should be able to print in ABS, in which ASA is an option, and the best choice for boat parts or anything that lives outside as it is UV stabilized.
Both of my kids have a Flashforge Finder. It doesn't have a heated bed. My neighbor has an Ender which has a heated bed and prints ABS. I'm still new to this. At work we either have people who run the machines or for metal 3D printing we go out to vendors.
Good to know about UV. My boats live inside when I'm not using them.
Here is my first prototype of a batten pocket protector. Still tweaking parameters. They will cost me about 60 cents per pocket vs about $10 that I saw on Murrays.
Print on the left in blue, original part on the right in white.
Edited by waiex191 on Jan 09, 2021 - 09:36 PM.
Nice!
and good job on the jib hanks
MN3
MN3 wrote: Nice!
and good job on the jib hanks
Thanks! And now I know the proper name for jib hanks.
I print lots of parts for work, surgical instruments prototypes. More importantly I break lots of them. Be sure the slicer makes them solid. PLA isnt very strong. Its strength is about 16% of the most common aluminum. Use in steering parts should be avoided.
Parts break between the layers, which are weld lines.
The PLA parts feel good when new, and for a few cycles match the load capacity of conventional materials. Then they fall apart.
There are filled materials that are much stronger, some carbon filled. They didnt print well on our machines so I cant talk to their capacity.
I would recommend use in non critical parts only.
BTW I made a wind vane of PLA.
My suggestion is to get some heated beds on those machines and at least switch to PETG, that has been my go-to material. Will post pictures later, I mostly print trailer parts but have been printing some lower load parts or those that don't see much tension (spinnaker pole end caps for example). It is on par with ABS in terms of strength, less warping, and much easier bed adherence. I am using Cura 4.8 for slicing with 120% flow on the first layer, either glue stick or hair spray on a glass bed.
For structural parts, I print a lot in carbon filled PETG from Atomic Filaments, its $50/kg. The other parts to look into are PC and Nylon, there are some nice prints on Prusa Mk. 3's with eSun PA-CF, also about $50/kg, but this is an advanced filament that requires drying. PETG also benefits from drying, I bought a food dehydrator to get me started.
Oh, you may need an all metal hotend for the carbon loaded PETG. Standard PETG with a 0.4mm nozzle can be printed at 230-240 deg C, so stock hotends work.
Finally, for those batten end caps, I would double the thickness and maybe increase the pocket depth slightly vs. a factory injection molded Nylon. That will get you back on-par strength wise, at a slight weight penalty.
John, PM sent on another topic.
Double post, deleted.
Edited by samc99us on Jan 10, 2021 - 09:25 AM.
Excellent discussion, thanks all. We do have one heated bed machine in the family, an Ender 3. My kid has it back at his college apartment. We will look into the different filaments. $50/KG doesn't seem too bad.
Mainly right now I'm working on the geometry of the design. The latest is set up for #6 screws and nuts.
At work we have resin printers. We have actually used those parts to make couplings to drive rotating equipment under test. Not as durable as the steel parts but cheap, fast, and easy enough to replace for an endurance test. We have also been going to vendors to have parts printed in aluminum and inconel. Cool stuff, but a bit out of my price range.
BTW I made a wind vane of PLA.
John, I had also considered this as a good project. Did you publish on thingiverse or anywhere?
Thanks,
Im printing parts in PETG and Carbon PETG for my boats. Still learning like everyone else. Here are some quick releases to replace corroded aluminum junk.
Edited by bacho on Jan 13, 2021 - 07:29 AM.
That's very nice. What made you get into 3D printing? Once in a while I see threads and news about 3D printed tech and parts, but I don't really know much about it. Any suggestions how to get started or what is worth reading about it?
bacho wrote: Im printing parts in PETG and Carbon PETG for my boats. Still learning like everyone else. Here are some quick releases to replace corroded aluminum junk.
Bacho, any chance of sharing those parts? Did you find a source for the inserts?
I had to make it all. 1/4 stud in a 3/8 cylinder. All 316ss.
Drilling and tapping the 3/8 rod would be a real challenge by hand IMO.
We found some Hobie mainsail batten tensioner ends on thingiverse and printed up a bunch. We also designed the luff end caps for the main, plus tensioners and luff end caps for the jib battens.
Here are the caps we found on thingiverse:
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3162935
When my kid posts the other solid models I'll put the links up. Also, we found this tool for unlocking the cams:
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4606236
We have printed that tool and I'll try it out tonight.
Also, we found this tool for unlocking the cams:
not sure how that works - may be perfect
i used this one a few decades ago - it was perfect - still under $10
MN3
Cool stuff going on here....
I've done a bunch of design and 3d printing outside of the sailing world, and I would agree that PETG is for sure a step up from PLA when it comes to handling the outdoors.
I think another great candidate that not many people consider is TPU. It's flexible, so it makes printing soft parts possible. While it can be a pain to print, it is very useful for holding things you don't want scratched, or for essentially making any formed "rubber" part. It has been quite tough in my testing, although I wouldn't trust it to hold water....
I've printed a whole bunch of TPU parts for my new P16 trailer, and I another application is to use it to make more comfortable handles for trapeze lines that sits on top of a metal bar.
I got a rat rig 500 that I do parts out of when needed. Next project is doing a whole rudder casting of my own design. Ultimately want to use carbon nylon but there may be other filaments that are strong enough without the cost of carbon nylon.
I'd like to see that if you get it to work, although somehow I see it being quite the job to get something that is going to hold up to that kind of stress.
Do you have any specific ideas on how to go around that currently?
Those rat rigs are pretty nice machines. I like my Voron 2.4 too, although it doesn't have the reliability of a prusa mk3s.
I agree with everything SamC said, but want to add another option.
I've been using PLA+, which is in a whole different league from regular PLA. I'm currently testing an aft spin pole plug and boom gooseneck DS plug from 100% infill PLA+. Parts have held up as well as Delrin so far. Only been in use for two months, but have seen 20-25 kts.
Regular PLA sucks in water, but I made some shark toys for my son the play with in the pool out of PLA+. After a year of use, they still look like new. Three shell layers?, 15% infill.
I'm going to try some carbon filament, but haven't needed to yet.
braddh wrote: I'd like to see that if you get it to work, although somehow I see it being quite the job to get something that is going to hold up to that kind of stress.
Do you have any specific ideas on how to go around that currently?
Those rat rigs are pretty nice machines. I like my Voron 2.4 too, although it doesn't have the reliability of a prusa mk3s.
If you made the print identical to the casting maybe you’d have issues but you can add as much material as you want in key areas. Also almost all filaments have better flex stability than cast pot metal aluminum. I see broken castings all the time from fatigue. I’d imagine a couple brass inserts on the west points and it would last a lifetime