Making race car body mold plugs

[dauntless]

Thanks Brady. We already make our patterns about 40-thou under to account for the finish. No harm reminding me, though! We are not looking for high production speed, as we are not making signs or cabinetry, so I am hoping a router will work for a while. Congrats, BTW...I would LOVE to sell 50 of anything!

Thanks Gene...that site has plenty of inspiration, doesn't it?

[hespj]

Stan, I've done a few things like this on the ShopBot (with a router sometimes). This for instance:

http://www.talkshopbot.com/forum/mes...tml?1199393452

Some points I'd raise are:

Watch out for those tall vertical surfaces, there's only a certain vertical clearance available before the router hits the workpiece. This depends on the slope of the surface, the width of the router and the length and diameter of the router bit.

MDF is HEAVY.

I suggest you'll need 12" Z (at least) ShopBot to carve such deep shapes. I manage to machine as deep as 8" on a 12" Z machine. That sometimes means making the item in layers and joing the layers together.

The item in the link above wasn't anywhere near as good a finish as you're looking for, and as I say, they took a month. Large areas of 3D are time consuming if a good finish is required. Quicker than doing it by hand though :-)

And (perhaps) stating the obvious - You need to be able to produce a 3D CAD drawing of the item you want to cut, and you then need to produce 3D toolpaths for the ShopBot. Neither is straightforward and both have steep learning curves, but I did it, so you can.

John

[kc10flteng]

Stan...can you get onto Travis AFB...?

[dauntless]

Ron, yes...I am a retired C-5 driver/tactics guy. Ring a bell?

[kc10flteng]

Yeah...thought it was you. Jambo! I've been operating a Prt Alpha 48 x 96/5hp Colombo for 3 years. Cruise by the base wood shop...I'm there.

[dauntless]

Hujambo Ron! My phone number is on the contact page of my website. Give me a shout...and yes, I will swing by the wood shop. Stan

[jackal]

Hi guys,
I'm very new here and I'm pretty much a novice. I do not know anything about shopbot. I have however started building my own supercar project from scratch.......I'mpretty far with it using two part poly urethane which I fill in between chipboard ribs...yeah I know marine ply should of been used. But damn pricy. I have started using a Murcielago as start off for dimensions but I'm shaping it as to be one of a kind. My problem I had was the fact that I needed like a plaster or kind of filler to finish the car off and to be able to sand to smooth. I see you guys talk about fibre glassing the mold and sanding and filling that as to get a smooth finish. I think I will do that. The project car will have hopefully a ausi box and Audi 4.2 liter V8 engine (thinking of RS4)

Chassis will be basically a Lambo chassis (Diablo based)

Thanks for an informative forum.

Cheers
Jackal

[cabnet636]

Spindle and foam!!

jim

40277.jpg

[bcondon]

Power Longboard -
http://www.rutuonline.com/html/long_boards.html

This entire site is very interesting and I have talked to Glenn about ihis project..

[terryd]

Jackal, we have done several "supercar" type projects over the last few years including a K1 Attack knockoff. Great work using mdf for us, but an absolute money pit for the inspired. If inspiration and cash exceed fear procede directly to Brady's post above......just save enough for cab fare home