One Heck Of a Project

I've decided to embark on a project that's gonna make me seem crazy... 3D print a widebody kit for my Tundra.

I want it to look like the honey D kit but a 1" wider and use hidden mounting hardware so the bolts go in from the inside.

I've always strided to be different hince all my other projects I've done to my truck, this one will definitely top those.

Currently in the design stage:

 

So Honey Double D then?

 

The wireframe in the thumbnail piqued my interest, the first line of OP's post locked me in. Any thoughts on material? What kind of printer access do you have?

Good luck and I'm looking forward to seeing your progress!

 

Thank you, I plan on using ASA filament, it basically ABS but has better UV protection, and it over all has better outdoor properties than ABS. It technically wont matter because I plan on encapsulating each fender (once assembled) in fiberglass to give it even more strength.

I have two Anet printers one is A8 plus 300x300x350mm and the other ET5X is 300x300x400. the white boxes in the 3rd photo represents the printer volume. So as you can imagine the fenders will be printed in pieces aligned with dowel pins and glued together with some sort of epoxy adhesive.

I thought I would need a big Ender CR10s which is 500x500x500, but turns out I don't becsue the peices will be printed vertically and since the fender will be maybe 8-ish inches at its widest point and 300mm is 11.8 inches it works out. The only limiting factor is the Z height which is is 400mm on the ET5X. 500mm isn't necessary, but would be bice to have. im probably going to use use the ET5X more anyways since I have Octo-Print installed on it, and have a camera connected so I can control and monitor my printer from anywhere.

Im reciving a spool of ASA today and a printer enclosure because ABS and ASA need warm non-drafty air to maintain bed and layer adhesion and prevent pre-mature shrinking and cracks.

 

Way cool!!! Hoping everything works so we can see the finished product!!!!

 

sick!

 

Thats freaking awesome! How'd you get the scan of the truck?

 

The only video game to officially have the Tundra in it, Grand Turismo Sport a racing game for Playstation. Someone pulled it from the game files. However It was in the wrong scale, wayyyy too small. So I had to do mathto scale it correctly. I took the length of the model which was like 1.5 meters them took the length of the real life truck, converted to mm then did some algebra to find what percent it needed to be scaled to. I somehow managed to get it first try.

To verify I printed the letter T from the lower Tundra door emblem and its a perfect match. Im sure if my truck didn't already have the blacked-out emblem covers it would fit right over the original chrome letters. Along with taking other measurements from model to real life like the TRD pro girll letters, mirrors, doors, tailgate width, etc. That ensured me that the studio who made the game had most likely laser scanned the truck for the game.

 

Do you own a modern Apple product? You may be able to resolve the scan by pulling in a new scan with their LIDAR tech; not sure what apps are recommended for this though.

I love the wide body look. If a built for Tundra airspring kit was available I would be all over it. WARN sells the adhesive rivets to mount their aero flares on.

 

Just an FYI, there's a decent market for 1:10 and 1:8 scale truck bodies for the radio control car market. You may be able to defray some of your investment by printing those ad selling on eBay/etsy.

 

Cool stuff! That's some big ambition.


I'm over here printing out vent rings and console badges lol.

Can't wait to see your progress.

 

I have a hard time getting my damn printer to print a freakin' Word document. I can't imagine the mess I'd make with a 3D printer...

 

If youre going to do this, do it right. build a couple Voron printers and go from there!! will be able to print MUCH quicker! Also get high flow hotends and 0.8+MM nozzles, cut your print time down. you could do 0.6+mm layer heights since you will be covering anyways!

 

You would love the story behind "Rocket Bunny":
https://youtu.be/Spx6s9Q2xFg

 

Very cool. I'm not familiar with ASA, but it sounds like it has some appealing properties. Are you going for vapor smoothing the exterior? Maybe that doesn't matter since you're wrapping in fiberglass.

I'm not super well versed in all the material options on the market, but I have had good success as far as durability and higher temperature performance with PETG. Not trying to change your mind or anything, but if you run into issues with warping, cracking, etc., even with the enclosure, it may be a decent alternative since it seems to be more tolerant to temperature gradients.

 

ABS or ASA all the way here, PETG is hobby stuff. Really though, if he's covering in FG anyways, why not an easy PLA?!! Ha!!

 

I was definitely thinking about acetone vapor smoothing, but like you said yeah im going to cover it in fiberglass anyways. I'll consider doing it if the layers become more bonded and stonger because of it. I'll have to see if CNC Kitchen has done a video testing that yet.

I would do PETG but im not sure becase the backlit letters I make for TRD Pro grills are printed in clear PETG and have lasted a good while, only problem is very slight yellowing after 5-6 months of SC summer heat. Otherwise they hold up well for small thick walled components like my letters, but for something with this much shear surface area, I'd rather use ABS, ASA, or PC even though I know it's going to be a pain in the butt.

 

Very cool. Send me a scan of the truck without a front bumper so I can design my own bumper lol

 

Oh yeah

Oh yeah tust me I tried a .6mm nozzle on my other printer. One big print I did in PLA Cura said my .4 nozzle printer with .3mm layers would take 52 hours. But on my .6 nozzle printer with .4mm layers only took 16 hours.
I had already decided to use a .8mm nozzle with .6 ish mm layers because these parts are so large that small details and visible layers aren't a big concern.

 

I don't, but I've heard about the LIDAR stuff.

As more mounting I'm still deciding to use rivit nuts in my quarter panels, or insert nuts in the fenders.

It's hard to explain what I mean by that.

But either way im going use both Bolts and glue/VHB tape

 

Yeah as soon as I get a couple of more test prints confirming that the body is sculpted correctly, im willing to send it to any of y'all who may want it.

It has the full interior modeled as well, down to the seat belt buckles, air vents, sunroof etc.

 

I use a Faro Focus S Laser at work that I could scan my 19 crew max with. What file formats are compatible with what you are using? I believe I can export in CPE, DXF, E57, FLS, IGES, POD, PTC, PTS, PTX, RCS, VRML, XYZ ascii and XYZ Binary

 

I can export a mesh object as an STL rather than working with the point cloud, that would probably work best if its something you can use.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5m6Bax7oX8

 

When I get home from work I'll see what formats 3ds Max can export to, if I had to guess probably DXF is what I've seen before.

 

DXF is an autodesk format so 3dsmax should be able to use that

 

Feel free to send some STL's this way. I'd love to just print a model for display.

 

I work in Creo, I know it'll open iges, dxf, stp, stl