Some comments in the ScaleTrains thread got me thinking. Do you think we’ll see a 3D Printed freight car? And Affordible one?
I’ve always though 3-d Printing will eventually get bigger and I wonder if we’ll be able to see cheaper freight cars in the future because of 3-D printing?
It is doubtful 3D printing will lower prices or displace standard mass production practices.
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However…3D printing will (and already has) make more unusual frieght cars available.
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I am dreaming of the day I can make a cardboard template of my streets and send it off to a printer and they can make me a custom cobblestone street system with curbs, sidewlaks, driveway entrances, culverts, manhole covers, etc. in any configuration I can dream up!
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-Kevin
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3D printed product is limited in size to what fits in the machine. And a machine that will do a whole street is going to be big. And getting time on it will be expensive. So I think you’ll be waiting for awhile.
I’ve seen some 3D printed freight cars. They’re pretty good. Not great, yet. But pretty good. And if you’ve just gotta have a string of ABC railroad’s weird gondolas, it’s a thought.
I can’t see why it WON’T become both better and more affordable. At the speed I take to finish projects, it might make sense to just watch TV instead, for awhile.
Ed
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[:(] I know.
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-Kevin
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Ed:
[(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D]
Wouldn’t work for me. I hate watching TV!
Dave
If you need a string of them I would suggest resin casting. Make one master and one set of molds and you’re good for 25-40 copies.
I needed mill gons for my 1900 era railroad (a car generally over looked), so I make a master and a mold and have pulled about 15-20 one piece shells that fit over an MDC metal underframe.
The street could be done in sections, but with the level of current development in 3D printing I think it would still be pricey. First, there is the issue of doing the program. If you were taking full advantage of 3D printing the streets could be fairly complex. (If the streets are going to be simple why use 3D?) Making a complex and detailed design would be great except somebody has to spend the time doing the design. That’s going to cost if you can’t do it yourself. Scanning a model would work, but somebody has to build the models. I say ‘models’ plural because you will need both straight sections of street as well as corners and possibly curves etc. etc. All doable but at what cost?
What the technology needs is a magic wand.[swg][(-D][(-D]
Dave
Do you think that we need one? [:P]
It seems to me that the market’s fairly well covered, and I can’t imagine that such a car could compete, both price- and detail-wise with what’s already available.
Dave’s suggestion is a good one. I’d save the 3-D printing for more complex stuff that’s more difficult for the average modeller to scratchbuild.
Wayne
If you check out Shapeways, you will find dozens of freight and passenger cars as well as locomotive shells. Most are N scale and smaller, but there are quite a few HO scale as well. This is their model trains home page; use the filters to find your area of interest. Cost depends on the model size (volume of plastic used) and the material you choose; it is a good idea to refer to the site’s materials description page.
https://www.shapeways.com/marketplace/miniatures/trains?li=nav
This is an HOn30 short boxcab that I bought for Boohbay Railway Village last year
There are a huge range of prices but most appear to be very reasonable. Even with the cost of furnishing trucks/couplers, (powering locomotives) etc the total cost is in most cases about what you woud expect for simular mass produced models.
I think the costs of most items are fairly low because most of the designers are hobbyists. They design things they want and try to make a little extra money by selling some. In some cases I suspect doing the designing has become their hobby. A business would have to pass on the cost of developing the models. Most of the prices do not appear to reflect that.
With tooling in the 100,000 dollar range I would say 3D is a good possibility in the coming years.
As owner of a 3D printing and design business, this is an interesting thread. The cost to buy a good quality hobby printer is coming down, but they are still just that, hobby printers. I really don’t think you will ever see 3D printed items, such as freight cars, cost less than mass produced items. The design work in CAD is the same either way, and while there are tooling costs with injection molding, the time it takes to print an item is the deal breaker. While a single item can be printed multiple times at once, it’s still a speed thing. Raw material cost is trivial as it is with injection molding. We currently print items that cost us about $0.30 that we sell all day long for around $15-20. It doesn’t take long to recoup your costs in design time and materials if you have a good design and a product that people want. The area that 3D printing shines is for one-off, custom, small run, items. There are printers that print jewelry quality detail (SLA) that can be had for around $3K. Decent detail, if you know how to program your printer and 3D drawing, can be had with a few others (FDM). Having just gotten back into model RR’ing, the wheels have already been turning for items to design and print. We do offer services to print your design if you already have a 3D file, but I’m probably walking a line here so you’ll have to message me if you want more info.
I previously said “I think the costs of most items are fairly low because most of the designers are hobbyists. They design things they want and try to make a little extra money by selling some. In some cases I suspect doing the designing has become their hobby. A business would have to pass on the cost of developing the models. Most of the prices do not appear to reflect that.”
I stand corrected by one who really knows. Thankyou bibbster. “a product that people want” is the deal breaker as far as making money.
https://www.shapeways.com/marketplace/miniatures/trains/
The US prototype HO scale freight cars on shapeways currently cost $55-120. The are printed in FUD or FED, which is typically more expensive than other plastics used in 3D printing. 36’ NYC box car in FUD is $69.99. Same car in FED is $115.
Prices per cubic centimeter of material are listed here. White strong and flexible 0.28 per cm^3. Frosted Extreme Detail $5.99 per cm^3. 18K Gold $600 per cm^3.
There is no reason in the world to 3D print those freight cars in anything other than PLA or ABS (unless you just want fancy schmancy plastic). Those materials are very strong if used properly, even if using an FDM printer. Super fine detail can be had with an SLA printer using the same two materials as well.
Shapeways charges a hefty premium and finding a 3D printing service on a site like 3D Hubs would save you lots of money. Of course, the person doing the printing can set their own prices to match Shapeways, but we set ours to be very competitive. We’d rather sell ten widgets at $10 a piece than one widget at $50. [:D]
3D printing will allow us to finally kitbash some niche models into more realistic prototypes since the manufacturers have produced very little of them.
So it unlocks more opportunities for the hobby, especially if you enjoy kitbashing.
I hate to say it David but as these photos were taken over 3 ½ years ago, the first part of your question is redundant.
Now there’s the rub!![swg]
Cheers, the Bear.[:)]
How much of the detail was printed on, and how much is added detail parts?
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If for $125.00 I could get a freight car with nicely printed brake detail, grab irons, ladders, roofwalk, etc., then I would be very interested.
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If for $125.00 I just get a nicely printed boxcar body, I will not be interested. I don’t see any improvement in that over a single piece body Westerfield or Funaro & Camerlengo kit. It would be just as much work for more than twice the price. No thank you.
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-Kevin
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If you’re speaking of a model of an obscure freight car, perhaps used only by one or two roads and not in any appreciable quantity, that price may be acceptable.
However, several manufacturers are offering more common freight cars, r-t-r, with all the details mentioned, and at prices half or a third of $125.00. And even in that scenario, “common” includes cars like B&O wagontops and Milwaukee Road rib-sided cars, ownership of which was pretty-much limited to those roads. Likewise for Blackstone’s r-t-r narrow gauge stuff.
I don’t know anything about what Westerfield’s (or any other makers of craftsman-type kits) output might be, but with kit-builder’s ranks supposedly declining, I would imagine their output might be following that trend. Most such cars represent older prototype designs, too, another area of shrinking interest.
So if you needed a couple of N&W HPc hoppers, yeah, 3-D printing might someday fill that need.
A friend gave me an older Westerfield kit for such a car (not something I really needed or wanted) and after an “eventful” [banghead][:-^]construction period, even I might have opted for a 3-D printed r-t-r version for $125.00. [:P]
Having built several other Westerfield kits, I’d guess that one to be an anomaly, as most were fun to build and wouldn’t have been too challenging, I think, for anybody.
I see more potential for 3-D printing relatively obscure steam locomotives to fit existing manufacturers’ mechanisms, as I’d guess that there would be more people willing to build a few freight
“If for $125.00 I could get a freight car with nicely printed brake detail, grab irons, ladders, roofwalk, etc., then I would be very interested.”
That’s not a problem at all, and many within this range are on Shapeways, including my own Eastern Road Models Line. Due to cost, however, they will not try to compete with mass produced kits- these are items that are unlikely ever to appear in the mainstream market.
However, trust me that you do not want printed grab irons. Use good old fashioned wire grabs for strength. On my cars, I always spot the drilling locations with dimples to simplify drilling. All rivets, bolts, etc. are included.
You will want to learn a little about each designer, and see what lengths they go to in creating accurate models with high detail levels, that aren’t too difficult to build. Some are dabbling in 3D for the first time, others have spent a lifetime in high end 3D CAD in an engineering environment.
Steve Hunter