Have you ever thought up a part or an idea, and wanted a quick, affordable way to validate whether or not it would work, fit and function as you imagine? 3D Printing is slowly making its way to the consumer market, but is still quite complicated and tricky to setup and get reliable prints. As a result it will be some time before the average race shop invests in a 3D printer as it can take a long time just to get the machine to print usable objects.
I thought it would be a value added addition to our motorsport consulting services to offer the community the ability to bring to life any of their ideas, far cheaper than you might imagine. What can be printed is nearly limitless, and we’ve already 3D printed a number of parts for Kels the 350z racecar, including a throttle bracket, alternator re-location brackets, airbox velocity stacks and ITB trumpets.
3D printed items that OnPoint has produced.
In fact, one of the main products we expect to prototype for clients would be those ITB trumpets. Any engine builder serious about optimizing an engine setup can opt to have a few sets of trumpets printed which we can test on our dyno to establish the ideal power curve. With 3D printed trumpets on the 350z, we found over 10whp. That’s power that would be left on the table if we didn’t do the testing.
Our 3D printer has a build envelope of 6″ x 6″ x 10″, and there are a few simple guidelines to follow for your designs. Print tolerances are generally within +/- 0.005″, so you are able to get quite precise with your objects. To send your file to OnPoint to be printed, you need to export your 3D file as an STL object. This can be done quite easily with most 3D design programs.
Pricing will be quoted based on the object being printed, so please don’t hesitate to export your STL files to us for a price. You can download our 3D print design guidelines below, for some ideas of modifications you may need to make to your object to allow it to be printed successfully.
If you would like to have velocity stacks printed for your throttles, that is something we can design for for a small fee. We will need to know the desired height, bolt circle diameter and bolt circle size, throttle taper, bore size, and velocity stack maximum diameter. See our velocity stack request PDF for details.
Pick-up will be required on all printed parts, or can be delivered at a dyno appointment. We can typically print your designs same day. Understanding that the motorsport community is often time-sensitive, as long as you can dream it up, we can have it to you “hot off the press.”