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So i got the design done, lens and housing. sorry i haven't updated in a while, life and work got in the way lol. so here's a pic of the lens and housing before i put them together.
this is one of the stock lens, my most recent one and the original one from my first post.
this is how the stock one lights up, ya i know my car is dirty...
this is mine...
i'll take one at night, these day pics don't do justice. And for some reason the right bulb sits weird in both stock and my housing. something i need to correct, not a flaw on my design.
Now i know what you're thinking, "whoopity-dooo, a red brake light, haven't seen that before...."
i made this one red for a few reasons:
1) This new material i bought in 3 colors: red, clear and black. I can do other colors, but these are the ones i have on hand.
2) I wanted to make sure my design was right.
3) I sure as hell wasn't going to practice with the clear or black, this material is a little more expensive than the ABS i made my original one with.
I'm estimating about 20 bucks. a spool for this material is $35, coating is another 35. It takes about 17 hours to print, plus another 5 hours post processing....
Well boys and girls, there it is. Not 100% perfect but getting very close. i've had the red one on the car since my last post and it has no signs of being affected by weather. it's rained heavily and sat out in the sun while i was at work in 85-90* heat. this latest one fits the spoiler much better, but sadly it's not as clear as i thought it would be. nature of the beast with 3D printing. i'm going to try my hand with the translucent black material next, after a little tweaking to the design.
I think a good goal would be to have a design to allow a cheap/readily available COB LED bar to clip into the piece, making the reflector removing/attaching process unnecessary.
17cm length (most commonly available, in various colors): http://www.ebay.com/itm/2-Pcs-17cm-Red-COB-LED-Car-SUV-Daytime-Running-Light-Driving-Fog-Light-Lamp-Bar-/231562249456?hash=item35ea2f84f0&vxp=mtr
i make a new reflector housing each time, so there's no removing and re-installing it. i really like your idea though, and will definitely try making one with those LED strips. it would cut down on time when making this if i didn't have to make the reflector housing each time. thanks for the input!
so i ordered some of the 17 cm COB LED bars. these would most likely work a lot better than the 6 cm since the opening in the back of the lens is about 17.5 cm. thanks again ZexGX for the suggestion.
Another thing to consider is that a 3D printed piece (or two that interlock) can be used to make a plug for a silicone mold (would need to sand down the rough edges of the plug and polish or cover the surfaces in wax and then polish that), which the mold can then be filled with a UV resistant clear casting material like "Smooth-On Crystal Clear" for a nice see-through appearance. This particular product recommends putting it in a pressure chamber to remove air bubbles for a couple hours and then heat-curing for several hours in an oven, so probably not good for one-at-a-time mass production.
Info: http://www.smooth-on.com/tb/files/Cr..._220___221.pdf
Example price (first seller I found): http://www.douglasandsturgess.com/product/CR-1043A.html
An example of a finished product would be a cast clear outer lens and a colored inner reflector piece (3D printed or casted). The problem then becomes making sure it's sealed properly. It's a lot more work which is probably why people haven't done it yet.
it sure is a lot more work, i've tried and have the smooth-on materials to do it. problem i came across was that the silicone molds were soft and the casted lens would come out pretty warped so i gave up on that endeavor. i may give that a try again one day, just not soon.
04-26-2015, 04:52 PM
