Compared to my previous resin printing experience, I continue to be impressed by the FormLabs ecosystem of resins, even the general purpose ones.
I’m preparing to ride one of my electric motorcycles through Big Bend National Park in Texas next month. This will be 5 days through some pretty rugged terrain of rock, sand, and gravel. One of my motorcycles was in desperate need of a fender extender to keep the front tire from slinging sand and gravel particles up in my face. So I got to work in Fusion360 and started running prototype prints on my Form4 using Black V5. I ran several prototype prints on the bike, but I was still getting tiny particles in my face/eyes when riding. The design wasn’t quite good yet.
Stock fender, without extenders
I was surprised at the durability of this general purpose resin. I used 3M tape to secure the fender extender to the bike’s fender. A few times, I misaligned the position and had to pull the part off. Although some parts did break eventually from the stress of being twisted and pulled, if pulled slowly and with subtle twisting, the parts survived! Any other consumer resins would have shattered instantly.
v3 - angle was way off, but design was close
Eventually I added a small deflector on the inside of the fender extender, and that significantly reduced the amount of small particle sent airborne into my face.
lengthened and deflector added
What I’ve always loved about resin printing is the ability to iterate quickly. I was able to design and print 7 designs and prototypes within a 24 hour period. I went from having the idea one day, to riding with a functional design the very next day. If only I had such technology as a kid (beyond legos and erector sets), I probably would have been an engineer!
function design complete.
After printing two of the near final designs, I went for about a 50 mile test ride. While the design doesn’t stop every single grain from being slung up at me, there was a significant reduction. This is how the bike will be for now, as I don’t have time left to get the aesthetics where I would want them for a final-final design. Ultimately you want to have these adhere to the inside of the fender, and have the body ‘pick up’ where the original fender ended as to carry the body forward.
So we will see how Black V5 holds up to 600+ miles of bumps, jumps and hopefully no drops!