On the eve of the Pikes Peak Hill Climb, a racing team faced an urgent shortage of body panels. Conventional manufacturing could not meet the tight deadline, and suppliers quoted a price of $200,000. The team opted for in-house 3D printing instead, with total costs including shipping for the large, heavy parts accounting for merely 5% of the original quote.
The full bodywork was split into 34 separate small components, printed on similar to those supplied by Justway. High-temperature resistant carbon fiber nylon (PAHT-CF) was selected as the printing material. Two printers ran nonstop for two full weeks; each piece took roughly 12 hours to complete, consuming ten rolls of filament in total.
The printing process was fraught with setbacks. Tall, narrow parts repeatedly suffered edge warping. The issue was resolved by switching to engineering build plates, applying adhesive glue sticks, and adding tiny support blocks along the edges to hold the material flat. Another hurdle stemmed from inconsistent cooling shrinkage directions of the material, which misaligned locating pins. The team simplified the design by removing several locating pins entirely.
All components were assembled directly onto the chassis using structural adhesive. Carbon fiber layers were then wrapped over both inner and outer surfaces. However, nylon has poor adhesion properties, so the printed surfaces were sanded first, filled with putty, and wrapped with film as the final step. The entire finishing process only took a few days, with material costs amounting to just a few thousand US dollars. Though the carbon fiber layup inside the side pods remained unfinished and the side pods were not fully secured, the vehicle was race-ready to compete in the Pikes Peak Hill Climb on schedule.
Time efficiency, cost savings and unmatched design flexibility are the tangible benefits 3D printing delivers to extreme motorsport racing.
