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Someone asked me if I can do a Vega Bumper model. He has one brand new in a box, and he has a Vega without Bumper. Challenge accepted... He gave me meausrements and I started to model it.


Then asked for a few additional measures, in particular to determine than angle of the fold...

A chat and a print later (TPU-95A)...



The print quality is surprisingly good (I think I never got such result with a TPU print)...

Someone happy to find files to repair a Nichimo Luminous contacted me recently to ask me for my mail address...
And yesterday, I got a nice surprised in my mailbox


An sticker sheet, original, from a 44B Rock'n City. I will have to plan for a paintjob at some point (likely during spring, as temperature is too low for this currently). I'm thinking about gun metal or dark gun metal...
In anycase, I sent a mail back to the sender to thanks him as this is great. And it is also great to see printed parts on a repair car when people take the time to send you pictures and tell you they are happy with it.

The red bodyshell from the second Hilux was sent to my friend at Loisirs Creations RC so he can do a reproduction of it...
He made a mold from it and few weeks ago he sent me a picture he published also on facebook while he was adjusting the depressions here and there to make it work...

Few days ago, when coming back home a big box was awaiting for me, with two bodyshells in it... I trimmed the first one, it's not prefect: I followed what was cut on the original bodies I had in hand, but I could have done better. I'll do better on the second one (and the two others that will come later).



I still need to position the holes for the mirrors and finalise the front end, and also print the other version of the roll bar... I'll do the paint after all of this (it's too windy today to do a paintjob anyway )

Had to reorder some Black PETG as I finished a roll quite a few weeks ago to print some stuff for the Hilux bodyshell

The front end is now fine, as well as the roll bar (original version, just modified for the interface between the main parts and the side bars, and the exhausts. The mirror are lijely to require some mods...




Roll bar was printed splitted with adaptative layers, and the result is good.
I need to rework the mirrors and make those files available both as cluster and for home printing...

I printed the mirror twice. Support removal is a pain, whatever the orientation of the print. Powder base process will be definitely better, with potentially the possibility of relying on polypropylene which would give a lot more flex to the part.




The cluster files are already good to go. I also prepared some masks for the windows, I'll probably share the file somewhere (cults3D with the stl files?).

Next : clean the body, masking and paintjob. I'm not sure to be able to do this within this week-end. But i'm targeting to have this done soon...

Now that I have the insurance to have bodyshell for this car, the next is to make sure I can pull parts easily (specially the one which tends to break easily). The way the design is done does not make room for many possibilities to split and fix splitted parts... This ran in my head for a few weeks...
And if the solution was not to split but to do something else?

I decided to add two small triangle at the front to ease printing stability in an optimal position. And went for some test print...
Auto orientation in slicing with tree supports...


I launched a test in PETG... Here is the results


After support removal :


Last step was to removed the sacrificial added parts and to see



The result is quite satisfactory, and it opens quite a few possibilities. I'll order PC for those parts as this is the material known with the better layer adhesion. On the arms, I may think about PP or PC to build a reliable 44B runner...

I painted one of my Bodyshells yesterday, and sent the pics right away to my friend at Loisirs Creations RC so it can be published soon... What a change compared to how it was when I started the project !






I will probably paint the other body in a lighter color, and since I have only one set of stickers at this stage, I'll have to take care of this as well...

Today, I did finish the first of my 44B projects. And considered how this project started, while there was no reproduction of the bodyshell available anywhere at that time, and the state of that bodyshell, this is totally unexpected result...





For those searching for the Hilux 44B bodyshell, I'll share the link from Loisirs Creations RC once I have it. I sent him the pics of the finished body, so he can use it in the publication. It should be very soon...

Nylon PA12 MJF Printed clusters arrived for the bodyshell today...

As usual, the surface is a bit grainy, but that is very nice compared to FDM results....

Here is a comparison for the mirrors. Whatever orientation, supports are needed, unless you split the part in the middle of the pipe, which is not perfect either. Here the FDM parts were printed on the top half back of the mirror. To get better result, sanding is required. FDM parts were printed in PETG with adaptative layers. The main issue remains the supports. On the MJF side, the result is homogeneous and nice.


I will have to paint the second body and rebuild as well the second 44B Hilux.

Loisirs Creations RC put the bodyshell online this morning on ebay.
As promised, for those searching a Hilux bodyshell, here is the link: https://www.ebay.fr/itm/226086719942
My friend is usually doing 1/8 and bigger scales bodyshell, and he is not fully convinced there is a big market on 1/10, because he doesn't really know about 1/10. Hopefully, he sells quite a few of those, as it may allows me to convince him of the interest to do some very specific 1/10 tires (he is already doing some 1/8 vintage tires and have the capability for it).
I've put the files for the accessories on cults3D ( https://cults3d.com/:1914996 )

Added the mirrors on the car, and re-supply some tamiya PS paint for the second body, and many other projects...

There was some details missing on the Hilux and the City, and I had some remaining work on the Zerda...

The Hilux got some paint on the tires, it looks even better this way...


I had to do the paintjob on the Zerda, it is only the driver figure, and it actually did not took much time... I decided to keep in the red, white and black theme... I also add a bit of paint on the tires, which will do the job until I print tires for this car...





Finally, I added some paint on the tires of the Rock'nCity, which is still missing a steering servo and an ESC. This is easier than to fnd a City bodyshell, so i'm not worried....





I will have to take the time to take a picture of the 4 Hirobos together (as there is also the Bearcat SS)...

Here is the current state of my rebuilt Hirobos...


Now it is time to take care of the others. I'm not building my Hunter Prototype, because I do not want to start until it has a bodyshell.
From all the parts I have, there is room to rebuild a 44B Hilux, and I have a bunch of parts that could allow me to rebuild a 44B LWB chassis, with some little adjustments (there will be probably missing transmission components, but I'll know only when the 44B Hilux will be rebuilt). But since I want this 44B Hilux to run, I intend to print all the suspension components and gearbox walls... And for this, I'll use the same principle as done for the front gearbox wall which was a proof of concept: the idea is basically to add elements to the parts to sit them on the bed with proper orientation and to print them with tree supports (no slicer likes when you don't have any surface on the part to stay on, and that's what I'm trying to solve here...).


And then this will go within the slicer with tree support, and finally, I'll be able to launch a print...


I got all the suspension parts together for both the Zerda and 44B chassis, parted in Common parts, 44B parts, and Zerda parts, and I'll print at least the two firsts plate. And those will be printed in black PETG for the time being (have nothing red except PLA, so I will have to order some red filament, but not sure yet what I can find - no emergency anyway, I want to see how PETG will resist in run for another project).

First plate printed...


A bit of support removal and parts are good to go. Only the bottom of the arms are not that nice on the middle bar, but I paid attention to do two symetric parts while it is not required except for this exact reason : finish. Everything else came out perfectly...


I slightly modified the right part that goes around the motor to take into account the size of the current motor cages. I'm lauching the 44B specific parts print right away...

Second plate is as good as the first one...

And the parts are definitely usable... With the same issue as the first plate for the suspension arms, but as I made a symmetry, the top side is good on both arms when positioned for right and left...


And as I needed additional datapoints, I also printed the third plate for the Zerda, and the result is basically the same...

Same results for the parts...


And just to state the obvious here, the parts are not perfect, and may not do the job for shelf purpose, but to run a car this will be perfect...