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Posted by Sherman in Idaho [72.47.153.24] on Sunday, June 17, 2012 at 19:03:44 :
In Reply to: Re: Windshield frame for '41 posted by Jerry in Idaho [69.59.83.175] on Sunday, June 17, 2012 at 12:26:16 :
Pretty soon now, 3D printing is going to be the only way to go to make repros of old parts that used to require expensive tooling. For now, it's only good for plastic, but metal will be coming soon. All those old parts that used to require lots of machining steps, or were stamped with expensive dies or cast in expensive molds, will be printed out of plastic goop in a computerized machine.
You can get a low-end 3D printer kit for about $1000 today, or you can send cad files to companies that will print the parts for you using a wide range of resins. Some will even do sintered metal powder.
A windshield frame is way too big for the desktop printers, but I wouldn't be surprised if there are some big ones out there already that can do it. Of course you'd need a perfect original frame to copy, or you'd have to be good with a CAD program to reconstruct what it should have looked like, starting with measurements off of whatever you can find.