Good to know. Thanks for the info. I'll be placing my order asap.
LX470 HID RETROFIT PROJECTOR BRACKET
Looks very cool, watching this unfold.
I can offer some insight to tooling costs. I'm a manufacturing engineer with experience in low and high volume plastics and some metals. You may already know this stuff, but figured it might be helpful.
The 3D printed materials are an option, but you'll need an industrial printer to make anything as strong or heat resistant as I'm thinking you need... The MarkForged printers offer high temp options, but entry price for those is $10k and up to get into the high temp resins. Price per print would probably be really low though. Stuff I've had quoted on their printers is probably around $10 for something the size of your piece - and that still has a markup from the printer service. Doing it yourself would probably be a couple bucks.
Stamping could be great, but you'll still have finishing steps which I assume would add cost making each part more expensive than it needs to be. Throw in the initial tooling cost and extremely limited application AND cost of tooling rework should you decide you need a revision in a bend or something and I'd be cautious of stamping.
Injection molding has a HUGE tooling cost. $5k would be suspiciously cheap for anything that's going to run a dozen or more parts even with a basic A-B mold. I'd expect closer to $15k. This has similar problems as Stamping where revisions will be very costly. You'd be fine with temp though - plenty of molded plastics could hold up.
CNC seems to make the most sense. Your square holes are doable via holed corners or a small bit to finish the corners with a small radius. If you can order 100 parts at a time or more you'll get pricing down a ton. I've used RapidCut many times with great results. The cutting is typically done in China with a level of quality and low price you just can't touch with domestic shops. The customer support is all in the USA so you can't really tell any of it is done overseas until the shipping box arrives with Chinese postage.
Manufacturing details aside, I'd love to see a plug and play drop in kit. Something I could order from you with no permanent modifications required, no core, no sacrificed parts that I could drop into my car in an afternoon. I've been toying with the idea myself for a long time, just never had the time to dedicate to getting it all set up.
I can offer some insight to tooling costs. I'm a manufacturing engineer with experience in low and high volume plastics and some metals. You may already know this stuff, but figured it might be helpful.
The 3D printed materials are an option, but you'll need an industrial printer to make anything as strong or heat resistant as I'm thinking you need... The MarkForged printers offer high temp options, but entry price for those is $10k and up to get into the high temp resins. Price per print would probably be really low though. Stuff I've had quoted on their printers is probably around $10 for something the size of your piece - and that still has a markup from the printer service. Doing it yourself would probably be a couple bucks.
Stamping could be great, but you'll still have finishing steps which I assume would add cost making each part more expensive than it needs to be. Throw in the initial tooling cost and extremely limited application AND cost of tooling rework should you decide you need a revision in a bend or something and I'd be cautious of stamping.
Injection molding has a HUGE tooling cost. $5k would be suspiciously cheap for anything that's going to run a dozen or more parts even with a basic A-B mold. I'd expect closer to $15k. This has similar problems as Stamping where revisions will be very costly. You'd be fine with temp though - plenty of molded plastics could hold up.
CNC seems to make the most sense. Your square holes are doable via holed corners or a small bit to finish the corners with a small radius. If you can order 100 parts at a time or more you'll get pricing down a ton. I've used RapidCut many times with great results. The cutting is typically done in China with a level of quality and low price you just can't touch with domestic shops. The customer support is all in the USA so you can't really tell any of it is done overseas until the shipping box arrives with Chinese postage.
Manufacturing details aside, I'd love to see a plug and play drop in kit. Something I could order from you with no permanent modifications required, no core, no sacrificed parts that I could drop into my car in an afternoon. I've been toying with the idea myself for a long time, just never had the time to dedicate to getting it all set up.
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- #63
@suprarx7nut This is what I love about MUD...there are so many folks with years of experience and willing to share. I'm going to forward this to Ara he has a solid understanding regarding these processes. Thanks for the information
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@Luke111 , have you considered a water-jet cut aluminum part? The tooling costs are obviously zero and there is a very minimal set-up cost involved, which should be one-time. In small batches, it should be quite economical as well. If your design can be converted so it is all in one plane (or stack two plates which then get bolted together to achieve the same effect), I think this method would be significantly more cost-effective than CNC or injection molding, and most likely much more robust than 3D printing.
Good call. Waterjet is awesome.
Could even make two (or three, if required) layers of waterjet parts to yield a 3D part comprised of cheaper, 2D layers.
I used to do that with acrylic at my last job. We had a lot of emergency needs for parts/tools/fixtures and we had a laser cutter/engraver with plenty of scrap acrylic. While we waited for a machined part to come in we could whip up a layered piece in 2d layers in an hour at essentially no cost.
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- #66
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This might be the way to go... I'll send this to Ara as this method makes a. lot of sense and would definitely save a lot of money
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- #67
Update.... We have looked into CNC and injection molding and both are costly. CNC was $145 each my cost and injection molding has a $4800 setup cost but under $20 each which was spot on the estimate that @suprarx7nut noted.
If this is going to happen water-jet cutting recommended by @whitenoise is the way to proceed and I'll have the quote tomorrow for the Mini H! 7.0 bracket which will be the easiest projector to install and will almost triple the light output of any Halogen bulb. I'm still working on the D2 4.0 but I've already trashed two shrouds in the process so the plan is to put max effort into a very simple projector install for results like this
If this is going to happen water-jet cutting recommended by @whitenoise is the way to proceed and I'll have the quote tomorrow for the Mini H! 7.0 bracket which will be the easiest projector to install and will almost triple the light output of any Halogen bulb. I'm still working on the D2 4.0 but I've already trashed two shrouds in the process so the plan is to put max effort into a very simple projector install for results like this
Update on cost?
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- #69
I'm waiting for one more estimate on water jet cutting and I'll make a decision. My gut is telling me to roll the dice and go with injection molding even with a high up front cost... I can duplicate the factory mounting points which I cannot do with water jet cutting at least as far as the depth but I did consider cutting the factory mounting points off the OEM projector and JB weld or epoxy them to a water jet cut bracket which would eliminate the need to bolt plates together to get the needed depth
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- #70
Working with a local water jet company ... I should have a pair of brackets to test fix in a few days. The samples should be cut and in the mail tomorrow along with a quote for 100 pairs.
I may also have a solution for anyone who is willing to cut their shrouds for the larger D2S 4.0 projector. The solution is to use a halo LED ring to cover the hack job of opening up the shroud to fit the larger projector. I ordered a set from RTS today to see if it works... Anybody have thought on this please chime in?
Below is the 2D image for water jet cutting
I may also have a solution for anyone who is willing to cut their shrouds for the larger D2S 4.0 projector. The solution is to use a halo LED ring to cover the hack job of opening up the shroud to fit the larger projector. I ordered a set from RTS today to see if it works... Anybody have thought on this please chime in?
Below is the 2D image for water jet cutting
I've used the halo rings many times. What size did you order? Looking forward to the results.
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- #72
I ordered !00mm which should give me a 86mm opening. The D2S is 78mm so I'm hoping it will do the job and look ok. This is all new to me and I'm enjoying the process ( just not the bleed of the wallet) I'm hoping to provide two quality brackets for those looking to retrofit. I also have two Mini H1 projectors on the way for test fitting.
Updates sound good! Glad the water-jetting provided a reasonable option. I'm interested in seeing how this goes together in the end. I've lusted after HID projectors for nearly a decade now. Perhaps this will be the path to achieving that in the cruiser!
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- #74
@suprarx7nut, I noticed you said "cruiser" in your post. If you have a 100 series you do not need a bracket to run HID projectors. On page 3
I linked a video. It's not a 100 series but it walks you through the steps to installing projectors into a factory shroud.
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- #75
HID Projector Bracket cut from .125 Aluminum are in the mail. I should have them tomorrow to test. I'm also waiting for the Mini H1 prototype that's on the 3D printer for a final test.
Ah, I see. I grasp what you're doing a little better now. You actually already responded to my interested earlier on i just blocked it out I guess - my bad. I'd still like to see a better "plug n play" solution for the LC though. I'd rather not have to un-glue the housing, shave it, only to still have to worry about leveling and alignment etc...
Those waterjet parts look good!
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- #77
There's no way around opening up your lights to get to the shroud but what you're missing is your whole shroud moves when adjusting the lights. So once you have the projector mounted you can handle alignment with the OEM adjusters It's not as hard as you think i.. watch a few more videos.. This will be my second time opening my LX lights ..so I'm pretty much a newbie.
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@Luke111 , glad to see the waterjet solution appears to be working out so far. You said something about epoxying bits off the OEM projector, it sure would be nice to avoid introducing potential alignment errors during installation. Other than that I really like your approach of keeping it simple with an off-the-shelf and plug-n-play projector.
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- #79
It's really nice to have my CAD designer and a water jet company so close. Brackets arrived UPS standard overnight
I have two fresh headlights that I'm gonna bake and open up tomorrow and test fit these brackets and I'll determine whether they should be cut from a thicker piece of aluminum as my only concern is the fixed point which contains the circular attachment point. It's I think the only part of the OEM bracket that I'm worried about the two plastic clips I plan on epoxying onto the bracket
I have two fresh headlights that I'm gonna bake and open up tomorrow and test fit these brackets and I'll determine whether they should be cut from a thicker piece of aluminum as my only concern is the fixed point which contains the circular attachment point. It's I think the only part of the OEM bracket that I'm worried about the two plastic clips I plan on epoxying onto the bracket
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- #80
A big shout out to @whitenoise...Water Jet was your idea so thank you! Look at the picture below the two plastic clips and the circular piece are the parts I might need to epoxy and should not effect alignment
