Manifold patterns and casting 1

[motorsportsdesign]

I just finished a fun project making an intake manifold for spread port BB Chev.

I made some photos of the key steps and posted them on my web page, see the manifolds page.

http://www.motorsportsdesign.com/

Jonathan T. Schmidt

http://www.schmidtmotorworks.com

http://www.motorsportsdesign.com

 

[GraviMan]

Great link!

I'm suprised you didn't find someone capable of epoxy stereolithography! You give 'em the 3D cad and they "print" the part out of epoxy, layer by layer. The end result is accurate enough to make the sand molds directly - including for blocks!

Not sure of cost though, pattern making might be cheaper...

Mart

 

[motorsportsdesign]

GraviMan,

I have explored the SLA method, the cost is about $4.00 per cubic inch and the accuracy on big pieces is not good enough. Then you still have to make an epoxy casting that costs about $0.16 per cubic inch.

Good wood pattern making material is about $0.05 per cubic inch and can actually be done faster than SLA with fast CNC equipment.

I am working out the details of a new method using layered wax masters and epoxy tools. I will use it on my next manifold.

Jonathan T. Schmidt

http://www.schmidtmotorworks.com

http://www.motorsportsdesign.com

 

[tbuelna]

Jonathan:

Check these guys out:

http://www.soligen.com/parts/gm-man1.shtml

They make casting tooling from something that resembles an ink jet printer.

Terry

 

[motorsportsdesign]

tbuelna:

Soligen is far too expensive for a project of this type. The set of patterns and core boxes for this project would cost about $100K. ROI for a product like this would be 2~3 years.

Jonathan T. Schmidt

http://www.schmidtmotorworks.com

http://www.motorsportsdesign.com