Spent the past two weeks reprinting the final panels, this time from a material that is more stable than PLA — rPET (recycled polyethylene terephthalate), the stuff used for fizzy drinks bottles. Initial advantages are that it has higher UV, chemical, and temperature resistance and in some instances is tougher. That is to say that PET is not stronger than PLA, but it’s mode of failure is different. PLA is brittle and will not survive shock/vibration, it shatters. PET is tougher, survives more shock and vibration but deforms as it fails. This is a better mode of failure for a motorbike, which inevitably will be bashed about and will suffer from a lot of vibration.

Ideal would have been to choose CF nylon, ABS or ASA. But my slim wallet, printing environment and less need for heat resistance (no hot engine) dictated the choice today. Maybe a fancier material can be used later on down the line.

In reality the PLA material was great and cheap to do iterative prototyping of the the shapes and forms of the panels to ensure they all fix together and fit to the motorcycle frame/components. However, it has always been the aim to do the finals in a more durable material once the bugs have been tweaked out of the design.

These final pieces we printed with a higher 0.2mm resolution for finer detail, rather than the 0.4mm of the draft PLA mock-ups.

In terms of finishing, I’m lucky to have an uncle in the paint trade so he fixed me up a plastic & 2K prime, colour matched white base and clearcoat as is normally done in the automotive trade Hopefully they should be durable enough to take road abuse.