Interested to find 3D printed sidelight & taillight lenses - yes, 3D printing will be a boon to classic & antique car lovers.

Friend of mine has been doing trim and the like on his H₃ using his 3D printer... and with the graphite filaments, it’s pretty durable. They also have mirrored and clear filaments and well as a soft rubber. Don’t know about the mirrored, but the rubber filaments (used for making tires and the like for Remote Control toys)

I've been thinking this for years, maybe 10 or 20. It has been possible to do "cosmetic" (plastic) parts for many years, but not done often because of size limitations, and cost. It has become possible to do metallic "structural" (metal) parts in the last few years, but not done often for the same reasons. Another problem for both is the lack of a digital (STL I believe) file for the part. For folks with older vehicles, a part drawing usually is not available, so we need digitization, which I don't know enough about. A broken part could be glued together, or a bent part straightened in a computer, for digitization.

I've been involved for several years using 3D printing to make master patterns for antique car reproduction parts. I work with a patternmaker and reverse engineer parts ranging from carburetors to bumper brackets and back as far as Locomobile steam engine parts.

Jay Leno did a video once a few years ago where his guy used a laser scanner to scan a part and then 3D printed a pattern to make replacement castings.

With the new materials that have come on the market, plastic lenses are certainly possible. Probably no one has asked yet.

A good designer working from the 2D drawings could reverse engineer a part so it can be made on a 3D printer. Laser sintering metal is becoming commonplace, or even making a 3D plastic part modified so it can be a pattern for a metal part is possible. Structural parts should be made from the proper raw material, but these can be made using substractive technology ie milling/turning/welding. As an owner of a 82 bike, I'd resort to 3D printing a missing part instead of searching for a junker part. Could also improve on the design if necessary.

I'm in the process of selecting a cheap 3D printer capable of running wax filament to directly print wax patterns for investment castings. I have a really complicated 1/4 scale Westinghouse air pump for a locomotive for which I need gray iron castings and sand castings are having a high manufacturing failure rate.

I'm also looking forward to be able to use metal filled plastic filament that can be fired and sintered into a metal part, however the part shrinks about 20-25 percent. These filaments have become available over the last year. I have used a product called metalclay that models like sculpey clay, but is dried and sintered in a kiln to make a metal part. It also shrinks about 25%.

Most of the time drawings are unavailable and I get a worn or broken part to reverse engineer. I work mostly in SolidWorks and 3D print on a pair of Dimension SST FDM 3D printers using ABS plastic. After finishing to improve the surface finish the printings go to a patternmaker to be boarded if they are going to be green sand cast. If multiples are needed, he makes a dynacast mold and pours duplicate dynacast patterns to be boarded. The latest project is a 3/16 scale Otto stationary engine that is investment cast. The master printings are used to make silicon rubber molds used to make wax patterns. I have tried using sparse interior ABS prints directly as investment casting patterns, but residual ash from the ABS makes it necessary to add a sacrificial chamber at the far end of the part from the in-gate so that the first metal has a place to flush the residual ash out of the finished part.

they have 3d wax now that can be used in most 3d printers

Any information on suppliers of wax? This could solve many modeler's problems.

http://www.machinablewax.com/product.php?product=52

there are others also

Thanks, and they even have the set-up parameters shown on the webpage.