3D printing is a technology that offers us a wide range of possibilities when making an object. Many companies and companies use these 3D printers to create products that help them save time at work, as well as costs.
This technology is easy to get and very accessible since anyone can buy a 3D printer and print whatever they want with it.
3D printing continues to boom
This time it has been in the world of motorsport where we have seen how this 3D printing technology has been applied. A Polish go-kart team has chosen to use 3D printers to build parts for their vehicles and thus reduce their weight, a great advantage that will help the karts speed up.
This team has been participating for six years in Formula SAE , the competition for university kart racing around the world.
The team was thinking about how to gain more performance with the vehicle and they realized that the relationship between weight and engine power was very important so reducing the weight of the vehicle was put as the priority objective.
A better, lighter and faster kart
A total of three pieces have been printed in 3D to lighten the weight of the kart. The first part has been the set of tubes responsible for guiding the fuel and air. This mechanism is very important since much of the power of the vehicle depends on how well this part performs.
This new piece is twice as resistant as the one used by the team until now and does not reach 600 grams in weight. It took less than three days to make and is three times cheaper.
The second part that has been replaced is the steering . That is, the entire system responsible for turning the wheels once the pilot turns the wheel, made of aluminum.
This is one of the most complex parts of any land vehicle , so changing it to a 3D printed part has resulted in huge savings and caused the vehicle to lose a kilo of weight.
Finally, the other piece made with 3D printers has been the gear lever cover. This part is usually made of a material that is not very resistant , but now it has been achieved that in addition to holding more it is more flexible. In less than six hours the part was completely manufactured.
In this way, the team has achieved two very important things for their future in the following races: saving money that they can invest in future improvements to the kart and reducing the weight to gain speed.
