3D Printed Spares

[rramesh]

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With the reducing cost and increasing quality of 3D printing, I was wondering if there are online stores that can make good copies of Leica camera parts like lens hoods, base plates etc.

[wlaidlaw]

It is still very expensive, not least getting the drawings made and print file written for replacement parts in metal. It cost me over £400 to have a small (and wholly unobtainable) part made for my 70mm Graflex Combat Graphic made. Most of that was getting the drawings made and print file written. The company that did it has now gone bust (Frazer-Nash), so I am very glad that I got hold of both the drawings and print file (they are my property and copyright), so I can print duplicates for other Combat Graphic owners. The part was the brake ring for the very powerful clockwork shutter/film transport motor drive. The original was a fragile aluminium diecasting. This is frequently broken on these cameras, by folk firing off the motor drive without the braking/damping effect of film in the camera. At least now in 3D printed, high-density titanium, the ring is now far stronger than the original and is unlikely to fracture again. 

My son, who is a senior development engineer at Rennishaw, one of the market leaders in 3D printing (metal and plastic), has 3D printed a prototype film trimming template for my 250FF Reporter Leica (ANZOO). The originals fetch huge prices (up to $3000) when they very rarely come up for sale. Having signed off on the plastic prototype, my son is now going to fabricate a final version for me in stainless steel. 

Wilson

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[pico]

1 hour ago, wlaidlaw said:

It is still very expensive, not least getting the drawings made and print file written for replacement parts in metal. It cost me over £400 to have a small (and wholly unobtainable) part made for my 70mm Graflex Combat Graphic made. Most of that was getting the drawings made and print file written. The company that did it has now gone bust (Frazer-Nash), so I am very glad that I got hold of both the drawings and print file (they are my property and copyright), so I can print duplicates for other Combat Graphic owners.

For heaven's sake spread the word. As you may recall I had SN 7 of that camera with good shutter. I'm certain that there less fortunate owners who would like to use that Monster Contax!

[wlaidlaw]

Jac, 

I have tried on the Graflex forum and a few other places like the Graflex group on Facebook. I said I would get the part printed and sell them on at cost as a service to Combat Graphic owners. Not a sniff of interest. I was astonished. I think that with the lack of new 70mm Perf type 2 film, with the only current availability being Rollei 400S B&W plus the difficulty in processing, most Combat Graphics have been relegated to the status of shelf ornaments. 

Wilson

[levegh]

I have told our Frazer Nash about the insolvency. He is very upset. So am I. Frazer Nash Research and Frazer Nash Consultancy did excellent work but seem to have had very poor management. Actually, the original car company had its ups and downs and, at times, had a rather eccentric approach to management. Let us hope that the name survives and that their work on electric vehicles will continue. I can recommend a vintage Frazer Nash as transport for a Barnack Leica.

Stuart

[wlaidlaw]

32 minutes ago, levegh said:

I have told our Frazer Nash about the insolvency. He is very upset. So am I. Frazer Nash Research and Frazer Nash Consultancy did excellent work but seem to have had very poor management. Actually, the original car company had its ups and downs and, at times, had a rather eccentric approach to management. Let us hope that the name survives and that their work on electric vehicles will continue. I can recommend a vintage Frazer Nash as transport for a Barnack Leica.

Stuart

Stuart, 

I have a large burn scar on my leg from getting out of a race spec (172 BHP Bristol BS4A Mk.2 2 litre) Le Mans replica Frazer-Nash. The bare aluminium floor was a bit greasy and my foot slipped as I was getting out. I was wearing shorts and this allowed my bare leg to sit against the red hot exhaust - ouch! This is the car. As it was a race car, the door was bolted shut. 

Wilson

 

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Edited April 14, 2019 by wlaidlaw

[pico]

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1 hour ago, wlaidlaw said:

I think that with the lack of new 70mm Perf type 2 film, with the only current availability being Rollei 400S B&W plus the difficulty in processing, most Combat Graphics have been relegated to the status of shelf ornaments.

Does this help? 

Quote

This item is one 50'-long roll of double-perforated 70mm-wide film. It is wound emulsion side-in and does not have a backing paper.

Or it a messed up advert? Or not type-2, whatever that is.

Edited April 14, 2019 by pico

[wlaidlaw]

Jac,

The Rollei 400S is just as good as HP5 and about 1/3rd of the price. €80 for 100 feet instead of $164 for 50 feet. Ilford offer 70mm HP5 to special order, about once every two years for a very short time window from Harman's special products division but other than B&H, I have never actually seen any for sale in retail outlets. At that price I am not surprised. The Rollei is available all the time off the shelf from Maco-direct. 

What I would really like is for Kodak to offer Ektachrome SP488 Aviation again, which was made for the hand held Maurer KE28 cameras and Hasselblad Aviation Cameras, which both used the same double Kodak 70mm cassette system as the Graflex KE-4. Hardly surprising on the KE-28, as John Maurer was the original designer of the KE-4 and sold the design to Graflex, who then used Hubert Nerwin (ex-Contax) to productionise it. I have a few unexposed, US military surplus cassettes of the Ektachrome 70mm SP488 but they date from around the Vietnam war to the early 80's and have not been cold stored, so I suspect of dubious use. 

Wilson

PS Type 2 perforations are what still cameras use for 70mm and it looks very like grown up 35mm. Type 1 uses smaller perforations, sometimes on one edge of the film only and spaced further apart. This is a print film for cine use and is what they print the images to, from the 65mm film that runs through the cameras, leaving enough room to print the audio digital channels to one side, for projection on IMAX etc. W

Edited April 14, 2019 by wlaidlaw

[willeica]

11 hours ago, wlaidlaw said:

Stuart, 

I have a large burn scar on my leg from getting out of a race spec (172 BHP Bristol BS4A Mk.2 2 litre) Le Mans replica Frazer-Nash. The bare aluminium floor was a bit greasy and my foot slipped as I was getting out. I was wearing shorts and this allowed my bare leg to sit against the red hot exhaust - ouch! This is the car. As it was a race car, the door was bolted shut. 

Wilson

 

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A touch of the Birkin's, Wilson. I often wondered how drivers and others protected themselves around hot exhausts.

William

[levegh]

I have a large burn scar on my leg from getting out of a race spec (172 BHP Bristol BS4A Mk.2 2 litre) Le Mans replica Frazer-Nash.

What a delectable car. My brother missed a Le Mans Replica Replica (Crosthwaite and Gardner) by hesitating because it was not quite the real thing though identical. These days, every part seems to be available so that race cars are clones anyway. That last sentence was sour grapes, I should admit. Our Frazer Nash is a chain driven one. In the argot of the Leica fraternity, it is an Ur Frazer Nash (or would that be a GN?)

Stuart

[wlaidlaw]

25 minutes ago, levegh said:

I have a large burn scar on my leg from getting out of a race spec (172 BHP Bristol BS4A Mk.2 2 litre) Le Mans replica Frazer-Nash.

What a delectable car. My brother missed a Le Mans Replica Replica (Crosthwaite and Gardner) by hesitating because it was not quite the real thing though identical. These days, every part seems to be available so that race cars are clones anyway. That last sentence was sour grapes, I should admit. Our Frazer Nash is a chain driven one. In the argot of the Leica fraternity, it is an Ur Frazer Nash (or would that be a GN?)

Stuart

Although it is called a replica, this one is actually an original 1950 car other than the engine, which is a 1952 F2 spec Bristol. It is quite challenging to drive, with a very narrow power band from 4-6000 RPM, a four speed gearbox and drum brakes. The handling of the lighter Mk.1 cars, like this, with a rigid rear axle suspended on quarter elliptic springs, could best be described as "interesting". The heavier Mark 2 cars with De Dion rear are slower but a lot easier to drive. We bought this for the pre-1952 drum braked sports car race at Monaco but in the end used a C Type Jaguar instead, which broke down with jammed open float chamber valve, where we were lucky it did not go on fire. They have now both been sold. 

Wilson

[Michael Geschlecht]

On 4/14/2019 at 1:21 PM, wlaidlaw said:

It is still very expensive, not least getting the drawings made and print file written for replacement parts in metal. It cost me over £400 to have a small (and wholly unobtainable) part made for my 70mm Graflex Combat Graphic made. Most of that was getting the drawings made and print file written. The company that did it has now gone bust (Frazer-Nash), so I am very glad that I got hold of both the drawings and print file (they are my property and copyright), so I can print duplicates for other Combat Graphic owners. The part was the brake ring for the very powerful clockwork shutter/film transport motor drive. The original was a fragile aluminium diecasting. This is frequently broken on these cameras, by folk firing off the motor drive without the braking/damping effect of film in the camera. At least now in 3D printed, high-density titanium, the ring is now far stronger than the original and is unlikely to fracture again. 

My son, who is a senior development engineer at Rennishaw, one of the market leaders in 3D printing (metal and plastic), has 3D printed a prototype film trimming template for my 250FF Reporter Leica (ANZOO). The originals fetch huge prices (up to $3000) when they very rarely come up for sale. Having signed off on the plastic prototype, my son is now going to fabricate a final version for me in stainless steel. 

Wilson

Hello Wilson,

Do you think that the part might have been purposely made of aluminum so that it WOULD fail under certain circumstances?

A simple to replace part designed to eventually fail, like a spark plug, MIGHT be made to protect a more difficult to repair section of the mechanism from failing under certain circumstances.

You see this sometimes in woodworking where a chair comes apart & someone repairs it with VERY strong glue. The next time the chair has too much weight on it: It breaks. Since the joints that were connected with glue that was strong, but not as strong as the wood it was holding together, were NOT able to come apart. And later be reassembled.

Best Regards,

Michael

[pico]

36 minutes ago, Michael Geschlecht said:

Do you think that the part might have been purposely made of aluminum so that it WOULD fail under certain circumstances?

In this particular case I do not think the part was designed to fail: this case being shutter actuation without loaded film so that  film drag inhibits destructive behavior. The military does not want equipment to self-destruct in case of a relatively benign error. They just screwed up the part.

There have been fasteners which would mutilate the fastener head with over-torquing but that was before precision manufacturing. Besides, the 70mm Combat Graphic was hand-assembled.

As I have written before I owned such a camera (ser# 7) in top condition and sold it to finance three new Leicas.

Edited April 16, 2019 by pico

[wlaidlaw]

I think the other point is that the aluminium diecast ring in the Graflex had probably suffered from age-embrittlement. This is a common feature of older diecastings, which I have frequently come across in old Weber carburettors. The embrittlement of the Zamac alloy is accelerated by the dissolved hydrogen in gasoline.

It has now reached the point where an unused 40DCN17 carburettor, as used on the Ferrari 275 GTB/Competitione will fetch over $2000, against its original cost of just over $50 - supply and demand. You would have thought it was worth Weber making them again. There is a US company called PMO that makes copies of the three barrel downdraft Zenith and Weber carburettors (40mm, 46 and 50-IDA3) used on older Porsche 911's and they are great for racing but less good for road use and very thirsty. When I rebuilt my 1977 911 RSR from a scrap yard wreck, I thought of using a pair of 50mm PMO's to replace the missing mechanical fuel injection but in the end opted for Bosch Motronic electronic fuel injection on special manifolds. Alavente make copies of the 40 IDF 2 carburettors, as can be used on the Ferrari Dino but my experience with them was very poor and we ended up converting our Dino to fuel injection as well.

When the price comes down, these are the sort of things that can and will be remade by 3D metal printing. For simpler parts without voids, you can print a 3D plastic prototype, check the dimensions and fit, then scan it and make the part on a CNC milling machine, as this is considerably cheaper than 3D metal printing. We have done this for the bronze mounting flange of the magneto on our 1904 Panhard et Levassor 30HP, where the faulty part was more multiple brazing repairs than original metal. We made it out of much stronger silicon bronze than the original and also a bit thicker. We could check all the fit with the plastic prototype. As I mentioned in a post above this same method is what my son and I have done to re-create the ANZOO film trimming template for the Leica 250 Reporter, except we are using a laser metal cutter rather than CNC milling for the final version. 

Wilson

 

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