3d Printed Molds?

[Macboy]

Has anyone 3d printed molds for pads/jump pads? I'm wondering what material I would cast them in. Rubber, silicone etc. 

[0000]

No, but you might be surprised just how well TPU-printed pads and armor hold up over time.

My TPU-printed wheel armor has held in probably over 30 wrecks now of various speeds and severity with no issues whatsoever. Well, to be 100% accurate, I split my rear Clark bumper which is TPU a while back along the thinner section, but it still works. On the other hand, my ABS-printed rear mudguard cracked and is currently held together with duct-tape. Easy to replace though.

Just skip the extra molding step and hassle and print directly in the TPU color of you choice IMO. It's the perfect material for slowing down the sharp impulses that can crack the wheel shell, very easy to work with, very cheap, and can look pretty cool too depending on your/the designs.

[Macboy]

I was just thinking since they seem to be somewhat "universal" (the STLs I can find at least) that a guy could print up a set of molds in PLA (much easier to print than TPU) and just cast sets as required. I'll need two sets to start with and then I can help any local newcomers by just casting more. As soon as you're doing more than one offs the casting seems more of a time saver. 
 

That said, I haven't looked into the costs of the casting materials. I'll do that tomorrow "just to see". Maybe TPU will prove to be far more economical. The place I get my silicones from is quite knowledgeable - they'll likely know what material will be most like TPU or what material would be best suited to the application. 
 

I've also never had luck printing TPU but the things I was trying to print were pretty fussy too. Tracks for a little ESP32 Scout vehicle. Pretty thin print but my issue was more to do with nozzle clogs than retraction settings or adhesion. 

[EMA]

TPU is the way

[0000]

16 hours ago, Macboy said:

I was just thinking since they seem to be somewhat "universal" (the STLs I can find at least) that a guy could print up a set of molds in PLA (much easier to print than TPU) and just cast sets as required. I'll need two sets to start with and then I can help any local newcomers by just casting more. As soon as you're doing more than one offs the casting seems more of a time saver. 
 

That said, I haven't looked into the costs of the casting materials. I'll do that tomorrow "just to see". Maybe TPU will prove to be far more economical. The place I get my silicones from is quite knowledgeable - they'll likely know what material will be most like TPU or what material would be best suited to the application. 
 

I've also never had luck printing TPU but the things I was trying to print were pretty fussy too. Tracks for a little ESP32 Scout vehicle. Pretty thin print but my issue was more to do with nozzle clogs than retraction settings or adhesion. 

The problem with a casting is, unless you include hollow channels/tunnels in your mold(s) to decrease the rigidity of your cast, you're probably going to end up with a more rigid parts than would be useful no matter what durometer polyurethane you would use. Not to mention heavier as well, but that's a minor point. And if you use silicone, just guessing here, but you would probably lose a lot of durability too. I could see silicone pads chunking out in a wreck really quick turning probably a lot of experimentation efforts into wasted time.

If you're having a difficult time with your printer settings, which I know can be a real bear to mess with if you went with most of the cheap and popular "Ali-Express" type models, I think you'd be better served skipping printer mods and all that utter nonsense and just researching then buying a printer that is known to be able to print TPU right out-of-the-box. Maybe a Prusa mini would be fine, not sure though, haven't looked myself.

With TPU, you can dial the shell-thickness, layers, and most importantly, infill pattern and % to get the right amount of give vs durability. IIRC, many of my parts used slightly different settings and I had very good success with the Triangular infill pattern. I may do a video on this sometime, but anyway, there's my advice.