D-6

I can mill my knuckle from 21 inch tall, 11.5 inch round stock 7075 aluminum on the 5 axis machine I saw today. Also means I can get down to the nitty gritty on the detail.

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MetalCraftSolved said:
I can mill my knuckle from 21 inch tall, 11.5 inch round stock 7075 aluminum on the 5 axis machine I saw today. Also means I can get down to the nitty gritty on the detail.

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I truly wish you the best of luck, but I'm also confident you honestly have no idea what it would cost to have a pair of those made (even assuming a zero scrap rate). Maybe someone in the engineering and machining world could give you better advice.
 
jeepinmatt said:
I truly wish you the best of luck, but I'm also confident you honestly have no idea what it would cost to have a pair of those made (even assuming a zero scrap rate). Maybe someone in the engineering and machining world could give you better advice.
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I took a tour of the shop I found with 5-axis capability yesterday. Also got to see the CNC lathe that would shave off excess round stock before they set it up in the mill.
 
I just want to know what a chunk of AL like that cost much less the machine work.....
 
willness33 said:
So basically $15k a knuckle after machining.
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Nah, it wouldn't be that bad. But $10k a pair isn't unreasonable to expect. And they are aluminum, with little concern for torsional rigidity, so you better have a backup pair. I already see where the first crack will start.
 
jeepinmatt said:
Nah, it wouldn't be that bad. But $10k a pair isn't unreasonable to expect. And they are aluminum, with little concern for torsional rigidity, so you better have a backup pair. I already see where the first crack will start.
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Psh. Torsional schmorsional. You worry too much. :lol: What, you think you're an engineer or something? :laughing:
 
I fully agree with @jeepinmatt's judgement. I was mildly sarcastic with my response above. (gratuitous sarcasm inserted here with the 'mildly' as well)
 
braxton357 said:
That's probably 1500-2500 low. What's wrong with a fabricated knuckle? If you have any work into after machining and want to make any money off them they gonna be 7500 a piece. The front end alone cost more than some entire race buggies
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When I'm on salary then I'm only adding up the cost of all the parts and equipment. When I'm producing front ends to sell, it would end up being a percentage thing price wise. You would have to pay me a percentage of cost for a partial buggy, or whole buggy.
 
I'd like to feel like I'm pretty big into doing the whole "interact with the people around you thing." I've sent the knuckle demo file to 5 places in the immediate area. (North Carolina) I received a quick response from 1 that said they were looking forward to looking at it tomorrow, when they get to work. Hopefully I'll hear from all of them by the end of the week. I would bet that there is 5-axis equipment around that I don't know about. It's just one of those things, where I'd enjoy paying some attention to prideful work coming out of NC.
 
MetalCraftSolved said:
I'd like to feel like I'm pretty big into doing the whole "interact with the people around you thing." I've sent the knuckle demo file to 5 places in the immediate area. (North Carolina) I received a quick response from 1 that said they were looking forward to looking at it tomorrow, when they get to work. Hopefully I'll hear from all of them by the end of the week. I would bet that there is 5-axis equipment around that I don't know about. It's just one of those things, where I'd enjoy paying some attention to prideful work coming out of NC.
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I'd bet there's plenty of 5axis capability around and it's a cool part. Just complicated and time consuming.
 
jeepinmatt said:
I'd bet there's plenty of 5axis capability around and it's a cool part. Just complicated and time consuming.
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I haven't heard back from any of them today. It must look like a serious pain in the ass to machine. I've worked in a few machine shops, and they're gonna want to spend their time messing around with the gravy work. Running a lot of the same parts over and over all day long. I don't blame them, that's where the money is. The machine shop I visited the other day runs 24 hours a day, and they were 20 weeks out on production. Theoretically, the way I see it, the machining corporation that I got the instant quote from probably has an entire 20,000 square ft wing of their facility dedicated to prototyping parts. I would imagine all of the single item stuff like this goes through an area like that. For them to be able to instantly guarantee a quote like that is above anything that I've been around or seen. We're talking some serious computer technology, and super expensive CNC machines, and they're moving some serious amounts of metal.
 
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Here are some more milling quotes. I'm pretty excited to have ventured in this far. All this machining influence is going to give me the tools I need to figure out how to tie in everything below & in front of the differential. All in an effort to keep things from getting beat up on the rock trails, and these rock bouncer events. I can already tell there will be changes to the lower front bumper, and possibly even the frame rails under the lower control arms.
 
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Honeycomb armor detailed. Now I can make the front bumper shape flow into it, and then all that lower impact tie in will be done. Probably should be anodized, rather than powder coated.

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