Everyone, everyone, get over here, I have big news! Big news for the thriving and important cottage industry of making “BRIBED” stencils for cars participating in 24 Hours of Lemons races, which are used to indicate which cars have suitably bribed a Lemons Judge. I’ve been a Lemons Judge in the past, and I’m about to be one again in the near future, at the race in Buttonwillow, California this weekend. As I fully intend to be bribed, I need to have at least one stencil ready so I can mark the car as having done the right wrong thing and bribed a judge.
Normally, I make these stencils like humans have done since Gilgamesh was a pimply teenager: draw it on a scrap of cardboard, and cut it out, slowly, laboriously with an X-acto knife.
This method works fine, but it’s a bit labor-intensive and offers a lot of opportunities for mistakes. Also, the lifespan of a cardboard stencil is fairly limited, as they tend to wear out and tear apart pretty quickly. Clearly, the current state of art of Lemons bribed stencil-making could use some improvement.
Here’s an example of one of my cardboard stencils:
Crude but effective enough. Spray paint through holes in cardboard is hardly a precision medium, but for these purposes, it’s basically fine. Here’s a car sporting a number of various bribed stencils from many races:
Not Betty White there, she’s a decal, and a fine decal she is. I mean the five other illustrations on that hood, those are other bribed stencils, made with effectively the same laborious cut-out method by various Lemons judges.
So, as the race approaches, I realized I should make a stencil, but the truth is I’m just not sure when I’d get the time to just sit down and cut one of these damn things out. There must be a better way, right? Can modern automation help at all here?
The good news is yes, yes, it can! Here was my idea: why not use a 3D printer to make the stencils! As long as I avoid googling “3D printer stencil,” I can convince myself of the vanishingly unlikely idea that I somehow was the first to come up with this notion! Exciting!
By 3D printing a stencil, not only will I get a much more durable plastic stencil, but I can also be doing other things while the 3D printer is drooling out the stencil! All I have to do is design it on the computer, and send it off!
I also thought that I could make far more elaborate and complex stencils than I could make by hand, and with that in mind, I tried to design one that used a sort of halftoning effect that would be absurdly difficult to cut out by hand.
I came up with a stencil idea featuring George Washington in racing goggles and tried to print that:
Yeah, that didn’t exactly work. Maybe a better 3D printer could have printed those fine lines more effectively, but mine wasn’t really up to the task. I’m sure there’s a happy medium where I could find some less fine halftoning that would work, but I decided to just try for something simpler. So I drew a new design right on my iPad and extruded that in 3D:
A little Honda T360 Kei truck with a big cartoon-style moneybag in the bed. That screams “bribed,” right? And by using an image complexity about on par with what one likely could have cut from cardboard, it all seemed to work just fine!
I even added a little handle onto the stencil, though it’s likely not going to keep your hands from getting painted like I hoped.
Still I call this a success! It’s a stencil with far less work! And I can print multiples with minimal effort, and they should all last a lot longer than the cardboard ones!
It’s a revolution! A revolution in the car stencil-making world! Crapcan race car-stencil-makers of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your X-Acto knives!
Oh, also, Happy Rosh Hashanah, to those who celebrate! It’s 5786, bitches!
Very nice Jason! I especially like your choice of muse used for the final version 😉
Dammit! If you had posted this two days earlier, it could have saved me a whole evening with my X-acto!
Shanah Tovah!
I would always go for a laser cutter for something like this as I am far to impatient to wait for a 3d print… that said I have a school wokshop at my disposal and laser cutters are big machines
The kei truck hauling money is charming, but I think the resulting image from the George Washington sporting goggles would work fine if you just widened the halftone/rasterscan bands. 🙂
I think making them consistent width would help as well
If I had a 3D printer I’d enjoy messing around with it. I’d also make a botique mail-order business scanning and then printing center caps for alloy wheels. Two of my three cars are missing the caps, and I swear, I can’t bring myself to try to hunt for them online, and then pay some extortionate price for them.
If you can design the caps in CAD, there are a variety of print farms that can print and ship for you. You simply market and collect the orders. imo, it’s really the only way to have a scalable 3D printing business.
If you’re just doing it for fun and to help some friendly strangers on the internet, most consumer printers would work fine.
I highly encourage it. It’s one of the coolest things I’ve ever bought and a fascinating technology when looking at what the potential future can be.
I was figuring/assuming it’d be necessary to scan an original (to get a good result with a secure fit). That would mean obtaining one of each cap to be recreated, which I haven’t been able to do for my own cars, so the idea of doing it for others on top of learning the 3D print game seems unlikely. 🙂 If I were younger/more ambitious it’d be possible I suppose.
I know about places that will print for you… the maker channels on Youtube use them for final prints in better materials, only doing test pieces in-house. It’s all quite awesome to someone who’s always kludged together ‘inventions’ out of plywood, plexiglass, and scraps of aluminum, all shaped with hand tools.
PS: some rich and altruistic auto enthusiast ought to assemble a ‘library’ of wheel caps (and other hard-to-impossible-to-find) auto trim bits) and then scan them and share the scan data.
What exactly are we talking about when you say wheel cap? In my mind, it’s just the center cap of a wheel to cover the hub.
Yes, that’s what I mean. My 240 wagon (with wheels originally from a 740 Turbo I think) came with all four missing, and my ’95 Miata (some sort of special edition that came from the factory with BBS wheels) is also missing at least three caps (there may be one in the trunk IIRC). The plastic (I assume, though maybe metal in the case of the Volvo) cap that covers the open center of the alloy wheel that has the lug holes.
Live up to your namesake and get your hands on a plasma cutter. A stencil made of CORTEN steel should last you a good long time. You could even skip the spray paint and use a sandblaster.
You just keep thinking Andy Individual, that’s what you’re good at.
Nifty, I think a vinyl cutter like a Cricut would be a better solution. It could conform better better to curved surfaces and could be rolled up for transport.
I would not buy an actual Cricut due to their DRM issues, but it was the first that came to mind
I don’t have one, but I’ve seen infomercials for these laser-based cutters that work on paper, thin wood, etc…
Shanah Tovah buddy. What is the Jewish ‘year 1’ based off? Moses?
It’s supposed to be the creation of the universe. It’s the rough basis for Creationists who claim the earth is a few thousand years old. The number comes from adding all the generations listed in the Bible. It gets a little mushy since some folks lived longer than we would expect. Moses made it to 120, while Noah lived to the ripe old age of 350 for example. Maimonides was the first person to implement the counting of the years, albeit in the 1100s of the common era.
I think I would pass on living to 350 years old. Just seems a bit much. I guess there is supposed to be a rapture happening today or tomorrow. Not sure I meet all the requirements to go up.
Based on the sorts of people preparing to ascend, I think you’re better off staying back with us.
I keep hearing something about a broken elevator. Is that related?
I wonder if flexible TPU would be better fitting to the vehicle curves and making a sharper result.
Not getting your hands painted should be easy: program a socket that fits one of those wooden paint stirring sticks. Now, you could use a press fit, or glue it in, or wrap the joint with the Handyman’s Secret Weapon, Duct Tape. Voila, no more painted hands. Or less paint, anyway…
I think we can do better. And by better, I mean more complicated and janky. Let’s combine the flexible TPU print suggested with the stirring stick so we have something resembling a fly swatter. But wait, there’s more! We attach that to a spray can extension pole, like the kind you use for wasp sprays – now the
tagstencil can be applied safely from up to 12′ away!…we’re gonna need more duct tape.
Over spray is a feature not a bug in this case.
“And by better, I mean more complicated and janky.”
This. This is the Commentariat gold that keeps me coming back, friends and comrades.
!!!!לשנה טובה
Happy high holiday to you, too
Looking forward to hanging out with you, Eric, Jeeves, and others this weekend! I’ll likely be performing tech/safety duties.
Would 3D printed plastic be considered awfully fancypants for Lemons? That is, when it comes to stencils? Though I’m guessing 3D printed parts would be de rigueur for Lemons given the culture of homebrewed fabrication in that racing series? (At least that’s what I’m given to understand re: Lemons from what I’ve read; I’ve never participated in Lemons or other racing series due to modern racing’s pervasively heavy reliance on aural communication, plus I already have to put up with so much from all the tiresome prejudices all too many people have about deaf drivers in everyday life. Oh well…)
Guessing you don’t have a laser cutter but if you had access to one would that work for making stencils out of paper (cardstock) or cardboard? Some combustible materials can indeed be cut with laser cutters with nary a problem.
My dad had a lot of cardstock stencils left over from his days in the Army during the Korean War as well as from military surplus stores afterward; those stencils were surprisingly substantial and durable despite being made from seemingly insubstantial paper, plus they had a pleasingly tactile quality that I don’t suppose 3D printed plastic would have.
Not to mention paper stencils (as compared to cardboard or 3D printed plastic) would be easier to roll up for ease of secrecy if Lemons judges have to be surreptitious about accepting bribes, emblazoning thereof on bribers’ cars notwithstanding…
Yeah, laser cut was my immediate thought, but 3d printers are a lot more accessible.
Jason, try a Bambu a1 (or better Bambu). It’s a revelation.
Good point. I should probably come up with a bribe.
3d printed or laser cut out of aluminum has been my go-to. Sendcutsend for metal typically.
If you could get the word BRIBED in a heckenblende, that would be perfect.
Only thing I have 3D printed is the keychain for my mini. The previous owner printed out a image of the car with R32 inside it. Pretty cool to me.
L’shana tova, my dude. New year, new stencil.
How about an Autopian Bribed stencil???
During the pandemic, I was stuck at home and – among other things – watched a lot of videos about 3D printing. I thought it might be something interesting to pursue.
I took some time to think about it, and then realized that I can only get my antique Hewlett-Packard LaserJet Pro M401n to do what I want it to do at about a 60% success rate. I decided that if I can’t even master 2D printing, 3D printing is probably not for me.
2D printing seems to be nowhere near as good as it ought to be…
I’m a 3D printing nerd, and I’ve done lots of tuning and modding, and have what I consider a pretty reliable printer. I also have a 2D printer, and it’s been nothing but pain. I just sprung on a new ink cartridge for it, but now it doesn’t even attempt prints and just tells me it’s jammed! Grrr.
It amazes me that 3D printers are cost-comparable to 2D ones, have (seemingly–it’s hard to compare) much more reasonable material costs, and (to me at least) seem to be way more reliable and easier to fix.
I’ve wondered why nobody has built a 2D printer with the same open-source, DIY mentality that 3D printers were originally built around, but maybe the higher precision required for a 2D printer rules that approach out?
I started off as an HP LaserJet stalwart, but I’ve long since converted.
Brother printers are where it’s at. Not to shill too much, but they’re both cheap and economical. And the printers are solid enough for home use. I’m still on my original HL-L2315DW running an OEM “high-capacity” toner cartridge. Best printer I have ever owned.
Also, not affiliated with the company in any way, just a happy printer owner.
HP laser jet 1350 user here. Bought for the company around 2003. Brought home for personal use around 2010 (company made the mistake of leasing a xerox [big mistake]).. Brought back to the company around 2016 since it rarely got used at home. Prints around 250 quarterly invoices since then without missing a beat.
Can print a test page from a Win 10 machine but haven’t figured out why I can’t print anything else. It’s OK since I have an XP machine that plays nice with it..
I bought a laser Canon last year. I don’t print much so it’s great that it works all the time. Ink jets dry up.
When I bought my Bambu P1S and started printing right out of the box (the included SD Card includes some files to start with), I was amazed. I deal with my parents, my home, and my work printers. They are all infuriating. I really wish my Bambu could print in 2D because I’d junk everything else.
It’s not flawless, but the amount of tinkering I do is minimal and when a print does mess up, it’s usually easy to troubleshoot. And! there’s no DRM in the filament. (yet)
I keep OEM toner on hand at work to troubleshoot. When the problem is solved, I take the OEM out and put in 3rd party to save the OEM for future problems.
Isn’t that a fantastic machine? I damn near gave up on trying to get my old Ender 3 to work the way I wanted to. The P1S was a godsend. Now rather than screwing around with the machine, I can concentrate on designing and making stuff, which is what I wanted to do in the first place!
(In retrospect, I kind of wish I had sprung for an X1C…)
It’s pretty incredible. I have damn-near a Star Trek replicator in my house.
And same with me. I was on the fence about a DIY solution but realized I want to design more than tinker. And the more I look about the models that are on Makerworld and other sites, the more inspired I am to design. Out of spite, mostly, because people don’t know how to design for 3D printing and that has been a fun added challenge for me.
It’s a life changer. Printing models you get online is cool and all, but the real power of the machine happens when you figure out how to design your own custom stuff. Then the possibilities really open up. Took me about two years of messing with Fusion before I really got the hang of it, and I know there’s still more to learn.
If I got into it, I’d want something that could print ABS, it appears the Bambu can not.
Really? Why not? I was looking into settings for printing ABS today (thinking about building a Voron), and the impression I got was that you might want slightly higher hotend temps than your cheapest printers, and probably an enclosure, and that’s pretty much it. I would think any Bambu enclosed CoreXY could handle that!
You want an enclosure and ideally an external air-vent if you’re printing ABS. You get some pretty nasty chemicals being released.
The P, X and H series can if they are equipped with an enclosure. My P1S is reported to be able to do it, but I don’t have a good way to route my air vent and I haven’t had a need for ABS, yet. I have a spool of ABS still in the box sitting there taunting me.
When you get some practice with that ABS spool and run out, make the switch to ASA. It’s like ABS but amped up a notch and also easier to print. Still emits volatile gases, but not as bad.
Still waiting for a need. I made brackets from PETG that go on my Bronco roof rack. If the sun starts to warp it, I’ll start looking into other materials, but it’s holding up fine so far
I have a spool of Bambu’s TPU as well that I’ve been holding out on opening. I’ve come up with a couple potential uses but the moisture absorption has me worried if I don’t use it quickly enough.
I definitely wouldn’t open it until you need it, but the little TPU I’ve used isn’t as hygroscopic as I feared. Nowhere near as bad as PETG. I bought a 250g spool of TPU to mess around with and only had to dry it once in the 6 months or so it’s been sitting out. Made a phone case and some gaskets. Can’t think of anything else to use it for. 🙂
I love the Beetle one because a little cartoon VW that looks like a plushie is a dead giveaway for Torchinsky.
Ofc if you want to lean into the “moneybags” aspect why not Tor¢h? It’s kind of like Ke$ha but let’s face it, you could be bought off with some decent hummus
and paint chips for dippingand we love you for it.Go global with it! Tor¢hinsk¥
BRB all of Autopia seeing how many currency symbols we can cram into Torch’s name
You missed the straight up dollar sign for the s.
Where would you put the symbols for the euro and pound?
₮¤₹₡£؋₦$₭¥
t: Mongolian tughrik
o: generic currency symbol, as none besides Torch himself can fathom his mind
r: Indian Rupee
c: Costa Rican colon (presented without comment)
“h”: pound sterling (look it kind of resembles an “h” okay)
i: Afghan afghani (“afghan” refers to the people; “afghani” is the currency)
n: Nigerian naira
s: dollar (many countries besides the US use “dollar”)
k: Lao kip
y: Japanese yen
My lone regret is that due to the lack of a “d” in his name, one cannot, in fact, insert the (Vietnamese) dong. (₫)
Inserting the dong is sometimes a problem for us all. 😉
MAGNIFICENT job on it Zep… I’d never have had the patience to look them all up, and then cut/paste them all.
Now, only if we could somehow get Jason elected to be the leader of a secret global financial cabal, so he’d have a reason to use that as his signature…
ADHD hyperfocus + Wikipedia rabbit holes.
And thank you 😉
Did Big Printer bribe you to write this?
I half expected a ” sponsored by Bamboo labs segment”
Since I got my printer, I’ve felt like the old saying “when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail” needs to be updated.
Try making your stencil from TPU so it flexes with the curves of the car and sits flat against them!
I think cutting it from a sheet of flexible magnetic material (plastic w/a magnetic backing) would be even better for adhering right to the surface of a car, provided it’s not an aluminum, fiberglass, or plastic part.
But then I wouldn’t be using a 3d printer and that is unacceptable.
LOL! 🙂 I don’t own a 3D printer or cutter or anything myself, but I understand your position. 🙂
Embed the magnets into the 3d prints in the corners! Or glue them. Much easier to glue them.