In my experience, anything 3D printed tends to be quite brittle. In compression, it doesn't really matter, but in tension, i.e., the pull-up stroke, or loading your foot forward and backwards, its more likely to cause an abrupt snap without warning.
True. FDM wont work on cleats.. maybe printed vertically to improve layer separation issues.. But dont think will work for cleats. On the other hand, i just 3d printed a Shimano BB tool that did the Trick! Suppose previous mech was friendly with the torque :) I do 3d-print a bunch of GSE tooling for aviation, albeit no torque involved, mainly alignment tools & "easy" stuff.
PLA is probably the worst choice of material for this. ABS or Nylon, preferably with a reinforcement additive would be better suited as they are softer and more compliant - but add printing challenges due to higher temperatures and tendency to warp. Larger layer heights and wider nozzles also increase layer adhesion. Printing the cleats at a 45 degree angle vertically may help with shear loads. Ultimately not the best suited application, agreed. Nothing stopping one from making a 3D printed positive, pouring a mold and making cast duplicates with two-part urethane. Could even add in chopped glass fibers.
Yeah... and that's why I think the carbon fibre filament thing would be a bust. The weakpoint is still the layers, and there wouldn't be any carbon fibre between the layers. In fact, the carbon fibre is a bit of a distraction, because in this use case, the keyfactor is absolutely the material used to bind the fibre, and that's something I haven't heard talked about. Right, so I found the reel he used to represent carbon-fibre (it was the first hit Google gave me, so he was probably doing the same) and the polymer is PETg. I just don't think mating layers with PETg sounds like it'd do anything for strength. If you wanted to give cleats a fighting chance, you'd have to print them on their side (and by that I mean the orientation if the shoe was on its side) and do filament runs not 90 degrees to the cleat itself. Doingthem between ground and sole would still leave layer boundaries where they would be vulnerable to unclipping (i.e.lip would break off as a chunk rather than delamination running further into the cleat. Which angle would be best? No idea, But my head is churning over that sort of stuff now. ARGH!!!
@@nialltracey2599 I think that irrespective of the material used to print, the voids left between layers by the FDM method and layer adhesion are the major issue here. Maybe a resin/UV SLA print will be better? Humm.. I think the best chance this cleats had is if they were printed "on their narrow side", but the supports required would make it highly impractical..
The special filament will not make the delamination problem go away, if anything, it will be made worse. (And you would need a special nozzle, standard brass ones will die quickly this way). You could put the PLA parts into an oven and anneal it, however, this will change the dimensions slightly so you would need multiple test runs. Even then, the end result would be pretty crappy. Huge 3D-Printing-fan myself, but this scenario kind of showcases its structural weaknesses.
3d printing for road cycling for now is relegated to make stuff like bolt covers (i use them a lot), and aero accesories like headunit fairings i also successfully printed a garmin mount for a temporal replacement in PETG, worked great, and i suspect that some bentobox like the ORBEA Orca Aero or the BMC Timemachine could also be pretty interesting
This seems like a perfect opportunity to do a collaboration with one of the many 3D-printing channels. Someone like CNC Kitchen, who does a lot of videos on durability of prints, might be a good collaborator. I think he's in Germany, which would also make it a bit easier with regards to time zones and shipping.
thoughts, I have a few. First for PLA printed cleats, I'd look at annealing them after printing, which would essentially melt the layers into a more cohesive object. Fiber infused filaments don't add strength and usually have worse layer adhesion (essentially the fibers create "voids" where the plastic can't fuse to other plastic). Not to say fiber infused filaments don't have other properties that may be desirable in certain applications, but for this application they would most likely perform worse. Resin may be a good option, but can also be brittle in its own ways, so if I were going that route I'd probably look for a "tough" or perhaps semi flexible resin of some sort.
@@Robutube1 Hopefully I won't have to try out their return policy after I try out their bibs, lol. I watched a number of reviews on their sizing so I'm fairly confident I ordered right.
stick em in the oven @ like 80degrees for a couple hours, this does an Annealing job on the plastic, makes it stronger bonding the layers together, and also makes it less brittle.
good idea especially for pain cave shoes - i wonder if printing the cleats sideways will make them strong enough for indoor only duties as the filament line runs 'front to back' of the cleat. Will have to try making some Favero power pedal spare cleats : )
I think you want to print it vertically laterally, ie starting with left/right side at the bottom and building up, so that the layers there aren't any forces to pull the layers apart on clip in's or whilst riding, however there may be damage when clipping out in that case. both ways you printed it have forces that directly pull the layer lines apart, I've done some quite successfel prints of quadlock adaptors and mounts, and the best orientations are unfortunately never the ones that cosmetically look the best! A redesign of the cleat to more suit the anisotropic manufacturing method is probably in order.
The actual cleats are injection mounded and use a tougher plastic, perhaps HDPE or ABS, I can't find any reference online. Looking at mine over the years and the wear pattern, they look like they have combined randomly orientated strands or fibres mixed with the main plastic. Which would make a lot of sense and an easy way to distribute random loading. Your basic home 3D and it's run of the mill materials won't give you the right mix of structure, density and material properties required for the type of high loaded a cleat needs to withstand. It's possible that more high tech additive technologies exist to produce a cleat, but injection moulding is the cheapest (once tooling cost have been recovered), faster and simplest way to produce them. You're not going to be able to cheap out on these items, which is unfortunate, because they do seem fairly expensive. I usually replace mine every couple years. I guess that's about 10 quid per year in cleats. I don't use covers and push off from some pretty rough country lanes if I have to stop.
I think the best way to test this idea is to print them in multiple segments to optimize the layer line layout. Basically, print the base and the clamping section in two parts, allowing you to use the strongest orientation for each section and simply bolt them together.
3d printed cleats work fine when printed in glasfilled pp, nylon, 98 shore a tpu, asa with tpu bumpers,.. a decent resin will probably also do the trick,..
It is actually surprising how dimensionally accurate replica cleats need to be. I have acquired several different sets of aftermarket Shimano cleats and they all have a noticeably different engagement and float feeling than the genuine ones.
Luke, good video as ussual, I personally come for the content and the "bonus clip" jingle, its almost like the video didn't happen without that little "song"!!!
First Workshop Tour PLS 😋 Second: i printed mine from CF Nylon on my Qidi xplus 3 (cant recommend this thing enough), with the side standing up. Going strong for 3 months now on my Simulator shoes.
Maybe send the files off to a shop that can SLS with Nylon. It's hard to get a home-gamer printer to perfectly adhere to the material properties. As some have mentioned, a ABS, Nylon, ASA with carbon may hold up better but you'll need a heated chamber to print them successfully.
Be aware filaments with fillers can be a bit abrasive and damage some printer heads. The thing that might be interesting (but a lot more work) would be to print tooling that would allow you to mold a composite cleat using "forged carbon" (compressed chopped strands, in an epoxy matrix). But that's a lot of work potentially.
Your beard is coming on well! I can't say I've been hankering after this particular video but it was interesting to see. Not an entirely unpredictable result. I think with the glass reinforced plastic, all the filaments are pointing in different directions to give it strength on all directions. 3d printed stuff is very weak between the layers.
An additional issue is the prints are flat, but the bottom of your shoes are curved and likely putting extra tension in the parts when you bolt them to the shoes. Print flashlight mounts and other low impact parts if you want to be successful with 3D printed bike stuff.
Most of the cycling world parts tend to be 30% glass fiber filled Nylon. Nylon is one of the keys to their durability and the GF is there to increases stiffness. It's also notoriously annoying to print due to it absorbing humidity and require between 8 - 16 hours at 70 - 100 degrees to dry out. I recently trialed some Polymaker CF-Nylon on a modified anycubic i3 (nozzle and firmware) for my EPS derailleur project and it's so much stiffer. Previously I'd been using their nylon on RC car drive shafts and it's layer adhesion is in another league compared to PLA and PETG because you basically don't cool it with a fan. When it fails it almost looks continuous. I suspect you'd have more success but still similar issues because those fibers will still be aligned making z still weaker.
Well that was obvious. I have printed various shims for the bike, as well as a garmin mount for aero bars, and a bottle cage mount for behind a saddle, for eg, but this can't work. MAYBE with a resin printer, but i have zero experience with that. In compression it works very well. Spacers above / below a stem would work as well, for eg. I printed a box that I designed to go behind the seat post & that worked for a bit until it disintegrated (and when it fails, it fails spectacularly). It should work if i reinforced it with fiberglass or carbon fiber. 3d printing tech + composites can get to very interesting results for the geek minded.
I printed some sneaker compatible platform adapter for my pedals. They worked like a charm, although a lot less stress on them, compared to printed cleats 🥖
I wonder if nylon would work better? Bit of a bugger to print, though. ASA maybe? I'm not going to try, though - I use Speedplay :) The only 3D-printed bike part I have used (designed, even) is an insert for the Campagnolo 11-speed front derailleur. Because I lose one every 3-6 months, and got fed up of giving Tullio's lads £15 a time. My 3D-printed versions work just as well, tend to only last 2-3 months, but only take 2 minutes to print.
I think other kinds of pla filaments might perform better without having to use fiber filaments or nylon. There are some filaments branded as PLA+ (for example from eSun which is quite popular) that are way less brittle. Those can be printed on a regular 3D printer with a brass nozzle and will not have any of the complications of material such as Nylon (different nozzle material / extra toxic fumes / low adhesion / high heat). Printing PLA+ on the hotter side makes it a bit stronger as well. Technically there are also ABS+ variants that have certain additives to make it more flexible but printing ABS is a bit of a hassle in general (low bed adhesion + warping).
None of those materials will be suitable for the strength, toughness and impact resistance needed for cleats. The cleats are injection moulded. Probably with HDPE. They might be ABS but you're not going to 3D print a cleat on a home machine. Injection moulding will give a more uniform cross-section than 3D printing.
Sometimes it is even a good idea to print without a 100% infill because every type of infill has different strength propertys and will react differently to a force.
If you use nylon with carbon filament, you will love it or filament nylon with fibreglass but it is difficult to work, but it works better than original
The only printer technology to even come close to the strength of injection moulded parts is SLS. This generally prints in sintered nylon but I have seen parts printed in glass filled nylon which is stronger still. The only problem with SLS is the cost, once you pay someone to print them (because the machines are eye wateringly expensive) it can costs more than off-the-shelf cleats.
Hey Luke, im wondering if LT-WOO has fixed any of the problems on there ERX groupset since i want to upgrade my bike. Di2 and ERX in my country has a big difference in price. Over Rm3000 in difference! Other than that, thanks for the videos!
SLS or MJF prints in Nylon don't have layers and are almost isotropic. They would be the only ones that could possibly come close to working that I can think of. You won't be doing those at home though.
You should try resit printing. Quite a fair bit more expensive, but generally resin gets harder then PLA. Do try it if you can, would like to know if that theory is true XD
Still not convinced on several things on 3 d print... 😅 Money saver... Material is long lasting? That is the only thing yo measure besides the twitch here and there to notice that every cleat design has their own twitching. ... But for what we witnessed... 3D cleats need good material. ... Will they last?
There could be many other things worth 3D printing: often your cheap sunglasses break but the glasses last forever, just printing a new frame will make all those old glasses usable again..
I wonder if this low rigidity is because of the printing material or the layered printing itself. Normally these cleats are injection molded so I assume they have a more consistent and stronger bond netwoek on the atom level compared to layered object, but if you could get the same raw material used for the injection molding for the printer, maybe such cleats would be more robust.
In polymers it's the molecular level that's important for strength, ductility and toughness. Interactions of long covalently bonded chains with with weaker secondary bonding like van der Waals and hydrogen bonds. Depending on the manufacturing route you might end up with a lot of molecular chains that are entangled or in some cases purposely oriented along a specific axis. You can vary the anisotropy.
I'm surprised the pla did this well to be honest lol. If you want to try something else, I would love to see it. It will be a lot of work, with longer prints and annealing would be required so not a Thingiverse grab project by any means. If you can modify the files or make some from scratch through CAD, it's doable. If not, please don't torture yourself lol.
what do the clears cost to print. if you could get hold of a formula 1 3d printer they use to print parts.then it would work, but it would be way to expensive.
ABS is the way to go, maybe petg is worth a go. PLA is good for nothing except making the kids models. Also if you did make some that work they need waterproofing as most would fail eventually after a few wet weather trips.
What we can learn from your test: 3D printed things cannot absorb tensile force perpendicular to the welding direction very well. one could have thought that this had to be taken into account in the design. Thank you for the insight!
Yeah, but as some commentators point out, with some better materials and more know how there might still be something achievable here. (But it was entertaining for sure!)
yeah those prints looked pretty rough. I think you could get more strength out of the perfect filament type, settings, printer and post processing. There might also be room for adjustment of the model.
One thought on some nifty use coild be if you wanted to xarry somr last fitch spares in a bag to get you home or soft pedal? Cheaper than regular cleats? 😂 (Or not with how many you need to print)
Even if this test worked would you trust them on a descent? 3D printing is good for novel items but don't consider them for any load bearing surfaces where failure can result in injury. Official cleats are not that expensive and you know they work safely
You can produce very robust 3D prints. You just need to know how. It comes down to material choices, post processing the correct printer settings. I printed some flat pedal adapters in ABS and baked them afterwards and the show kind of no wear after over 100km.
Before I watched the video, I knew the answer. I watched the video anyway and as usual it was entertaining and informative. However it is possible to 3D print bike parts as I show in these videos: ruclips.net/video/an_K8p4Juro/видео.htmlsi=6ZzIAzIgGeaVAk2H ruclips.net/user/shortsBm_4YTDDkKw ruclips.net/video/4Z26S2GoHIg/видео.htmlsi=diNtNZAsXbDeVGY_ ruclips.net/video/mc-1zr1Nm4M/видео.htmlsi=63qah8tQf2D_Kqxy Of course I am a professional engineer, so I (shouid) know what I am doing.
In my experience, anything 3D printed tends to be quite brittle. In compression, it doesn't really matter, but in tension, i.e., the pull-up stroke, or loading your foot forward and backwards, its more likely to cause an abrupt snap without warning.
True. FDM wont work on cleats.. maybe printed vertically to improve layer separation issues.. But dont think will work for cleats.
On the other hand, i just 3d printed a Shimano BB tool that did the Trick! Suppose previous mech was friendly with the torque :)
I do 3d-print a bunch of GSE tooling for aviation, albeit no torque involved, mainly alignment tools & "easy" stuff.
PLA is probably the worst choice of material for this. ABS or Nylon, preferably with a reinforcement additive would be better suited as they are softer and more compliant - but add printing challenges due to higher temperatures and tendency to warp. Larger layer heights and wider nozzles also increase layer adhesion. Printing the cleats at a 45 degree angle vertically may help with shear loads.
Ultimately not the best suited application, agreed. Nothing stopping one from making a 3D printed positive, pouring a mold and making cast duplicates with two-part urethane. Could even add in chopped glass fibers.
Yeah... and that's why I think the carbon fibre filament thing would be a bust. The weakpoint is still the layers, and there wouldn't be any carbon fibre between the layers. In fact, the carbon fibre is a bit of a distraction, because in this use case, the keyfactor is absolutely the material used to bind the fibre, and that's something I haven't heard talked about.
Right, so I found the reel he used to represent carbon-fibre (it was the first hit Google gave me, so he was probably doing the same) and the polymer is PETg. I just don't think mating layers with PETg sounds like it'd do anything for strength.
If you wanted to give cleats a fighting chance, you'd have to print them on their side (and by that I mean the orientation if the shoe was on its side) and do filament runs not 90 degrees to the cleat itself. Doingthem between ground and sole would still leave layer boundaries where they would be vulnerable to unclipping (i.e.lip would break off as a chunk rather than delamination running further into the cleat. Which angle would be best? No idea, But my head is churning over that sort of stuff now. ARGH!!!
@@nialltracey2599 I think that irrespective of the material used to print, the voids left between layers by the FDM method and layer adhesion are the major issue here.
Maybe a resin/UV SLA print will be better? Humm..
I think the best chance this cleats had is if they were printed "on their narrow side", but the supports required would make it highly impractical..
Print the whole cleat at 45 degrees. Problem solved
Yes for workshop tour...especially what you keep on hand in your small parts bins.
Yeah a workshop tour would be 👌
The special filament will not make the delamination problem go away, if anything, it will be made worse. (And you would need a special nozzle, standard brass ones will die quickly this way).
You could put the PLA parts into an oven and anneal it, however, this will change the dimensions slightly so you would need multiple test runs.
Even then, the end result would be pretty crappy.
Huge 3D-Printing-fan myself, but this scenario kind of showcases its structural weaknesses.
3d printing for road cycling for now is relegated to make stuff like bolt covers (i use them a lot), and aero accesories like headunit fairings
i also successfully printed a garmin mount for a temporal replacement in PETG, worked great, and i suspect that some bentobox like the ORBEA Orca Aero or the BMC Timemachine could also be pretty interesting
Agreed, PLA sticks best to PLA. Adding reinforcement fibers lowers adhesion between layers where delamination is a big concern.
He would need to print with Nylon filament with added carbon fibre. I dont see PLA, PETG, ASA, ABS work.
Workshop tour is a must !! always great content with you luke ! bonjour from french bike mechanic 🥖🥖🥖
This seems like a perfect opportunity to do a collaboration with one of the many 3D-printing channels. Someone like CNC Kitchen, who does a lot of videos on durability of prints, might be a good collaborator. I think he's in Germany, which would also make it a bit easier with regards to time zones and shipping.
thoughts, I have a few. First for PLA printed cleats, I'd look at annealing them after printing, which would essentially melt the layers into a more cohesive object. Fiber infused filaments don't add strength and usually have worse layer adhesion (essentially the fibers create "voids" where the plastic can't fuse to other plastic). Not to say fiber infused filaments don't have other properties that may be desirable in certain applications, but for this application they would most likely perform worse. Resin may be a good option, but can also be brittle in its own ways, so if I were going that route I'd probably look for a "tough" or perhaps semi flexible resin of some sort.
Just put in an order to Siroko through your link, looking forward to trying their product and throwing some support to the Trace Velo cause! 😃 🥖🥖🥖🥖🥖
I found their sizing a bit on the skimpy side, but the kit was well made.
@@Robutube1 Hopefully I won't have to try out their return policy after I try out their bibs, lol. I watched a number of reviews on their sizing so I'm fairly confident I ordered right.
@@jekyll8004 Like I said, it is nice stuff so I've got my fingers crossed for you😃.
stick em in the oven @ like 80degrees for a couple hours, this does an Annealing job on the plastic, makes it stronger bonding the layers together, and also makes it less brittle.
If you do come back to 3d printed cleats, try get them printed in metal. jlc3dp can do metal printing, and its reasonably priced.
good idea especially for pain cave shoes - i wonder if printing the cleats sideways will make them strong enough for indoor only duties as the filament line runs 'front to back' of the cleat. Will have to try making some Favero power pedal spare cleats : )
I think you want to print it vertically laterally, ie starting with left/right side at the bottom and building up, so that the layers there aren't any forces to pull the layers apart on clip in's or whilst riding, however there may be damage when clipping out in that case. both ways you printed it have forces that directly pull the layer lines apart, I've done some quite successfel prints of quadlock adaptors and mounts, and the best orientations are unfortunately never the ones that cosmetically look the best!
A redesign of the cleat to more suit the anisotropic manufacturing method is probably in order.
When u watch the whole video and there is no music for the bonus clip feels like u havent seen the end of it lol
The actual cleats are injection mounded and use a tougher plastic, perhaps HDPE or ABS, I can't find any reference online. Looking at mine over the years and the wear pattern, they look like they have combined randomly orientated strands or fibres mixed with the main plastic. Which would make a lot of sense and an easy way to distribute random loading. Your basic home 3D and it's run of the mill materials won't give you the right mix of structure, density and material properties required for the type of high loaded a cleat needs to withstand.
It's possible that more high tech additive technologies exist to produce a cleat, but injection moulding is the cheapest (once tooling cost have been recovered), faster and simplest way to produce them.
You're not going to be able to cheap out on these items, which is unfortunate, because they do seem fairly expensive. I usually replace mine every couple years. I guess that's about 10 quid per year in cleats. I don't use covers and push off from some pretty rough country lanes if I have to stop.
I think the best way to test this idea is to print them in multiple segments to optimize the layer line layout. Basically, print the base and the clamping section in two parts, allowing you to use the strongest orientation for each section and simply bolt them together.
3d printed cleats work fine when printed in glasfilled pp, nylon, 98 shore a tpu, asa with tpu bumpers,.. a decent resin will probably also do the trick,..
It is actually surprising how dimensionally accurate replica cleats need to be. I have acquired several different sets of aftermarket Shimano cleats and they all have a noticeably different engagement and float feeling than the genuine ones.
Luke, good video as ussual, I personally come for the content and the "bonus clip" jingle, its almost like the video didn't happen without that little "song"!!!
First Workshop Tour PLS 😋
Second: i printed mine from CF Nylon on my Qidi xplus 3 (cant recommend this thing enough), with the side standing up. Going strong for 3 months now on my Simulator shoes.
Maybe send the files off to a shop that can SLS with Nylon. It's hard to get a home-gamer printer to perfectly adhere to the material properties. As some have mentioned, a ABS, Nylon, ASA with carbon may hold up better but you'll need a heated chamber to print them successfully.
I am glad you have tried them indoors first! Nice try though :0)
Be aware filaments with fillers can be a bit abrasive and damage some printer heads.
The thing that might be interesting (but a lot more work) would be to print tooling that would allow you to mold a composite cleat using "forged carbon" (compressed chopped strands, in an epoxy matrix). But that's a lot of work potentially.
Your beard is coming on well! I can't say I've been hankering after this particular video but it was interesting to see. Not an entirely unpredictable result. I think with the glass reinforced plastic, all the filaments are pointing in different directions to give it strength on all directions. 3d printed stuff is very weak between the layers.
on the face of it, seemed like a bad idea but always worth experimenting to confirm! Cheers!
An additional issue is the prints are flat, but the bottom of your shoes are curved and likely putting extra tension in the parts when you bolt them to the shoes. Print flashlight mounts and other low impact parts if you want to be successful with 3D printed bike stuff.
Love the new tool organization,Luke!
Most of the cycling world parts tend to be 30% glass fiber filled Nylon. Nylon is one of the keys to their durability and the GF is there to increases stiffness. It's also notoriously annoying to print due to it absorbing humidity and require between 8 - 16 hours at 70 - 100 degrees to dry out. I recently trialed some Polymaker CF-Nylon on a modified anycubic i3 (nozzle and firmware) for my EPS derailleur project and it's so much stiffer. Previously I'd been using their nylon on RC car drive shafts and it's layer adhesion is in another league compared to PLA and PETG because you basically don't cool it with a fan. When it fails it almost looks continuous. I suspect you'd have more success but still similar issues because those fibers will still be aligned making z still weaker.
Well that was obvious. I have printed various shims for the bike, as well as a garmin mount for aero bars, and a bottle cage mount for behind a saddle, for eg, but this can't work. MAYBE with a resin printer, but i have zero experience with that. In compression it works very well. Spacers above / below a stem would work as well, for eg. I printed a box that I designed to go behind the seat post & that worked for a bit until it disintegrated (and when it fails, it fails spectacularly). It should work if i reinforced it with fiberglass or carbon fiber. 3d printing tech + composites can get to very interesting results for the geek minded.
Workshop tour, yes please!
Would love a tour of the baguette factory!
I printed some sneaker compatible platform adapter for my pedals. They worked like a charm, although a lot less stress on them, compared to printed cleats 🥖
🥖 Oh very nice with the workshop board. 🛠️ Another idea for you to try is photo frames and foam then cutout the tool shapes.
I wonder if nylon would work better? Bit of a bugger to print, though. ASA maybe? I'm not going to try, though - I use Speedplay :)
The only 3D-printed bike part I have used (designed, even) is an insert for the Campagnolo 11-speed front derailleur. Because I lose one every 3-6 months, and got fed up of giving Tullio's lads £15 a time. My 3D-printed versions work just as well, tend to only last 2-3 months, but only take 2 minutes to print.
thank you Luke, I'd like a worksop tour, but i am not keen on the fiber filament cleats, its probably not worth the cost or effort
Gamer Luke 01:14 🎮
Top entertainment as always Luke. Keep em' coming.
Thanks saved me a lot of time and pla!
Taulman 230 is a Nylon based filament that melts at 230C I wonder how well that material would work. Its not reinforced but Nylon is pretty tough.
I think other kinds of pla filaments might perform better without having to use fiber filaments or nylon. There are some filaments branded as PLA+ (for example from eSun which is quite popular) that are way less brittle. Those can be printed on a regular 3D printer with a brass nozzle and will not have any of the complications of material such as Nylon (different nozzle material / extra toxic fumes / low adhesion / high heat). Printing PLA+ on the hotter side makes it a bit stronger as well. Technically there are also ABS+ variants that have certain additives to make it more flexible but printing ABS is a bit of a hassle in general (low bed adhesion + warping).
None of those materials will be suitable for the strength, toughness and impact resistance needed for cleats. The cleats are injection moulded. Probably with HDPE. They might be ABS but you're not going to 3D print a cleat on a home machine. Injection moulding will give a more uniform cross-section than 3D printing.
Maybe resin 3d printing could work, the layers are way thinner
Can get some strong stuff out of resin 3d printing, likely solve the layer adhesion issue
Sometimes it is even a good idea to print without a 100% infill because every type of infill has different strength propertys and will react differently to a force.
If you use nylon with carbon filament, you will love it or filament nylon with fibreglass but it is difficult to work, but it works better than original
The only printer technology to even come close to the strength of injection moulded parts is SLS. This generally prints in sintered nylon but I have seen parts printed in glass filled nylon which is stronger still. The only problem with SLS is the cost, once you pay someone to print them (because the machines are eye wateringly expensive) it can costs more than off-the-shelf cleats.
🥖 was this an excuse just to get 3-D printer?
As always loving your content. Keep up the hard work.
Hey Luke, im wondering if LT-WOO has fixed any of the problems on there ERX groupset since i want to upgrade my bike. Di2 and ERX in my country has a big difference in price. Over Rm3000 in difference! Other than that, thanks for the videos!
SLS or MJF prints in Nylon don't have layers and are almost isotropic. They would be the only ones that could possibly come close to working that I can think of. You won't be doing those at home though.
You should try resit printing.
Quite a fair bit more expensive, but generally resin gets harder then PLA.
Do try it if you can, would like to know if that theory is true XD
Still not convinced on several things on 3 d print... 😅 Money saver... Material is long lasting? That is the only thing yo measure besides the twitch here and there to notice that every cleat design has their own twitching. ... But for what we witnessed... 3D cleats need good material. ... Will they last?
There could be many other things worth 3D printing: often your cheap sunglasses break but the glasses last forever, just printing a new frame will make all those old glasses usable again..
I use cleat covers. Solves the problem, not just the symptom.
I wonder if this low rigidity is because of the printing material or the layered printing itself. Normally these cleats are injection molded so I assume they have a more consistent and stronger bond netwoek on the atom level compared to layered object, but if you could get the same raw material used for the injection molding for the printer, maybe such cleats would be more robust.
In polymers it's the molecular level that's important for strength, ductility and toughness. Interactions of long covalently bonded chains with with weaker secondary bonding like van der Waals and hydrogen bonds. Depending on the manufacturing route you might end up with a lot of molecular chains that are entangled or in some cases purposely oriented along a specific axis. You can vary the anisotropy.
I've never used a 3D printer but did you need this experiment to achieve this conclusion? A fun activity perhaps but how expensive are replacements?
Laughs in SPD. Metal cleats ftw!
If you can afford 3d printer, you can afford an attachment! I LOVE YOU LUKE
What if they were printed vertically, would they be stronger as the layering is no longer a week point?
Nice tool wall! 🥖🥖🥖 Ive always wanted a pegboard tool wall but the cheapest big one Ive seen so far was close to a 100 bucks 😬
Hey, if you can sort the print file for the Times, you’ve got some cleats that last longer than the real thing!
I have the doubt if 3d printing could help to make the bike more aero? I mean the seat tube with more fin shape, the seat stays or the down tube.
Yeah filament and the way how the modell is print is the way
I'm surprised the pla did this well to be honest lol. If you want to try something else, I would love to see it. It will be a lot of work, with longer prints and annealing would be required so not a Thingiverse grab project by any means. If you can modify the files or make some from scratch through CAD, it's doable. If not, please don't torture yourself lol.
Standard shimano cleats are made from glass reinforced plastic no?
Well that was a complete surprise 😂
what do the clears cost to print. if you could get hold of a formula 1 3d printer they use to print parts.then it would work, but it would be way to expensive.
Workshop tour would be cool 🥖🥖🥖🥖
ABS is the way to go, maybe petg is worth a go. PLA is good for nothing except making the kids models. Also if you did make some that work they need waterproofing as most would fail eventually after a few wet weather trips.
Люк - золотые руки. Молодец!
was about the carbon nylon filament..
Ah, all those problems with plasticky cleats, when we already have a perfectly good SPD system that uses full metal cleats and pedals :)
What we can learn from your test: 3D printed things cannot absorb tensile force perpendicular to the welding direction very well. one could have thought that this had to be taken into account in the design. Thank you for the insight!
Was going to be a fail from the get-go, really. As soon as i saw the intro I thought "BAD IDEA". Fun though!
Yeah, but as some commentators point out, with some better materials and more know how there might still be something achievable here. (But it was entertaining for sure!)
The solution is obvious! Print the pedals too!
cnc machined aluminium, or stainless cleats?
Have you tried to 3d print them out on Nylon filament? I think it could definitely work!
I wonder if resin printing would do a better job.
Did you try liquid resin?
🥖🥖🥖Awesome highlight of the short comings of 3d printed bits. They're great for some things, but pedals, cleats, and garmin mounts aren't it. 🥖🥖🥖
Have you down a video about power meter that are from ali express?
It needs to be printed in PET-G or ABS for proper testing. PLA isn't a material for mechanical parts.
Yes to workshop tour and whats top used and maybe shonky Chinese tools uouve binned
You mean 100% infill. Infill density is measured as a percentage: 0% is hollow, and 100% is solid.
You should work with a 3D printing channel on RUclips
yeah those prints looked pretty rough. I think you could get more strength out of the perfect filament type, settings, printer and post processing. There might also be room for adjustment of the model.
How about making from wood? Like it is a proven material as in Dutch clogs and Japanese Geta.
Great experiment Luke, looks like 3D printed wont be a good idea for cycling stuff…
Would love to see how you made up your little set up at the end 🥖🥖
no speedplay?
Freat idea for content! Doing something so we don't have to. If you do find a material and process that can hold up, that would be great.
One thought on some nifty use coild be if you wanted to xarry somr last fitch spares in a bag to get you home or soft pedal? Cheaper than regular cleats? 😂 (Or not with how many you need to print)
A nice idea and worth a go, but..
I have a feeling the more expensive filament will be close to the cost of cheap cleats
Even if this test worked would you trust them on a descent? 3D printing is good for novel items but don't consider them for any load bearing surfaces where failure can result in injury. Official cleats are not that expensive and you know they work safely
You can produce very robust 3D prints. You just need to know how. It comes down to material choices, post processing the correct printer settings.
I printed some flat pedal adapters in ABS and baked them afterwards and the show kind of no wear after over 100km.
Nylon aka PA6 or PA12 filament
BAGUETTE NATION WER U AT?? 🥖
The guys 3D printed a rear derailleur bracket. The bracket also broke immediately.
A nice little aside from the normal content 🙂
ali MTB cleats is 3 usd, RB plastic cleats is 2 usd, I think the 3d printed one won't cheaper than that.
Next step: CNCed out of a solid delrin block
🥖 Workshop tour please Luke.
I failed to see the point. Now off brand is very inexpensive.
Before I watched the video, I knew the answer. I watched the video anyway and as usual it was entertaining and informative. However it is possible to 3D print bike parts as I show in these videos:
ruclips.net/video/an_K8p4Juro/видео.htmlsi=6ZzIAzIgGeaVAk2H
ruclips.net/user/shortsBm_4YTDDkKw
ruclips.net/video/4Z26S2GoHIg/видео.htmlsi=diNtNZAsXbDeVGY_
ruclips.net/video/mc-1zr1Nm4M/видео.htmlsi=63qah8tQf2D_Kqxy
Of course I am a professional engineer, so I (shouid) know what I am doing.
I use Exustar cleats which are vastly superior to Shimano IMHO...
i wonder if resin printed cleats would work