| Author | Message | ||
     Sickquad |
Short article about the Firebolt plastic in the June Machine Design. The company which designed the plastic received some form of a plastics industry award. | ||
| S320002 |
Sick, Are the plastic body parts still molded by Victor Plastics in Victor, Iowa? I met a guy from there who used make X1 parts. He said they had to raise prices due to QC problems. Greg | ||
| Anonymous |
S320002, Nope, Victor is gone, Bemis is in. | ||
| Sickquad |
The plastic is made in Wisconsin. Said they were color impregnated, this and that. Don't have the article in front of me right now. | ||
| Rockbiter1 |
Is it still made of Surlin (sp) the golf ball plastic? My Blast body panels are made of it, and while supposedly scratch resistant, my plastic just isn't very shiny anymore. | ||
| Dynarider |
Surlyn is a very durable product, but it also scratches easily, wont hold its color very well either. I imagine the Buell bodypanels have a UV inhibitor to reduce the amount of fade. Also the body panels cant be made out of 100% surlyn, the material by itself is very soupy & doesnt have a lot of strength, but mixed with either a low density pe or preferably a linear low density pe the stuff is almost bullet proof. We use quite a bit of Surlyn in my industry & for the applications we use it for its great. It has both strength when mixed properly & weird ability to be torn in a straight line along machine direction when extruded. The bags you buy at the grocery store that you tear along the top to open have a surlyn inner layer to them. It just doesnt hold its colors up to real long exposure. | ||
| 99buellx1 |
Wow, that has to be the most knowledgeable and non-bitching post that I may have ever read from Dyna.  Actually that was quite interesting, thanks. Craig Buell Cycle Center  | ||
| Blake |
Yeah, OUTSTANDING!!! Dynarider = Dr. Plastic Dyna, Do you have any insight into the best method to remove dulled areas on the Buell surlyn bodywork. My buddy Keith's black XB9S suffered some very minor rub marks from his tank bag (airbox bag?). He used the recommended HD products which did indeed remove the marks, but the surface was left with kind of a slight haze, just not as shiny as it was. He's tried waxing and buffing lightly, which helped some, but not much. Does he have any hope of restoring the original luster short of clear coating? | ||
| Dynarider |
Actually I dont have any idea on how to bring the color back to its original sheen. We are not to concerned about that so have never even experimented with it. | ||
| Dynarider |
craig, if its one thing I know about its anything to do with extruding plastics. Been doing it for over 15 years. Everything from High density, to linear Low, to nylon, surlyn, copper impregnated linear low, butene & hexene linear low, blah blah blah. mainly all blown film extrusion & flat sheet. just getting into the injected & foam molding a little bit now. | ||
| Court |
Greg: If you feel like you have to continue to be polite and carry on intelligent conversation, I can ask to have you banished to another board. Look, I've tolerated about 5 civil posts from you that conveyed useful information and I've about had my fill. If you persist and make a habit of contributing in a meaningful way you will test my patience! Have an explosive 4th! Court | ||
| Dynarider |
5?? was it actually that many  Im sorry, i will try & post more negatively in the future. thanks for understanding | ||
| Mikej |
If you're just getting into the injection stuff you're in for a world of fun. Flow marks, grain flows, sink marks, where to heat and not heat to get good fills. Worked in the engineering department of a consumer product company where the product was in daily public scrutiny and the slighest flow pattern really showed up on the dark-grayish color of the product. Dimples and stimples got nothing to do with pimples, has everything to do with apparent cosmetics though.  Have fun. | ||
| Bomber |
I've had great luck in polishing our dull spots in my wifes blast bodywork using Novus plastic polish . . . . .comes in three degrees of grittiness (labeled 1, 2, and 3, I orginally bought it to bring back old fountain pen bodies, an application at which is excells, btw) you can get the stuff from a variety of sources, including the (shudder) Container Store chain (wear your leathers, scratch and spit alot, and they won';t think you're there for faux bamboo toilet paper covers). . . I THINK the blast stuff is made of the same material as the new Xseries scoots . . . .. for those that don't know Dyna personally (in the flesh), he's really much more of a poopy-head meanin than his recent posts might lead you to believe . . .. cut him some slack, I'm sure he;ll be back to whining, insulting and snivling soon ;-} | ||
| Sickquad |
So I found another article mentioning BUELL motorcycles. This time in the July edition of Mechanical Engineering. The short article talks about Buell implementing new CAD technology front to back in the design and production processes. I think the software is the same as what Ford is using, if my memory is right. And it is good stuff. Seems like Buell is up on all of the latest technology. I didn't know this before reading this short articles. I always thought Buell and HD were just "good enough" companies. | ||
| Bomber |
along withi being a bull-goose creator of great scoots, Buell is likely acting as a live-fire excercise for new design and manufacturing techniques . . . . allowing H-D to have real-world experience in putting new technology to work in the plant and on designers desks in a smaller environment before rolling it out enterprise-wide . . .. . I'd bet on the colored plastic panels appearing on mainstream H-D bikes, for instance, as well as seeing some of the intelligent devices used on Buells production line moving across the state to Milwaukee | ||
| Sickquad |
Bomber, you may be right. That is a real smart idea from HD. I see on your profile that you added a oil temp gauge. Can you give me some details. Such as where you get the temp from and where you mounted it. I have machine shop access so I can make the necessary parts. | ||
| Bomber |
Sick youbetcha . . .ya gots mail! | ||
| Anonymous |
Actually, the body parts are made out of a specialized variation of a special version of Surlyn. There are many variations on it, and I can assure you the material in XB bodywork is a long way from the plastic in grocery bags. When you scratch it, it is virtually impossible to get it back to the perfect shine it had before. The molds used on the Buell's are wildly expensive ones with a special chrome finish on the inside, applied under very specific conditions. Unless you can smooth the bodywork to the same finish level as that chrome, it will always be slightly less glossy. So after you wax and polish your bike, it actually will lose a little of the shine. It will then stay at that level, as long as you always use the right products and care to clean it. But compared to paint, it's an awesome looking material with fabulous durability. And each year of Buell with Surlyn has brought refinements to the compound and color. Compare a new XB9S in black to a 2000 Blast in black, and you will see. | ||
| Darthane |
I think the software is the same as what Ford is using, if my memory is right. And it is good stuff. <~~Sickquad I-DEAS (a.k.a. SDRC, the 3D CAD software that Ford mainly employs) is quite possibly on it's last legs. Ford is looking into using CATIA (until now mainly associated with DCX) as I-DEAS was bought by EDS, the company that produces Unigraphics (the 3D suite that GM uses). ::shrugs:: I have at one point or another used all of them and they all have their ups and downs (I personally prefer UG). Any 3D package is better than none at all! This really had no relevence, so blah. Bryan | ||
| Court |
>>>Seems like Buell is up on all of the latest technology. Nothing could be further from the truth. Buell, since the day they went hot with the FIRST WEB SITE in the vehicle industry has been a pioneer. No wait, it was about the time Erik was carting an old computer in the trunk of an Audi with some high-zoot foreign software on it. Check out the text books at the finer institutions of higher eduka...eduec....learning and you'll find names in common with the Buell employee list. Why, evem yours truly, a relative idiot wandering amidst the gifted, bore witness to the creation of something that (a couple years later when L. L. Bean took their first e-order) would come to be called "e-commerce". Buell, as we squeak, is up to things that would make the eyebrows of astronauts raise in amaziation!. . . most concern motorcycles.  | ||
| Bomber |
like projecting pictures of Kansans at several times life size? that would make ANYONE"S eyebrows go up | ||
| Dynarider |
Anon, virtually all types of extrusion either use or require wildly expensive molds with chrome facing. Without the chrome the plastic will stick & drag & hangup resulting in nothing but garbage. With certain products you can also either coat the mold with a release agent or have it mixed directly into your resin. And unless Buell has had Exxon or Dupont, etc develop a proprietary surlyn resin, for the most part they are similar. The resin will vary slighty from lot number to lot number. Some might have a slighty different melt index or density but the product is all the same. | ||
| Dynarider |
Flow marks, grain flows, sink marks, where to heat and not heat to get good fills. Mike, flow marks are a problem with all of the extrusion processes. The other ones are indicitive of our injection molding but they have a pretty good handle on it so far. As far as the heat goes...yep heat is the number 1 way to either make good product or crap. Too much or too little in the wrong areas & you just wasted a lot of very expensive resin. So long as we know the density & melt index of the resin & have the proper mixing tip on the screw then we are able to control our melt temp & its all good. Might have to choke off the water flow on one of the zones to fine tune what we are looking for tho. You ever have to deal with delta t's? Thats where the flow of your plastic moves faster thru the center of your barrel or mold than it does near the edges. Sort of like a river where the water near the banks barely moves but the center of the river is raging..hence the term Delta T. You can fine tune that flow with heat as well. | ||
| Sickquad |
This is an interesting thread. When I graduated I was not enthusiastic about taking a job with a company which worked with composites and plastics but now I really enjoy it. We make the white tiles on the space shuttle (not the ones that fell off) and also composite brake rotors for F1 cars. I think I might stay with the composite industry. | ||
| Anonymous |
Dyna, Read again, and understand that I know a lot more about the specific situation than you do. This is a very special chroming process, that is quite expensive. Remember, you are just getting into learning about injection molding. There is a huge amount to know. And, yes, Dupont is working with Buell on special mixes of a special version of Surlyn. Saying all Surlyn is the same has knocked your one moment of credibility out with me  Believe me there is a lot more to it than lot to lot variation, which, BTW, we work darned hard to eliminate. | ||
| Dynarider |
Anon, I stated right up front that unless you had a deal worked with dupont than its basically all the same. You said that Buell & Dupont are working together on it so my point is still valid. I dont want to argue about it & I wont. I dont have a lot of experience with injection molding but I do have extensive knowledge of Plastics & extrusion. The basic principles are all the same as are the theories behind them. its the final product & they way they are achieved that is different. Also I know about the chroming process, I may not know your exact chromer but our dies do wear the chrome plating out & they have to be sent out to be refinished every couple of years. Its not your average joe blow down the corner "hey I will chrome your wheels for you" type place either. We make plastic pallets & connectors for the food & beverage industry. Also shipping containers, food storage containers, etc. Have also spent mega years in the medical product field & dealing with their stringent regulations. Quality has to be perfect as patients lives depended on us. | ||
| Blake |
Anonymous, See if you can get them to put a scratch resistant film on the parts like on most good quality helmet faceshields. Then it would be perfect! Are you absolutely sure the surlyn isn't the same as that used for shopping bags?... The light had to be just right, but I coulda swore I noticed the word "Kroger" ghosted within the tank cover of a Blast I saw last year.  | ||
| Crazyhorse |
Dyna good luck with Injection molding.It's wonderful. I've been around plastic long time.back when they were called (Plunger Machines). Extrusion is Totally Different. | ||
| Dynarider |
Wayne, its just good to be trying something a bit different. Been doing blown film & flat sheet so long my eyes are starting to cross. Plastics is a great business to be in tho. Basically recession proof. And once you learn the trade you can go just about anywhere & get a job. Big market for extrusion folks. |
