Steering rack gaiter

thingiverse

I am finding it difficult to get the correct steering rack gaiter for my car so i thought about making one in TPU. Its not quite there yet but I have produced a near perfect one using the thick walled file. The thin walled file may work as a single layer/spiral vase print but I am still working on that. I am a noob at Solidworks so it is far from perfect but it looks reasonable. The topmost bellow surface tends to still be porous which is a combination of not being able to hold it still and also possibly being a bit too thin. I haven't tried it on a car yet but it is very strong and will stretch to about twice the printed length. It could do with a softer flex than 95 shore but then supporting it would be more difficult Update May 2018 Printing the gaiter as folded re-entrant designs avoids the problems of them getting floppy and i could print one large enough to fit the real application. The straight sided design works well but obviously isn't particularly stretchy. Both print well with standard TPU settings and are watertight. The straight sided design inverts well but the centre section of the bellowed one stays dimpled. And of course they don't need to be black,. The smaller one is printed in NinjaFlex