Headlights Tutorial, rewritten....

[Allan31]

I inquired after MV products headlights and what are we using now a days.

Daniel Himmel mentioned a dapper block, something I had never even heard of Amazon delivered shortly thereafter.

To make the headlights, you will need: Dapping block set, punches, clear UV cured resin, food tray aluminum, all available on Amazon.

You'll only need one or two sizes for the headlights, I'm thinking I can now finally do those nifty screened intake covers on the F1 cars.

The punch set will also come in handy for sheet styrene and any number of other things.

  

I'm thinking the clear for instruments on dashboards but the minor heat might be a problem. Follow manufactures cautions, liquid resin can be hazardous.

Aluminum from a food tray, rolled foil is too thin.

I pick the shiniest side then rough the other so I don't screw it up.

I chose as a test to replace the badly yelloed lights on the Fisher 917LH.

I removed the lights and matched the sizes with the punches.

 

I punched out enough for several sets

Placed in the block and a #14 dapper gave me a good lens.

 

Mount on something not too sticky.

Apply drops of resin in each lens then a couple of minutes under the UV light.

 

Ba-Da-Bing, Ba-Da-Boom....

  

These are exact duplicates to the MV lenses, I'm thrilled......

Edited February 17 by Allan31

[Bainford]

Nice work, Allan. That does the trick.

[StevenGuthmiller]

I’m really liking this idea for the reflectors!

I’m always looking for ideas on how to do those.

I might try an alternative method for the lenses, but the reflectors look great!

 

 

 

Steve

[peteski]

That is a great tip.

So the aluminum does not wrinkle during the doming process?  How do you punch them out (or does the doming process already do that)?

[Straightliner59]

Glad that worked, for you! I've been using it, for years. I usually use lenses from my parts boxes.

[NOBLNG]

10 hours ago, peteski said:

That is a great tip.

So the aluminum does not wrinkle during the doming process?  How do you punch them out (or does the doming process already do that)?

A sharp hollow punch works nicely. You could even cut them out with scissors if you don’t have punches, but the punches are cheap compared to the doming block set.

[bobss396]

What is that white thing with the folding wings?

[Allan31]

Hey Bob,

That is the UV light for curing the resin on its side.

[Allan31]

39 minutes ago, NOBLNG said:

A sharp hollow punch works nicely. You could even cut them out with scissors if you don’t have punches, but the punches are cheap compared to the doming block set.

I had not intended this to be a tutorial, it was posted as an answer to an inquiry about MV headlights.

I will do a proper tutorial demonstrating the process.

[Allan31]

11 hours ago, peteski said:

That is a great tip.

So the aluminum does not wrinkle during the doming process?  How do you punch them out (or does the doming process already do that)?

Thanks Peter, I will do a proper tutorial and explain it all, works great.

[NOBLNG]

49 minutes ago, bobss396 said:

What is that white thing with the folding wings?

That would be the UV light for curing the resin. Kind of a neat design too…you don’t have to sit there and hold it.😎

Edited February 14 by NOBLNG

[Ace-Garageguy]

Most excellent info...  

[Straightliner59]

On 2/13/2024 at 6:48 PM, peteski said:

That is a great tip.

So the aluminum does not wrinkle during the doming process?  How do you punch them out (or does the doming process already do that)?

Since I told him about the doming block, I can answer this. I use a punch of the proper size for the headlight, from a set I bought at Harbor Freight. I drop the resulting disc into the chosen "dimple" in the doming block, and use the proper die, for the size. They dome, smoothly. It's the best method for making headlights I've discovered. You could even melt a ball onto a bit of clear, stretched sprue, and put an element in it. That's how I did the Vega and Chevy II, above. I did rectangular headlights for my Monza, by building a little box from strip styrene, and burnishing the foil into it, to dish it. That was a tip that was provided me by Steve Milberry. For aluminum sheet, I use Maid-O-Metal tooling aluminum available at HL.

Edited February 17 by Straightliner59

[Allan31]

Thanks Daniel !!

 

[peteski]

7 hours ago, Straightliner59 said:

Since I told him about the doming block, I can answer this. I use a punch of the proper size for the headlight, from a set I bought at Harbor Freight. I drop the resulting disc into the chosen "dimple" in the doming block, and use the proper die, for the size. They dome, smoothly.

Thanks Daniel, that clarifies things.  I thought you were placing flat piece of aluminum over the surface of the female die, then pressing it into the depression using the male part of the die.  Kind of what you would when punching the metal in a regular punch/die set.  That also answers my subsequent question about trimming the finished reflector out of the flat sheet - there is nothing to trim.  Now it is all clear.

Using this technique you are limited to the sizes available in a doming set.  Do those provide proper sizes for headlights which would be replacing kit's solid headlights drilled out of the grille of many older kits (or promos) where the headlight was integral part of the grille? Judging by the photos you posted, the answer is yes, close enough.

[ColonelKrypton]

1 hour ago, peteski said:

Using this technique you are limited to the sizes available in a doming set.  Do those provide proper sizes for headlights which would be replacing kit's solid headlights drilled out of the grille of many older kits (or promos) where the headlight was integral part of the grille? Judging by the photos you posted, the answer is yes, close enough.

the size of the part ( i.e. diameter if round ) is set by whatever punch tool you use to make your disc. You could use a simple 1/4" paper punch or round hole or leather punches (as seen in the first post of this topic) or you could even use a jewellers disc cutter ( often from about 3mm up in size in 1mm steps )

The curvature given to your disc is made from using the dapping block. You do not need to use the 5mm size depression for a 5mm diameter disc. For example, you could impart a shallow curvature by using the 20mm or 30mm size depression with your 5mm disc - smaller depression greater the curvature to your piece, larger depression the shallower your curvature.

These dapping blocks are quite handy. I have cast resin in one to make parts, even made some bits using heated sprue pushed into one of the depressions. 

Moon discs are quite easily made too - a 15mm ( or whatever size suits your needs ) aluminum disc, dapped into one of the larger depressions ( i.e. 35mm, 40mm, or 45mm ) and voila, a nice moon disc.

You don't the matching dapping punches although they are handy and easy to use, you can use ball bearings of the appropriate size as well. 

cheers, Graham

[NOBLNG]

And the disc diameter will shrink slightly as you dome it, so a tad bigger disc may be better than smaller. The more curvature you give it, the more it will shrink.

Edited February 17 by NOBLNG

[Straightliner59]

3 hours ago, peteski said:

Thanks Daniel, that clarifies things.  I thought you were placing flat piece of aluminum over the surface of the female die, then pressing it into the depression using the male part of the die.  Kind of what you would when punching the metal in a regular punch/die set.  That also answers my subsequent question about trimming the finished reflector out of the flat sheet - there is nothing to trim.  Now it is all clear.

Using this technique you are limited to the sizes available in a doming set.  Do those provide proper sizes for headlights which would be replacing kit's solid headlights drilled out of the grille of many older kits (or promos) where the headlight was integral part of the grille? Judging by the photos you posted, the answer is yes, close enough.

Yes, definitely. My block set has 24 holes/dies from 2.3mm-24mm.  I think I found it at HF. The block is a cube, as opposed to the rectangular shape of Allan's, above. It really makes for a nice set of headlights.

[Straightliner59]

2 hours ago, ColonelKrypton said:

the size of the part ( i.e. diameter if round ) is set by whatever punch tool you use to make your disc. You could use a simple 1/4" paper punch or round hole or leather punches (as seen in the first post of this topic) or you could even use a jewellers disc cutter ( often from about 3mm up in size in 1mm steps )

The curvature given to your disc is made from using the dapping block. You do not need to use the 5mm size depression for a 5mm diameter disc. For example, you could impart a shallow curvature by using the 20mm or 30mm size depression with your 5mm disc - smaller depression greater the curvature to your piece, larger depression the shallower your curvature.

These dapping blocks are quite handy. I have cast resin in one to make parts, even made some bits using heated sprue pushed into one of the depressions. 

Moon discs are quite easily made too - a 15mm ( or whatever size suits your needs ) aluminum disc, dapped into one of the larger depressions ( i.e. 35mm, 40mm, or 45mm ) and voila, a nice moon disc.

You don't the matching dapping punches although they are handy and easy to use, you can use ball bearings of the appropriate size as well. 

cheers, Graham

When I first saw it, I knew that, it might be handy to have around. Turns out, I use it much more frequently than I'd imagined! And, you're correct--its possibilities are greatly expanded by interchanging disc size with punch and depression size.  Here's a shot of the tools I have. In case anybody's wondering--insulin syringes are excellent tools for applying liquid cement!

Edited February 17 by Straightliner59

[Allan31]

I have the same set as Dan. And these are my leather punches.

I illustrated the tutorial with the smaller, less expensive set because for headlights, you really only need one or two of the doming holes and punches. The size of the headlight is dictated by the size of the leather punch.

Edited February 17 by Allan31

[ColonelKrypton]

1 hour ago, Straightliner59 said:

insulin syringes are excellent tools for applying liquid cement

Never tried that but hypodermic needles are good substitutes for small drills when used in poly styrene  25g needle is approx 0.5mm / #76 drill and 21g 0.8mm / #67 drill They don't work for material harder than poly styrene however. 

[peteski]

11 hours ago, NOBLNG said:

And the disc diameter will shrink slightly as you dome it, so a tad bigger disc may be better than smaller. The more curvature you give it, the more it will shrink.

That's what I suspected. After all you are taking a flat disk and making a dome out of it. So it gets cupped, making it smaller.
Think of a brown paper cup which holds a Reese's peanut butter cup.  When you flatten it, the paper stretches out quite a bit larger than the cupped version.  Yes, this is a rather extreme example, but similar process takes place during doming.

10 hours ago, Straightliner59 said:

Yes, definitely. My block set has 24 holes/dies from 2.3mm-24mm.  I think I found it at HF. The block is a cube, as opposed to the rectangular shape of Allan's, above. It really makes for a nice set of headlights.

Thanks for the confirmation.

 

As for hypodermic tubing, I used to get mine from Small Parts Inc., a great source of lots of useful items. But some years ago, they got absorbed into amazon, and the amazon store is useless trying to locate anything.

But I've found a source of similar type of supplies.  They have very wide range of hypodermic tubing and other items which can be useful in model building.

https://componentsupplycompany.com/