Do I have to send the part, or will photographs do?

The part is much better, even in pieces, because measurement beats estimation every time. Photographs work for simple geometry if you put a steel rule or a vernier in frame and send the key dimensions measured as accurately as you can. We will tell you honestly which of the two we need before charging anything.

Will you copy any part I send?

No. We will not reproduce something under a live patent or design registration, and we will not copy a part carrying another company’s logo or branding. Replacement parts for machinery you own are ordinary maintenance work and we do them all day.

A scan gives you the surface of a worn part, complete with the wear. It cannot tell you that a hole was meant to be round, a face was meant to be flat, or a bore was 12.00 mm before ten years of service. For engineered components, measuring the intent and rebuilding it parametrically produces a better file. Scanning earns its place on free-form organic shapes, which is not what breaks on a factory floor.

Can you make it in metal?

Not here. We print in engineering thermoplastics, which covers guards, guides, handles, housings, covers and a surprising number of machine parts. Where the replacement genuinely has to be metal, the CAD we produce is exactly what a machine shop or foundry needs, and you own it, so take it to them.

Reverse Engineering from a Sample

Bring the broken part and leave with manufacturing-ready CAD. We measure the original, rebuild it properly, correct whatever made it fail, and hand over the STEP file so you never have to do this twice.

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Right for

Obsolete spares, machinery whose supplier has vanished, undocumented parts, and anything where the drawing was lost long before the part broke.

Not right for

Parts under a live patent or design registration, anything carrying another company’s branding, and precision work needing better than ±0.05 mm on free-form surfaces.

The problem this actually solves

A guide snaps on a machine that has been running since 1998. The manufacturer no longer exists, or exists but quotes fourteen weeks, or wants a minimum order of fifty when you need two. Meanwhile the line is down and nobody has a drawing, because there never was one on your side of the transaction.

That is not a design problem, it is a measurement problem. The part in your hand contains all the information needed to make another one; it just is not written down yet. Writing it down is the whole job.

How we do it

Calipers, micrometers, radius gauges and thread gauges against the actual part. Not 3D scanning: a scanner produces a mesh of the surface, which is exactly what you do not want, because a mesh cannot tell you that a bore is meant to be 12.00 mm rather than 11.96 mm worn. Parametric CAD built from measured intent is a better answer and usually a cheaper one.

We prioritise the interfacing dimensions, the ones that mate with something else, because those are what decide whether the part fits. Where a feature is critical we say so and ask you to confirm it before anything is manufactured.

We fix the reason it broke

A part that failed is telling you where the stress went. A crack starting at a sharp internal corner wants a fillet. A section that fatigued wants to be thicker, or to be printed so the layers run along the load rather than across it. A part that went chalky and crumbled was in sunlight in the wrong material.

Copying the original faithfully would reproduce the failure on schedule. We would rather change the thing that broke and tell you what we changed.

You own the result

You receive the STEP file as well as the STL, and full rights to both. Take it to another supplier next year, modify it yourself, or keep it in your maintenance records against the next time. We do not retain the right to reuse your geometry and we do not print it for anyone else.