Local Motors Announces 3D Printed Car Design Challenge

Local Motors is one of those futuristic companies that comes along every so often in order to redefine an entire method of manufacturing. The company has garnered a ton of attention after announcing that they will be 3D printing an entire vehicle at the International Manufacturing Technology Show in Chicago on September 8th-13th of this year.

If that wasn’t intriguing enough, maybe the fact that they want you and me to help design the vehicle will be. That’s right, Local Motors today announced and launched the 3D Printed Car Design Challenge. The challenge wants designers, both expert and amateur alike, to submit designs for the vehicle. Local Motors will possibly use the entrant’s design ideas for its 3D printed vehicle, as well as award several awesome prizes. The challenge will run for 6 weeks, until May 13th, and give away over $10,000 in prize money to the winners. Winners will be announced on May 30th.

“Historically, producing a new vehicle from a new design has represented a significant investment in tooling and a large commitment in time to integrate multiple structures and components,” said Jay Rogers, Local Motors CEO. “This effort to design and deliver the first co-created vehicle using this digital technology and manufacturing process could change the process and speed in which vehicles are designed and built.”

The following requirements are set for those wishing to submit a design entry:

• The Vehicle must seat 2 people following the package configuration.  The location of the motor, battery, and passengers is “frozen,” and thus, you may not change the h-point of the passengers or the position of any of the elements in the provided packaging/CAD files. This includes the wheelbase and track width. Any modification of the packaging will result in an invalid entry.
• Must include 4 wheels and a battery pack following the package configuration. The wheels, tires, batteries and suspension components have been chosen and, thus should not be changed.
• Must embed the major elements and functions of the exterior, the structure, and the interior in one main printed part.
• Cannot have mechanical openings (no doors, no hood, no trunk lid… )
• Must have some kind of windshield/wind deflector

The Grand prize winner will receive a $5,000 cash prize along with a trip to the International Manufacturing Technology Show in Chicago to take part in the 3D printing of the Local Motors vehicle. Five additional first-prize awards will be handed out, which will be chosen by a panel of judges and include $1000 in cash. The judges will include Rick Neff, from Cincinnati Incorporated, Douglas K. Woods, from The Association For Manufacturing Technology; Peter Eelman from The Association For Manufacturing Technology; and Paul Warndorf from The Association For Manufacturing Technology. Finally, there will be one other $1000 cash prize awarded for the design which the community votes for the most. Will you be entering this contest? Let us know at the Local Motors Design Challenge forum folder.  Check out the video below for further details about this challenge.