BEC18106 Turnbuckle Stud

This item has not been available from Jaguar for quite sometime. There should be two on my car securing the carpeted cover to the ‘metal tray’ that houses the convertible top pump/relays & the battery is underneath - they have never been there for the 15 years that I’ve owned the car.

By chance, whilst removing the rear bumper to replace a broken reflex lens, I found one of these turnbuckle studs in the bottom of the passenger’s side rear wing. I approached a local design/drafting/engineering & 3D printing guy & now I no longer have missing turnbuckle struts:

Originally, I reckon Jaguar had these made in 3 different colours: light grey, dark grey & sisal to match varying trim colour combinations. The one the guy has printed so far for me is in a similar grey to the original one I found. There is a relatively small cost in modelling (scanning) the original item but the printing of each item, due to the small size, is quite low. I’m pleased with the results:



2 Likes

I had a couple of seat belt latch buttons “re-manufactured” for my SAAB. Not quite the right colour - the orange one - but perfectly acceptable. I see this as the way forward for currently unobtainable plastic items. Small scale CNC and sintered metal parts will be next on the list.

Can you tell us why the color didn’t come out right? I would have expected the correct color to be easy.

I think the ‘colours’ depend on what the person operating the 3D printer has access to. I’ve asked the local guy to print some more of the turnbuckle studs & he tells me he will have to order the ‘colour’ & there will be a 7 day turn around.

I’m impressed so far - especially when eBay vendors are asking $60 > $90 for 2 of the same turnbuckle studs.

I might see what this guy can do with the sun visor clips/catches that are allegedly also unobtanium.

As Andy says - it depends on what colour you use :wink: This was a free service offered by the Repair Cafe I donate my time to. They had something red(ish) to hand so I went with that. I don’t know what the full colour palette is for the plastic thread you can get.

I just got a new pair from Jaguar a few months ago. Maybe not an exact colour match for my interior trim, but not something you would care much about. The only problem with them was that lip was too pronounced to push the visor in. But easy enough with a sharp blade to shave some meat off to fix it.

I was able to find some visor clips easily a while back and there are some on eBay now for silly money. Might be an alternative cost wise.

The Classic Jaguar parts site was, for once, a lot more reasonable for a new sun visor clip than some of the eBay chancers flogging second hand stuff.

IIRC the sun visor clips were only in several colors…like barley, black and gray.