3D-printed lattice seat with red lattice inserts on a dark background

Applications · Automotive & motorsport

Printed parts, sealed for the road and the rally stage.

Vapor smoothing seals 3D printed polymer parts against fuel, oil and water and gives them a smooth, even finish. General Motors, ABConcept, Langen Motorcycles and Protolabs use PostPro vapor smoothing on parts printed on HP Multi Jet Fusion, from production seals to rally components.

Test your parts, free See the case studies

Key applications

Where automotive parts are vapor smoothed.

  • Aerodynamic parts

    Spoiler closeout seals GM added to full-size SUVs to improve aerodynamics, printed in TPU and vapor smoothed for production.

  • Rally car parts

    PA12 parts sealed against wear, oil and debris; smooth surfaces reduce drag.

  • Motorcycle parts

    Fuel tank cover parts and retainers with a sealed, durable finish for the road.

  • Flame-retardant parts

    Flame-retardant PA 12 parts for automotive use, with lower surface porosity.

  • Interior trim

    SLS armrests with a printed leather texture, before and after vapor smoothing.

  • Functional parts

    Air intake manifolds and prototypes with an injection-molded finish, made without tooling.

Printers and materials

The printers and materials behind these parts.

Print processes

MJF and SLS

The published automotive stories print on HP Multi Jet Fusion. PostPro smooths parts from MJF, SLS, SAF, HSS and FDM.

Materials

Which system? Compare all four

Case studies

Two stories from automotive & motorsport.

Each case study is the customer’s published account: the summary here, the full story and the PDF one click away.

  1. Case study 01 / 02
    Protolabs production floor

    Flame-retardant parts with UL94 V-0 compliance

    Protolabs combined HP Multi Jet Fusion in HP 3D HR PA 12 FR with PostPro vapor smoothing for automotive parts that need flame retardance and a molded-quality surface.

    Customer
    Protolabs
    Process
    HP MJF, HP 3D HR PA 12 FR → vapor smoothed
    Result
    Flame-retardant parts with improved surface quality and UL94 V-0 compliance
    Published
    Read the case study: Flame-retardant parts with UL94 V-0 compliance PDF: Flame-retardant parts with UL94 V-0 compliance (opens in a new tab)

All four automotive case studies in the case-study library

Automotive on video

See it at work

Watch on YouTube: Length 3:21

How General Motors Scaled 3D Printing with Vapor Smoothing | AMT PostPro Case Study

Watch on YouTube (opens in a new tab)

Next step

See the price. Run the numbers. Hold the part.

Starting prices are public and the cost-per-part math is yours to check, with no email needed for either. The free benchmark puts your own parts, vapor smoothed, in your hands.

  1. 01Quote

    Build your quote

    Pick a system and its options, and send AMT an itemized quotation request. Each system shows its starting price.

    Build your quote

  2. 02ROI

    Calculate your ROI

    Compare your cost per part with manual finishing, using your own labor rate and volumes. Every assumption is editable.

    Calculate ROI

  3. 03Benchmark

    Test your parts, free

    Ship us your parts with a prepaid label. We vapor smooth them and send them back with before-and-after photos and a benchmark report.

    Test your parts, free

    No cost to evaluate · Parts returned · Typical turnaround 2–3 weeks

Prices: starting prices, excluding tax and shipping; everything else is priced in your quotation.

Not sure which system? Help me choose

Questions

Questions, answered.

Can vapor-smoothed parts handle fuel and oil?

Langen Motorcycles reports smooth, sealed surfaces resistant to fuel, oil and water on its vapor-smoothed parts, and ABConcept improved resistance to wear, oil and debris on its rally car parts.

Is vapor smoothing used in automotive production?

Yes. GM’s spoiler closeout seals were a production program: 60,000 parts, needed quickly to avoid delaying 30,000 vehicles, printed in TPU on HP Multi Jet Fusion and vapor smoothed.

Does vapor smoothing work on flame-retardant materials?

Protolabs vapor smoothed HP 3D HR PA 12 FR parts printed on HP MJF. Vapor smoothing reduced surface porosity on parts with UL94 V-0 compliance.

Which materials are used for vapor-smoothed automotive parts?

The published automotive case studies use TPU (BASF Ultrasint TPU01 for GM’s seals), PA12 (ABConcept) and flame-retardant PA 12 (Protolabs), all printed on HP Multi Jet Fusion.

Can I test my own parts before I buy?

Yes. Send a few of your printed parts to AMT’s benchmarking program and they come back vapor smoothed: no cost to evaluate, parts returned, typical turnaround 2–3 weeks.