Our customer Ray and his wife recently purchased a Suzuki X90, a car that had always been a particular favourite of his wife after they first bought one brand new back in 1996. Around 1,500 Suzuki X90s are thought to have originally been brought to the UK, with an estimated 50 still on the road today, making them a rare sight.

Before they purchased it, the 30 year old car had been garaged for the last 10 years, so they were advised to replace all four tyres as they were likely to have perished during storage. A week after having the tyres replaced, they noticed that one of the wheel hubs was missing. They also found that all three remaining hubs were being held in place by just one screw, putting them at risk of coming loose and being lost.

Wanting to keep the car as original as possible, they started searching for a replacement for the missing hub. After numerous enquiries and even contacting the original alloy wheel manufacturer, they found that a replacement was no longer available. It was looking like their only option would be to replace all four alloy wheels, an expensive solution when all they really needed was one replacement hub.

As part of their search, Ray also spoke to an alloy wheel specialist in Northern Ireland who said they could make a replacement if he brought them one of the existing hubs. This got him thinking about how it would be possible to recreate the part and whether 3D printing could be an option.

Unsure whether 3D printing would work, Ray contacted Manchester Metrology and spoke to Sam Mather, our 3D Scanning and Reverse Engineer. Sam was confident that we could help and after taking a look at one of the existing hubs, confirmed that we could replicate the part using 3D scanning and 3D printing.

Sam scanned one of the original hubs using one of our Scanology SIMSCAN S Gen2 scanners. The quality of the scan data meant the mesh needed minimal clean up and very little optimisation before it was ready to be 3D printed.

Once the file was ready, Sam chose a suitable material and used one of our 3D printers to produce four new wheel hubs based on the original. The hubs were then ready for Ray to finish, paint and fit to the car.

The new hubs meant they could keep the Suzuki X90’s original alloy wheels rather than having to replace all four. It also meant the three existing hubs that were at risk of coming loose could be replaced at the same time.

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“We’re so pleased with the finished hubs and can’t recommend the staff at Manchester Metrology highly enough. They made it possible for us to keep the car in its original condition.”

Ray Slough | Suzuki X90 Owner

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Have a part you need to recreate?

Our 3D scanning and reverse engineering services can help recreate parts where drawings, CAD data or replacements are no longer available. Call us on 0161 637 8744 to discuss your project.

Interested in the Scanology SIMSCAN S Gen2 used in this project? Find out more or enquire about a demonstration⁠.