Can you make cars? Classic Cars?

i want a Triumph Herald convertible making..accurate and made in such a way.. or with additional construction... to be able to be dissassembled bit by bit down to its last nut and bolt, in 3D.

I think i am able to do it.. the drawings for the car exist.. online.. and i have a feeling, that anything i want to know about size and measurements and detail will be available from the TSSC and users..

my skill though , if any!, is in art and animation graphics.. not specifically technical drawing. I have a Triumph Herald 13/60 convertible in real life.

So.. i thought i would just sound out and see if anyone else had considered bringing something from real life so completely into SL, or has interest in the Triumph Herald, and would be interested in making something like this.

I have an empty quarter sim, waiting.

First, are you looking for advice on how to build this car yourself or are you looking for someone to build it for you? You post seems to indicate the latter, in which case you should post this in Help Wanted, not here. This forum is for education, not recruiting, which is why its title is Building Tips instead of Builder Recruitment, and and its description says "discuss building techniques" instead of "recruit builders to help with your projects". It's important to post the right topics in the right places, for everyone's sake. Thanks.

Anyway, your project sounds interesting, but unfortunately, there's a flaw in your plan. To get to "every last nut and bolt", you're talking about tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of individual items. You would not be able to model them all in a whole sim, let alone your quarter sim which only will support 3750 prims. Not to mention, it could take years to model every last piece, even if you had the room. You won't be able to achieve the level of detail you're looking for.

You can certainly build a highly detailed car with 3750 prims though; it just won't have EVERY detail. Instead of taking things to the "nuts & bolts" level, pick a level of detail that is balanced with practicality. For example, maybe your engine is removable, and maybe it could be broken down into its major component devices, but you don't have to unscrew any little bolts to get to them, and the devices themselves don't break any further down into sub-components. You don't necessarily need to take a piston apart to show how a car is put together, after all. Maybe the wheels could be removable to expose the breaks, struts, etc, but you don't actually have removable lug nuts, hub caps, or tires. Maybe the dash is removable, but you don't actually get to take the gauges apart. You don't really need to take a speedometer apart to show that the car has one, do you?

In other words, show just enough to demonstrate how a car is put together out of parts, but don't get caught up in the internal makeup of the parts themselves, and don't bother with things like removable screws, nuts, or rivets. that's the only way you'll keep it under 3750 prims.

Hee... to think that Triumph ever built anything with hundreds of thousands of pieces. A normal home is 400K pieces, all in, counting every nail. Heck, by the time a Triumph was on the road a couple of years enough pieces fell off that he could build it on a 2048.

Ok.. i understand you Chosen Few, the key, if any, was.. "So.. i thought i would just sound out " Which is what i did...

I can see that to make something more than just a visual example isnt something that SL was designed for. If anything i was sounding out to see if anyone had considered the options of creating something along such lines.

Pleading ignorance is often a way of getting ideas... if i say "yup.. i`m doing this, watch here, there will be one..." i might exclude the contribution of those who have something i have not considered. I try not to exclude any possibility.. I am an engineer.

Maybe there is someone who has tried to do it.. ..therefore why recreate the wheel?.

Yes i realise "the last nut and bolt" is an optomistic premise... I am an optomist.

How i approach this now is already coloured by your reply, Chosen Few.. i thank you for that.


That there are still Triumph cars on the road.. and enthusiasts who contribute and support businesses who keep them on the road, is some indication of desirability. If SL is still in such an environment thirty seven years after the last update.. i will respect it too. ( but the afterlife i have no proof of yet...!

Ok, I'll admit I have no idea how many parts are actually in a car, let alone specifically in a Triumph. However, I'd be willing to bet that if you add up every last nut, bolt, wire, fastener, there are probably at least as many, if not more, parts in an average car than in an average house. A car is a moving machine made up of dozens, maybe even hundreds, of smaller mechanisms. How many little pieces are there in each of those? I don't know. Do you? A diagram I just found on Google for the inside of a fuel pump shows about 40 components. Another for a spark plug shows about a dozen individual pieces. Add up every part of every component of every system in a car, and I think you could easily reach 6 figures.

Consider that a piano is made of about 12,500 parts. I think everyone would agree that as complex as a piano is, it's nowhere near as complex as a car. Again, I don't think it's a stretch to believe a car could reach a part count in the six figure range if a piano is in the fives.

A house, on the other hand, is a static item. It doesn't have to do anything very special except sit there and not fall down. It's relatively simple to build, and doesn't need to be made of very many pieces. The only reason it might take 400,000 parts to make a house is because a house is big. That doesn't mean it automatically has to be made of more parts than a car is though, just because it happens to be bigger than a car.


This debate may be pointless, but somehow it's fun. Not sure why.

Average number of parts in a modern car: 14,000.

Average parts remaining on a Triumph after ten years: 8

But what are you defining as a "part". Is a fuel pump one part or 40?

Do you own a car? The fuel pump example would count as 40 parts. The task in automotive engineering is to do what is required with the smallest number of parts. More parts means more to break, just in the odds and in materials engineering.

Yes, of course, I own a car. I own two, in fact. What does that have to do with anything?

You seem to be asking as if somehow I must not have any experience with cars since I dared to ask whether a stranger would consider a fuel pump to be one part or 40 parts. That really doesn't make any sense. But just for the sake of argument, let's see what happens if we approach this from the point of view of someone who has real expertise on the matter.

When my mechanic tells me I've got a bad fuel pump, it's generally assumed that he's talking about one part. It's not like he's gonna take the pump aprt to find the faulty component; he's just gonna replace the whole pump as one unit. When he calls the parts store and says I need part number ___________ for a 1994 Mercury Sable, they're not gonna ask him which little gizmo he needs from inside the thing; they're just gonna send him the pump. Generally speaking, from the mechanic's point of view and the parts store guy's point of view, a pump is one part.

However, were we to ask the guy who designed the pump, he'd probably call it a collection of 40 parts. In his world, a pump is something to be broken down into smaller pieces. But for someone else, a pump is just a pump.

Both answers are equally true. It's entirely a matter of opinion, perspective, and context. Whether or not the person asking the question happens to own a car has nothing to do with anything, as you must realize. So why did you ask?


Ok, so if your logic is that the fuel pump is 40 parts, you're saying that when you add up every last individual scrap of metal, plastic, rubber, and glass in a car, the total number is only 14,000. I find that pretty hard to believe. That number seems awfully low.

Just to be a stickler for detail, you did say "modern car". Modern cars have computers in them. A single computer chip has thousands of parts all by itself. I don't know precisely how many switches are in a microprocessor, but I think it's in the tens of thousands. That pretty much kills the 14,000 number right there, doesn't it?


Sure. That's just common sense. That doesn't mean, however, that that's what actually happens. Take my girlfriend's Honda Civic, for example. One day, a metal plate fell out through the bottom and started dragging on the ground. When she took it in for repairs, they simply removed the plate and told her it doesn't serve any practical purpose. Apparently it's a common problem, and they remove them all the time.

So, was her car at 14,001 before they brought it down to the correct "smallest number of parts"? Or is it just possible that things do get over-engineered/under-optimized, resulting in an overabundance of parts from time to time?

And by the way, out of curiosity, where did you come up with that 14,000 number? I tried briefly to research it myself, but couldn't find any published "average number of parts in a car" anywhere. So, did you just make it up, or do you have some actual data on this?



On a side note, I really don't know why I'm continuing to engage in this discussion. It's completely pointless, but as I said before it's somehow fun for reasons I totally don't understand.

Try Googling "number of parts in a car."

i did

heres what i got

first listing, some diptard trivia site with broken html and some questionable statements saying 14 thousand

then i went on a few pages to some automotive designers and got



which proves google will tell you anything you want it to, if its right or not is a totally different matter

walks away... this topic isnt mine now....

Don't confuse the number of parts with the number of types of parts. An older car might have 50 types of fasteners but 1500 fasteners.

You could easily model body panels with the fasteners shown as part of the the textures and save hundreds of prims. Your Triumph would probably have 3000-5000 parts including fasteners.

Do you want the car to *do* anything, other than sit there and look pretty? Do you need the wiring harness? Individual spokes (2 parts each)?

I saw an amazingly detailed locomotive inworld that was thousands of prims, including the two coaches behind it. It was modelled down to the very large bolt level. Gauges were just a couple of prims and not built down to the internal clockwork.

It can be done, especially now that we have sculpted prims.

Oh, well if McGruff said it, it must be true. I mean, anyone named after the crime dog must know his stuff, right?

I notice though that McGruff didn't specify whether that's 14,000 'whole parts' like our complete pump or 14,000 'sub-components' like the 40 individual items inside the pump. If it's sub-components, and a fuel pump can serve as any sort of average, then 14,000 x 40 comes out to over half a million. That would be a lot of prims.

As I said, I couldn't find any published statistics, not with my original search criteria, or with yours. Just a bunch of seemingly made up numbers from various web posters, none of whom agree (just like us).

And yet for every car in existence there must be someone who knows how many parts it can be broken down to...

Paging Democritus!

To answer the original question, go look at the new Cobra being sold on Slex. That should give some help.

Ok I have an intersting wway you could do this.. Using a rezing system and scripting.. you could hypothetcially rez an entire car .. even all 400,000 parts.. just not at the same time..

heres how you would do it.. or how i would do it.. mind you this would take you ages to do and be very expensive

Build the car using about 1k prims.. making the car detailed but not like massively detailed

then what you do is you can click on parts.. each part has a corosponding rezing system.. so lets say you click on the tire

the tire expands off the car

from there you can see the brake system or the tire..

so you click the tire again

now the tire expands again.. and you get to see the parts. stretched out like an drawing.... now when you click on another part.. the tire derezes.. and that part expands

bascially you could have infininte prims doing this. and make a very complex car.. but like i said.. this project would proly take you a year to build.. and would require the abilty to make scuptlies, scripting, building, textureing, design and more than anything a love to do it.

Would the end result be amazing.. im sure it would.. but the time it would take to do this.. yo could make some really amazing things ..


anyways thats how i would do it

Great idea, Flix.

Yes.. some directions at last.. Flix, Thank you for that. It sounds feasible, the time issue isnt constrictive.. Rome wasnt built in a day. I think it is something to consider enough to try.. to see how a section would work, and if it does.. then use the technique to expand..

Great advice Flix.. its spiked my interest.

Of course, too, the right and left side detail dont have to be duplicated, unless there is substantial difference from left to right, other than being handed. An engine piston assembly doesnt need making four times (4 cylinders) the valves.. are identical per cylinder etc etc.. that kind of duplication must decrease the essential prim requirement.

Textures can be integrated.. perhaps specific sequenced instructions...themselves carrying part information. even video links.. for example, what happens during a common known wear fault.. etc.

Ok.. The dear old Herald isnt a Ferrari.. but it is accessible and popular to a large indulgent community. I like that, for something that old and out of production for so long to still influence folks to spend money.. like me considering this, if i do it.. i do it because i want to.. not out of any desire for profit.

Ya im not just another pretty face I usually think outside the box. to give you and idea of how i think outside the box go check out my new product about to do a grand opening but i have soft opened it..

Sim in a box

SIB Island

*edit*

What I would look for first is the rezing system. I am sure you could use a pretty simple system.. In fact check with me in SL later today when I get on I might have a system that you could use.. ill try and put up an example to show you what i mean.

Flix that would be great to see., But.. please dont share anything that you intend to make specifically for reward... much of what i make, especially scripting technique and graphic art, i give away, just by making it public.

Just found this and thought of this thread

http://www.eglobe1.com/index.php/2006/11/09/interesting-facts-about-f1-race-cars/

Not quite a classic car but the exploded view is certainly classy