Making this structure inside wing by any traditional manufacturing methods is very hard and all should be done manually. with a 3D ptinting thechnology there is no any baundary to make such a advanced wing structure to make light weight, durable airframe. just by printing it
I should start by mentioning a slight bias -- I work in airframes manufactured using SLS/Composites.
I think the comments indicate that members of this community are taking a rather myopic view of this post. I think this is great. Does Shapeway's SLS == carbon fiber? No. However, can a plane be designed and printed in SLS? Yes. I watched two novel airframe manufactured with SLS fly two weeks ago.
The exciting thing about this, and the work of others on this forum, is that additive manufacturing makes innovation cheap (perhaps not in the hobbyist sense, but in a global sense). Will a 3D printed aircraft take on a mass manufactured EPP wing in performance? Perhaps not. Does 3D printing let you quickly iterate on new concepts (payload, aerodynamic, etc.)? Absolutely. Remember the first APM developed by this community, the one that used thermopiles? In hindsight, it couldn't do very much. However, it piqued significant interest in autonomous aircraft that led to the growth of this community and resulted in the launch of a company that now produces amazing hardware.
tl;dr: Let's encourage, rather than squash, new ideas. The specifics may be imperfect today, but that doesn't mean it won't be something significant in five years.
Let's get a bit specific. How much can you get with your magic plastic printing:
- grams per m^2 (10mm thick XPS is 300g per m^2; with some rods and foil about 500g per m^2)
- grams per m^3 (foam is about 30kg/m^3; with some rods and foil about e.g. 50kg/m^3)
for the same "strength" (ignoring all details) carbon fibre is lighter than plywood, which is lighter than fibreglass
1.5mm plywood is 1.5kg per m^2; 0.8mm plywood is 0.8kg per m^2
I am sceptical that any 3D printed material can outperform any composites mentioned above (FG, CG, PW and foam). Also the problem of current 3D printing is the length of the process; OK for a prototype; waste of time and money for more than 10 pieces ...
@DronDesign, do you have a specific example you can share of a printed aircraft that gives you the "same result" as a composite or all-foam one? I get that it's easier to print a plane, but the added robustness of composite sometimes mean you never have to replace structural components which negates all downsides of manufacturing complexity.
For small size airplanes ,under 1kg, composite is not a big advantage. plastic give us almost the same result. and Composite is complex,expensive ,requires proffecionals to manufacture it. As i said on previous comment, we are also providing CAD file of the airfram to the customer with all copy rights. Customer can just print the frame as much he/she wants just paying the printing cost, and assemble with the instruction which we will provide.
@DronDesign what part of "performance" exactly are your 3D printed airframes equal to composite ones in? are we talking aerodynamic? structural? weight? impact?
It would be interesting to see a side-by-side comparison of a composite plane and a printed plane but usually this is impossible because a good design will make efficient use of the structural materials available so two aircraft made from two disparate materials will necessarily not be comparable in a meaningful way.
What I've found is that you can substantially cut down on manufacturing time with additive manufactured aircraft but there is a corresponding increase in design time and, particularly if you are trying to do something new, the added design time and learning curve for additive manufacturing is nontrivial.
Having done multiple 3d printed fixed wing aircraft, and now in the past year having switched to doing a lot of composite ones.... I'm quite happy sticking to investing in more manufacturing time to provide a more robust, better strength-to-weight, unconstrained by print volume product.
On the other hand, the concept is sound and it's one I've attempted to advocate for many times in the past, so I am curious to see how you fare! Would definitely love to see some examples of what you have been up to.
Charles Blouin the main purpose of using 3D printing technology on manufacturing is taking cost dramatically down, and to speed up the devolepment process. And also we provide CAD file. Customer can print airframe as much as possible just by paying printing cost.We provide the all assembly instruction. Secondly, 3D printed airplane performance are good as composit frame, by advanced airframe structure we are making airframe as ligh as composit frame.
The concept is cool, but will people really care if the drone is 3D printed? What matters is getting the job done. 3D printing is just a part of the process. I'd encourage you to think about what your clients really want. Do they need a completly redesigned 3D plane when what they want is just a special mounting for their sensor? For example, improve aerodynamics is good, but overall, people generally want flight time, In that case, composite will be used, as they are lighter than plastics. Think about your business from your clients perspective. Why would they pay you when they can buy 3D Robotics plane? You must really offer an added value for them, and 3D printing is not one. Customisation, flight time, sturdiness might be. At the end of the day, if people pay you tens of thousands of dollars for a custom plane, they expect to make money with it. I think it should be shown on your website.
Comments
Chris Paulson Thanks for good explanation,
Making this structure inside wing by any traditional manufacturing methods is very hard and all should be done manually. with a 3D ptinting thechnology there is no any baundary to make such a advanced wing structure to make light weight, durable airframe. just by printing it
I should start by mentioning a slight bias -- I work in airframes manufactured using SLS/Composites.
I think the comments indicate that members of this community are taking a rather myopic view of this post. I think this is great. Does Shapeway's SLS == carbon fiber? No. However, can a plane be designed and printed in SLS? Yes. I watched two novel airframe manufactured with SLS fly two weeks ago.
The exciting thing about this, and the work of others on this forum, is that additive manufacturing makes innovation cheap (perhaps not in the hobbyist sense, but in a global sense). Will a 3D printed aircraft take on a mass manufactured EPP wing in performance? Perhaps not. Does 3D printing let you quickly iterate on new concepts (payload, aerodynamic, etc.)? Absolutely. Remember the first APM developed by this community, the one that used thermopiles? In hindsight, it couldn't do very much. However, it piqued significant interest in autonomous aircraft that led to the growth of this community and resulted in the launch of a company that now produces amazing hardware.
tl;dr: Let's encourage, rather than squash, new ideas. The specifics may be imperfect today, but that doesn't mean it won't be something significant in five years.
Let's get a bit specific. How much can you get with your magic plastic printing:
- grams per m^2 (10mm thick XPS is 300g per m^2; with some rods and foil about 500g per m^2)
- grams per m^3 (foam is about 30kg/m^3; with some rods and foil about e.g. 50kg/m^3)
for the same "strength" (ignoring all details) carbon fibre is lighter than plywood, which is lighter than fibreglass
1.5mm plywood is 1.5kg per m^2; 0.8mm plywood is 0.8kg per m^2
I am sceptical that any 3D printed material can outperform any composites mentioned above (FG, CG, PW and foam). Also the problem of current 3D printing is the length of the process; OK for a prototype; waste of time and money for more than 10 pieces ...
I bet I can much better performance out of an EPP wing than a printed one sub 1kg. Any flight videos or photos of working airframes to share?
Hi Eli Cohen,
For small size airplanes ,under 1kg, composite is not a big advantage. plastic give us almost the same result. and Composite is complex,expensive ,requires proffecionals to manufacture it. As i said on previous comment, we are also providing CAD file of the airfram to the customer with all copy rights. Customer can just print the frame as much he/she wants just paying the printing cost, and assemble with the instruction which we will provide.
You can also get information about 3D printed aiplanes from here (http://www.danishaviationsystems.dk/news/2015/swift-part-one/)
@DronDesign what part of "performance" exactly are your 3D printed airframes equal to composite ones in? are we talking aerodynamic? structural? weight? impact?
It would be interesting to see a side-by-side comparison of a composite plane and a printed plane but usually this is impossible because a good design will make efficient use of the structural materials available so two aircraft made from two disparate materials will necessarily not be comparable in a meaningful way.
What I've found is that you can substantially cut down on manufacturing time with additive manufactured aircraft but there is a corresponding increase in design time and, particularly if you are trying to do something new, the added design time and learning curve for additive manufacturing is nontrivial.
Having done multiple 3d printed fixed wing aircraft, and now in the past year having switched to doing a lot of composite ones.... I'm quite happy sticking to investing in more manufacturing time to provide a more robust, better strength-to-weight, unconstrained by print volume product.
On the other hand, the concept is sound and it's one I've attempted to advocate for many times in the past, so I am curious to see how you fare! Would definitely love to see some examples of what you have been up to.
Charles Blouin the main purpose of using 3D printing technology on manufacturing is taking cost dramatically down, and to speed up the devolepment process. And also we provide CAD file. Customer can print airframe as much as possible just by paying printing cost.We provide the all assembly instruction. Secondly, 3D printed airplane performance are good as composit frame, by advanced airframe structure we are making airframe as ligh as composit frame.
The concept is cool, but will people really care if the drone is 3D printed? What matters is getting the job done. 3D printing is just a part of the process. I'd encourage you to think about what your clients really want. Do they need a completly redesigned 3D plane when what they want is just a special mounting for their sensor? For example, improve aerodynamics is good, but overall, people generally want flight time, In that case, composite will be used, as they are lighter than plastics. Think about your business from your clients perspective. Why would they pay you when they can buy 3D Robotics plane? You must really offer an added value for them, and 3D printing is not one. Customisation, flight time, sturdiness might be. At the end of the day, if people pay you tens of thousands of dollars for a custom plane, they expect to make money with it. I think it should be shown on your website.
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