RC Aircraft

Mini Delta 50mm

First 3D Printed RC Plane

Printed in Lightweight PLA from plans from here.

Originally printed it out, but it was my first time dealing with LW-PLA, so I didn't have the correct settings. As a result, the model was almost twice as heavy as it was supposed to be. I'll spare you the first few flights of that one; just imagine throwing a brick into the air.

Version 1

As luck would have it, just as I was starting to print it out again, the author of the plane released a second, better version, and so I printed that one out. I decided to try to add some micro-fine glitter to the airbrush paint, and the particles were small enough where it actually worked really well and didn't clog the airbrush.

Sparkles!

For the first flights of the new version, I decided to try it in a local park after we got about a foot of snow. I figured this would help mitigate damage from crashes. The first few take-offs, it ended up stalling almost immediately. I figured either my CG was off - even though it was already very slightly nose-heavy according to the CG bumps. The battery is light so I couldn't put it forward any farther, so I added a bit of weight to the nose. I thought maybe also it was because I just wasn't going fast enough, and was tip stalling as a result. I'm used to prop planes so I figured I just needed to give it more throttle next time.

The next flight went much better, however, it was very fast, and I was in a very small area, so it was difficult to control. I decided to bring it in, but again, since I figured I needed the extra speed, I came in for the landing much too fast. When it hit the snow, I thought it cartwheeled and was in 100 pieces. Much to my surprise, it was completely undamaged. The decision to brave the cold and use the snow as a cushion paid off.

The third flight was great, until I decided to turn on the gyro. See if you can spot in the video the moment I turn the gyro on. Not sure what happened, I must have had something backwards, because it just spun like a top, and it happened so fast I had no time to react and turn it off, really didn't expect that to happen. Even though the snow was a great cushion, there was now another issue: trying to find a mostly white plane buried in the snow. To make matters worse, there were lots of tracks from people and animals in the area, so I couldn't ascertain exactly where it went down, I was too far away and it was past a bit of a hill. I started searching around, knowing the motor cut beeper should have been going off, but I couldn't hear it at all, and the wind wasn't helping. Luckily I eventually started to barely hear the SOS - it was buried far into the snow, which was doing a good job insulating the sound.

Successful Flight

Fortunately, the plane broke right at the second fuselage piece, so repairing it only requires printing out those two pieces and glueing it back together.

Parts List