I am looking for suggestions on how best to create a thin surface for aircraft wings. I currently have a closed solid aerodynamic surface. I want to convert this to a 0.9mm thick surface.
ER_4-0_Tip.3dm (7.8 MB)
Hi Ronald -
I’m probably not understanding the issue here and I’m not sure where to begin on this one.
Perhaps a good place to start is the design intent. What is this going to be used for?
Airfoils are typically not something that you’ll more or less arbitrarily scale in 1D.
From a previous thread, I assume that the surfaces you have in that model at this point are the result from changes in several different applications? As before, they appear to be severely over-defined. It shouldn’t be necessary to have 448 points in one half of the profile. But that’s somewhat beside the point.
When this then should become a 0.9 mm thick and 96 mm long profile, how much lift are you expecting to get out of such profile? Wouldn’t a simple rectangle give you the same?
-wim
The external airfoil shape and size are as they should be. What we need to accomplish is to convert from a solid to a 0.9mm thick surface. That is the skin thickness we are using for 3d printing.
Hi Ronald - the command to use is Shell, selecting the end caps as the faces to remove, but this object is massively overcomplicated and it may not work very well.
The upper surface has 7 stacked control points along one edge - that rght there will break offsetting the surface, I would guess.
But I think you can create these surfaces from much cleaner input and still maintain the accuracy you need.
-Pascal
The “Shell” command worked great. Next up is the “rib and spar” internal support structure. I did this the hard way several years back on Rhino5. My hope is that a “tool” now exists to make the process easier. I am attaching a file for the several year old wing tip. It looks similar to the new wing tip.
Baby Ray Wingtip.3dm (4.7 MB)
If you’re printing this there is no reason to model the wall thicknesses or internal structure, just use slicer settings for both.
Hi Jim. We are 3d printing to operate the aircraft, not display the aircraft.
Hmm, looking at the size of it, my comment stands, using the slicer for wall thickness and infill structure makes much more sense. You’re going to 3d print a .9mm wall thickness, 1/2" thick shape, somehow get the required support material out of it, then put little pieces of wood or plastic inside it?