Building the SoarKraft Roughgen V2

[Wayne]

Turns out one of our customers has been working on a 3D printed slope gliders and offering the print files for a very reasonable price. Check him out at:

SoarKraft.com

3D print files for radio controlled airplanes. Print Fly Crash Repeat

soarkraft.com

After chatting with Wayne (that name seems familiar) a bit about his planes I decided I needed to print one up for myself. He has a pretty neat approach to the planes. He offers a common fuselage and you can pick from different tail and wing designs. You can pick V-tail, cross tail with rudder, T tail. He also offers it with an electric nose option. I went with the cross tail, no rudder and 4 servo wing with the RG15 airfoil.

Paid my $20 and downloaded my files last night and put them into my slicer and started printing using some old trans orange PLA I had sitting around. I sort of ignored some of his suggested print settings as I'm not too worried about weight for our local slope. Here is what I had when I came into the office this morning.

A tiny bit of sanding and we have this (I did not use the suggested BRIM setting, no adhesion issues at all):

Some details:

I tried to use the Prusa slicer for the Horizontal tail, but it didn't do well, so off to CURA slicer and using Wayne's suggested settings, except no BRIMs. I hate Brims.

@RafaelAvila is helping to fine tune things with Cura and our Prusa printers. We are using PETG for the horizontal and wing panels. Also trying to reduce our adhesion to the printer bed as the first layer is tearing off the bed. Who needs brims? LOL

 

[Hank GB Z]

Signing on to follow.
Hank

 

[rcsoar4fun]

Very interesting. Started printing mine today. I need to look through carbon requirements and order some this week.

 

[Wayne]

We are waiting for our carbon to arrive, think we are out of one of the sizes.. Haven't looked to close yet.

@RafaelAvila Has been tuning our print settings and printing the wings while I was out. Just about done.

Ordered up some of the white Polymaker light weight PLA to test out. Sounds like pretty good stuff.

 

[nickhull83]

I hear it take 60 + hours of print time. I really want an airframe but don't want to deal with printing / learning how to print them.

 

[thenated0g]

@nickhull83 your probably sleep/working during most of it. Its robot time

 

[Wayne]

We might be able to do the printing for folks, would have to talk with Wayne to see how we could do that. Not sure we would want to print a bunch of them, but right now we might be able to do that since our printers are not super busy at the moment.

Test print with the light weight polymaker is the SAME weight as our normal PLA print. Will play with it some more and see what we can do with it.

Onto the build.
I opted for the metal T-nut option as I didn't want to buy a tap to make threads in a printed T-nut. So you have to trim off the barbs and flatten one side:

I added a drop of foam tack to hold the T-nuts in place, but they were already a nice snug fit. The tubes seen on the sides in the photo above will contain the 2mm carbon fiber rods, these align and strengthen the fuselage.

The next thing to play with was the elevator control horn setup. The design has an interesting little setup using an EZ connector. A bit of drilling is needed for one side and that then slides into place on a carbon strip.

The carbon fiber rods hanging out the tail in the photo above run all the way up to the nose and will be secured with thin CA. 1x4mm carbon trips are used as spars for the tail section and work well.

 

[Wayne]

Next I routed one of our double wall pushrods into the fuselage, only used the inner core and metal for this plane:

I kept the routing of the pushrod towards the top to keep it nice and straight all the way to the servo. Then started sliding the fuselage parts into place on the carbon rods.

That's it for now, only had a little time to put in on it yesterday. Should be flying this weekend if the weather permits.

 

[waynesie]

Hey everyone,
Im new to the Aloft forum, but I designed this model. I am SoarKraft.

I have been flying and crashing RC planes since 1984... I was 12 when I crashed my first Sig Kadet. I've done helicopters, jets, aerobatic, 3D, pylon racing, and slope gliders... mostly gliders for the past 20 years with many a model destroyed learning to do Dynamic Soaring.... many. I have built balsa tissue models all the way to vacuum bagged carbon fiber layups, cutting molds, CNC foam cutter, etc. I have built / bought / crashed / repaired / crashed again so many planes over the years.... and had a great time doing it.

I have been 3D printing parts for plastic design, product design and designs for injection molding for 25+ years. I am a Mechanical Engineer specializing in product development.
3D printers have become inexpensive and much easier to use recently, I use them everyday,
but they are still not for everyday items...
No one is walking around in 3D printed shoes and a store bought $10 cell phone case is way better than anything you can 3D print.

However you can buy a 3D printer for $169 that can print this model and fly it - crash it - and print another. Or print a different model you want to try. Sure, you could try to get someone else to print it... but then you are relying on someone else for replacement parts and or making it worth their time. You can set up the printer to print all of the fuselage parts, or all of the wing parts, and push a button and walk away... come back later and you have parts. This is not insta-plane, it takes ~ 3 days to print everything with one printer, but way easier than many other building techniques. I encourage everyone to look at this as a new and evolving part of this hobby.

To me this is the best reason to own a 3D printer.

- Wayne (yes another Wayne)

 

[thenated0g]

 

[nickhull83]

Aloft Wayne, put me down for an airframe print + all the carbon, if you are up for it. I want to see what Bruce can do with it...

 

[waynesie]

Here is a quick video of what Wayne is building in action.
enjoy

 

[Wayne]

I didn't take too many pictures, but assembled the airframe at our build night Friday, no surprises. Used Quick Grip on the hinges and to glue the elevator servo. I'm now thinking it may be a better glue then CA, so think we will print another one to test this idea. I like Quick Grip a fair amount. Gives you some working time, and is not a brittle joint. Easy to get off your fingers, etc.

Deciding what servo to use. I like the Emax digitals a fair amount, so that is what I went with. They are a perfect fit for the plane, and a lot better than a plastic analog servo IMHO, but still nice and cheap.

Wing panels sliding on.

Airframe done. Still need to install the wing servos, but ran out of energy, and the weather was not going to allow for a first flight this weekend, so no rush.

Very pleased with the build, probably a few changes in our print methods will give a little better results, but overall I am pleased. I have some clear PLA I may print hte next one in just so I can see the glue a bit better, then paint it before flight.

The hinges with a small amount of Quick Grip inside the "V" groove seems to be working well. I put a little on the flat of one of the elevators and think that is overkill, just the V side does well and is cleaner. I used a small 1/8" rod (dremel shaft) to push the glue into the V and wipe away excess glue. Quick, clean and easy.

I only glued the plane to the carpet once while pouring CA down the spar. LOL Any maybe glued my fand a time or two doing the same.. Guarantee most of the Super Thin glue is in the plane, but the carpet has a lot more than it used to. LOL

 

[thenated0g]

this would be pretty cool with leds inside

 

[Wayne]

this would be pretty cool with leds inside

Trust me, it doesn't need any. You hold this plane up to the sun and at certain angles it really lights up. Kind of like a prism. We have some clear filament, and thinking I'll print the next one in that. Why? It helps us fine tune our slicer settings for these wing prints, and I want to see what the glue is doing as a test bed. Probably slap some paint on it before it flies. The Orange one will probably gain some black stripes before it flies.

 

[thenated0g]

night flying

 

[nickhull83]

Looks super nice!

 

[Wayne]

Refining the print a bit more. This one is even cleaner than the orange one and fits perfectly. Still playing with slicers and settings to get these dialed in a bit more. With 3D printing, things can always be refined a bit more. LOL

 

[rcsoar4fun]

Looks great, I am dealing with some printer issues that are a bit frustrating. Using the recommended settings.

Was going to order some carbon strip, I don't see the 4mm stuff in the store?

 

[thenated0g]

Wayne(s) have you tried that stuff the flitetest guys are using? I dont know much about it but it sounds like its some lighter version that kind of foams up.