LIght weight upgrade, for Muffin RC airplane

thingiverse

This is an upgrade of the Muffin RC Airplane https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4252501, made to obtain a light weight, that can be equiparated to a classic RC airplane. Usually 3D printed airplanes are quite heavy compared to those made of balsa wood or foam; this leads to greater difficulty in piloting, due to the greater speed required to avoid stalling, furthermore the wings are very heavy and cause poor response to aileron commands. The Muffin, built entirely of 3D printed plastic, weighs 1080g. With some small modifications, keeping the plastic structure, but covering the wings with a thin sheet of balsa wood, and building the tail planes always in balsa, I managed to lighten it by 300g, obtaining a flight identical to a built model aircraft with classic methods. As I wrote above, there are not many changes to the structure: The fuselage only requires the replacement of the terminal part of the tail where the tail planes will be mounted, obtained simply by cutting them out of a 3mm thick sheet of balsa. The wing assumes a curved structure, in order to be able to glue two 1mm thick sheets of balsa wood and the aluminum spars are shorter, compared to the all-plastic version. The greatest weight gain is achieved by modifying the tail, because the lower weight allows you to position the center of gravity in the exact place, without having to add ballast on the nose and using a lighter battery.