Aug.25, 2013
Back in December 2012 Flapping wing Factory in Japan designed and built an impressive 3D printed flying crawler. The 3D model was created in Autodesk 123D and main parts were 3D printed at Shapeways. A recent work from Flapping Wing Production Studio (translated) is equally impressive - it is a 3D printed ornithopter that was assembled using 3D printed parts made on a desktop 3D printer.
The ornithopter is powered by a rubber band and the wings are made of a thin membrane-like plastic material. After a few seconds of winding up the plane can fly at great height and quite long time. A recent update of this 3D printed ornithopter is motors and RC control to remotely fly the plane around. It is controlled by the 2.4GHz DSM2 at the moment, but will be replaced by Bluetooth in the future so it will be possible to control it with the touch panel from the Android terminal. And the most important is, the parts on the main body were 3D printed on a MakerBot Replicator 2X.
Specifications:
Width: 760mm
Length: 250mm
Flying Weight: 8.7g (Including 50mAhLi-po battery)
Watch videos below test flights of this 3D printed ornithopter:
Source: Hacked Gadgets
Posted in 3D Printing Applications
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