3D printing is good for prototyping and for one-off DIY builds. If a plastic drone is what you want to design you should design it so that it can be injection molded (if it actually has market potential). A traditional quadcopter is best made out of carbon fiber because of the arms, but don't forget that many commercial camera drones are entirely made of plastic. 3D printing is however a great choice for mounting the electronics on top of your frame.
Exactly what Bardwell said….chase your passion. No matter others say, do what you love to do and chase after it. Otherwise, having a store that only sells 3D printed frame STLs for micros would be ideal. Smaller frames made of Essentium HTNCF25 will definitely be light and stiff enough. And if these frames break, it’s a matter of reprinting easily. Bigger drones require more stiffness and do require carbon skeletons so 3D printed frames would be too heavy for the equivalent amount of stiffness.
I designed and 3d printed a frame for my tinywhoop and printed it in ABS. I can't tell you how many times I've crashed it and then made a design adjustment to account for where the frame broke. would it be better to get it made out of cf? probably, but it's been a wonderful learning experience studying how it broke and what needs to be done to fix the design.
Im building a 3 inch cruiser with a 3d printed frame. But the only reason im doing it is for fun and because i have access to the 3d printer at work. Im using my extra fc/motors so really nothing to lose.
Through the process of designing a 3d printable drone I created 4 spin-off products that each have their own market. The drone turned out great too, but it is not a quad so the issue of arm stiffness was never a problem. I also managed to place all the electronics on the outside. But even if an idea goes nowhere, you learn so much from the process that it is worth it. Next time you'll nail it or maybe you end up designing something completely different because of the ideas you came up with along the way.
I got into drones because of 3D printing, needed a new project so thought why not a drone, flew alright bit heavy, took a crash or 2 before it would break tho, plus the vibration are awful after a couple flights, but it got me hooked on the hobby 😁
I've wanted to convert my flywoo cinerace20 into a small freestyle drone. So I've decided to try and make all new 3d printed parts by myself. And guess what. I've decided not to use pla since everyone said don't even bother making frame by your self. I still made everything and used nylon and carbon fiber filament. The drone turned out incredible. Basically the drone frame can hold the pulling force of around 100kg while weighting around 40g and the performance of the drone itself are great, no vibrations an even when I hit at max speed any type of structure no brakes. I believe that 3d printed frames can be used but you need to use interesting materials and extremely clever designing to get rid off any unwanted oscillations on the frame itself.
DJI uses plastic only but its latest tech in plastic and advantage is radio signal is not blocked by carbon and and less vibration under certain condition.
We 3d printed all of our frames when I was on the rocketry team in college but that was because we had to make a bunch of weird shapes and mechanisms for quads that weren't performance-oriented in any way. We were also using a Markforged printer with carbon fiber nylon filament, which worked great and made pretty durable, high quality stuff, but is way out of reach for most hobbyists
Hi, I am an aeronautical engineer and I have designed a 3-4 inch frame that few people know to print in polypropylene, a material that few people know too. It is not a prototype, it is a final product that you can see on my youtube channel where you can also find the link to the website where you have all the information. No, Joshua, you can not generalize as you have done in this video as was done in his day with the metal aircraft that would never take flight.
I wholeheartedly agree with Bardwell and have made the very same case/rant many times. I hate myself for getting ideas for a 3d printed frame while hearing Bardwells rant on how bad of an idea it is.
an idea for a 3d printed frame could be to make as lightweight as possible, maybe using generative design like fusion 360 has, and then having some form of lightweight metal tube in the arms mainly to provide support, and using something like PETG or ABS
True, for 5" I'd go with carbon but would probably 3d print prototypes for "ease of use". CAD can give you dimensional accuracy etc but you can get lost in scale easily and discover that you have to be fiddly with some tool to make things the easy way - or you can discover that the chamfer you struggled to put in exactly like you wanted is actually 2mm diameter and has no real impact on the final design (might as well be the other way - added a chamfer or curve that eliminated a shear prone area). For up to 3" though the FDM materials are good enough to DIY, even PLA (although they say ASA is king but not all printers can print it). There is a couple of good designs on thingiverse that don't really mimic a sheet carbon approach and are sort of structural. I took them and made some my own redesigns (things like fit a 3 layer stack instead of 2, or fit a different size camera or adapt for my vtx), printed them solid and they actually work not so bad. Forces on a 3" are not as huge as with carbon and yes, they break at wide open throttle, but honestly carbon breaks at WOT crash just as frequently. Now to transfer electronics on same frame is maybe 20 screws so it's not that big of a deal - depending on the design of course.
That Dave_C nano long range (the one pictured at the end) is the only 3D printed frame I've tried... it works, but only because it isn't designed to "fly good" in the conventional freestyle sense. It's just a super light cruiser; it would have no hope of surviving in a hard crash.
100% Yagreed! I started with a Peon230 5" and have a Thunderyaw Cinewhoop. PETG, ABS, PLA all just are not durable enough. I got tired of rebuilding them. The carbon fiber frames are just so much better, as Joshua described.
For 2.5” to 3” cinewhoop style frames, I’ve been using PCTPE for the ducts with good success. The frame still use top and bottom carbon plates for structural integrity but doesn’t have carbon arms as the motor mounts are built-in the duct part. The PCTPE has enough impact resistance for most crashes. Unless you hit a concrete wall at 50mph you shouldn’t break a duct. But it doesn’t scale for 5 inch builds, once you pass the 400g AUW there’s just too much energy in the crash for structural PCTPE parts.
Prototype it in 3D print, once you have the design right there are plenty of companies that will machine carbon fibre sheet if you incorporate this in your design..🤔🤔🤔
I agree about it being unsuitable for 5 inch freestyle or racing frames, at least just now and definitely if you try to use common filaments like PLA or ABS or PETG. There is a reason that commercial injection molded and 3D printed engineering parts are made out of other materials like nylon, polypropylene and polycarbonate, commonly reinforced with carbon or glass fibre. I think that a clever design can probably get around the maintenance and repair problem by having the arms removable or by segmenting the design as much as possible like having all the electronics mounted to the same section that is separate from the arms, that way to replace the piece with the arms all you need to take off are the motors themselves
Exactly Racewhoop in 3 inch it’s very excellent ! How many time i’ve tuch or crached… and re-arm and go… It’s amazing in bando… , in a tree 👌 And when you have excellent motors inside , it’s the fire !!
Note: Carbon fiber is a 'fiber reinforced plastic' as it is plastic with a carbon cloth submerged within it. (Not to say that carbon fiber isn't the best material for our drone frames)
Barwell... You really have to try the racewhoop, designed by freezillion. It's completely 3d printed and almost unbreakable. We use it to race ledtracks in the winter and its super locked in. Also it's free for everyone to download!
I printed several peon230 frames using PLA, Nylon, PETG, and ABS. All are useless materials for a frame. However, I have had luck with PP (Polypropylene). A bit tricky to print, so some printer setup homework is required.
Hi, i would need some help and you can help me with your ideas we have here in Peru a MD4-1000 drone that a guy broke an arm, is any possibility to try to repair this arm with 3D print, is difficult to get carbon fiber here. Hope you can answer thanks!!
I've seen guys put them together like they are 3d printers and save a bunch of money versus something prebuilt from a name brand. Actually I think some 3d printer platforms come with a CNC head as an option.
@@hultaelit it's just the top and bottom plates, which can be printed as well, which i did no doubt about the weight, but the electronics are very well protected
I think everyone is missing the point of the 3d printed frame. It not for the people that just buy their frames... Its for the person who can print their own frame thus when I crash I just print a new one in 6 hours or print 5 and be able to hotswap them for about 4 bucks in PLA a print.
Unfortunately all I got is that I think this was from months ago... I had thought this was new but it seems vaguely that I've seen it before. Not very helpful I know but I would like to make the point that it would be nice if these short videos included the link for the original video.
Every time you fail, you design better one and try again. Try another material and try again. Combine materials and try again. Again. Again. Until you either run out of passion or succeed. Either way, as Bardwell said, you will learn something from it all
Depends why you do it. If you like designing and building, or if you just want something to fly. I've printed some fairly OK 2" frames but not had much success with bigger ones as by the time you've got it stiff enough the PID loops don't go crazy, weighs too much. Also doing 75mm whoop style frames, but they are never as strong as a moulded frame, weight for weight. About to try CF filled polycarbonate, might be better. CF has amazing strength and stiffness for its weight, but designing from a flat sheet compromises that a lot, at least with printing you can come up with a 3 dimensional design. However, my experience so far has not been good, but I prefer my own designs rather than someone else's frame. Why? I just do, my choice. So, if you like designing stuff, want it the way you want it, not how someone else felt it should go, get a CNC router and design your own CF frames, much more likely to be successful than prints.
Did you say Uber Nero sent the pic of the "semi-viable" printed drones? I recognize that table, was that NERO 3D? If so this is an unexpected mash up of my favorite hobby RUclipsrs.
Like someone else said it's really short fibers and is still susceptible to the other limitations of 3d printing. CF reinforced filament is virtually the top choice, though, as it does increase the stiffness quite a bit regardless of the other tradeoffs. There's other exotic high end engineering polymers to explore also like PEEK and the variants similar to that.
I'd say if you have a printer already than save the money and print your arms and just print extra arms. Those other frames are like 30 to 60$ when printing only costs a couple dollars.
Carbon fiber sheet quad frames are incredibly inefficient from an engineering perspective in the way they are commonly designed. If instead it was common to use carbon fiber to construct quad frames in the tradition of aerospace engineering methods and somebody said, Hey, I can build quad frames from slabs of carbon fiber, you would be saying you can't do that because it will be too heavy and is aerodynamically inefficient. You did bring up a good point in that even slab type carbon frames break when they crash. Therefore the specifications for any quad copter frame should be they are stiff, lightweight, aerodynamically shaped and easy to repair. 3D printing methods can produce highly efficient structural shapes not achievable with any other method. What is important for success in the 3D printed frame is the combination of high strength materials (now common), proper use of that material during the printing process and proper engineering and design. 2025 will be the year of the 3D printed Quad Copter Frame......
Well put, even the real deal CF laminate is pushed to its limits for strength when hucking 3-4lb quad copters at 100mph+ For minis, and sub 250g in general the 3d printed stuff is an artistic niche which is worthwhile but nothing beats the current standard for carbon frames in strength, longevity, practality. At least the bones. Many drones could utilize aero kits and such in 3d printed application, mind you easily replaced body panels, air foils with carbon bones.
3D printing a frame is a good way to prototype before cutting out of carbon to see if components will fit into it first.
3D printing is good for prototyping and for one-off DIY builds. If a plastic drone is what you want to design you should design it so that it can be injection molded (if it actually has market potential). A traditional quadcopter is best made out of carbon fiber because of the arms, but don't forget that many commercial camera drones are entirely made of plastic. 3D printing is however a great choice for mounting the electronics on top of your frame.
Exactly what Bardwell said….chase your passion. No matter others say, do what you love to do and chase after it.
Otherwise, having a store that only sells 3D printed frame STLs for micros would be ideal. Smaller frames made of Essentium HTNCF25 will definitely be light and stiff enough. And if these frames break, it’s a matter of reprinting easily. Bigger drones require more stiffness and do require carbon skeletons so 3D printed frames would be too heavy for the equivalent amount of stiffness.
I designed and 3d printed a frame for my tinywhoop and printed it in ABS. I can't tell you how many times I've crashed it and then made a design adjustment to account for where the frame broke.
would it be better to get it made out of cf? probably, but it's been a wonderful learning experience studying how it broke and what needs to be done to fix the design.
Im building a 3 inch cruiser with a 3d printed frame. But the only reason im doing it is for fun and because i have access to the 3d printer at work. Im using my extra fc/motors so really nothing to lose.
Through the process of designing a 3d printable drone I created 4 spin-off products that each have their own market. The drone turned out great too, but it is not a quad so the issue of arm stiffness was never a problem. I also managed to place all the electronics on the outside.
But even if an idea goes nowhere, you learn so much from the process that it is worth it. Next time you'll nail it or maybe you end up designing something completely different because of the ideas you came up with along the way.
I got into drones because of 3D printing, needed a new project so thought why not a drone, flew alright bit heavy, took a crash or 2 before it would break tho, plus the vibration are awful after a couple flights, but it got me hooked on the hobby 😁
I've wanted to convert my flywoo cinerace20 into a small freestyle drone. So I've decided to try and make all new 3d printed parts by myself. And guess what. I've decided not to use pla since everyone said don't even bother making frame by your self. I still made everything and used nylon and carbon fiber filament. The drone turned out incredible. Basically the drone frame can hold the pulling force of around 100kg while weighting around 40g and the performance of the drone itself are great, no vibrations an even when I hit at max speed any type of structure no brakes. I believe that 3d printed frames can be used but you need to use interesting materials and extremely clever designing to get rid off any unwanted oscillations on the frame itself.
DJI uses plastic only but its latest tech in plastic and advantage is radio signal is not blocked by carbon and and less vibration under certain condition.
We 3d printed all of our frames when I was on the rocketry team in college but that was because we had to make a bunch of weird shapes and mechanisms for quads that weren't performance-oriented in any way. We were also using a Markforged printer with carbon fiber nylon filament, which worked great and made pretty durable, high quality stuff, but is way out of reach for most hobbyists
Hi, I am an aeronautical engineer and I have designed a 3-4 inch frame that few people know to print in polypropylene, a material that few people know too. It is not a prototype, it is a final product that you can see on my youtube channel where you can also find the link to the website where you have all the information. No, Joshua, you can not generalize as you have done in this video as was done in his day with the metal aircraft that would never take flight.
My decision to disregard all advice led me to design a frame in aluminum and get rid of three motors. Best decision ever.
Cnc carbon fiber it's actually quite cheap to outsource
I wholeheartedly agree with Bardwell and have made the very same case/rant many times. I hate myself for getting ideas for a 3d printed frame while hearing Bardwells rant on how bad of an idea it is.
an idea for a 3d printed frame could be to make as lightweight as possible, maybe using generative design like fusion 360 has, and then having some form of lightweight metal tube in the arms mainly to provide support, and using something like PETG or ABS
True, for 5" I'd go with carbon but would probably 3d print prototypes for "ease of use". CAD can give you dimensional accuracy etc but you can get lost in scale easily and discover that you have to be fiddly with some tool to make things the easy way - or you can discover that the chamfer you struggled to put in exactly like you wanted is actually 2mm diameter and has no real impact on the final design (might as well be the other way - added a chamfer or curve that eliminated a shear prone area).
For up to 3" though the FDM materials are good enough to DIY, even PLA (although they say ASA is king but not all printers can print it). There is a couple of good designs on thingiverse that don't really mimic a sheet carbon approach and are sort of structural. I took them and made some my own redesigns (things like fit a 3 layer stack instead of 2, or fit a different size camera or adapt for my vtx), printed them solid and they actually work not so bad. Forces on a 3" are not as huge as with carbon and yes, they break at wide open throttle, but honestly carbon breaks at WOT crash just as frequently. Now to transfer electronics on same frame is maybe 20 screws so it's not that big of a deal - depending on the design of course.
That Dave_C nano long range (the one pictured at the end) is the only 3D printed frame I've tried... it works, but only because it isn't designed to "fly good" in the conventional freestyle sense. It's just a super light cruiser; it would have no hope of surviving in a hard crash.
Mr. Bardwell, what 3D printer would you recommend? This would be my first 3-D printer. I would really appreciate your feedback. Thank you as always.
100% Yagreed! I started with a Peon230 5" and have a Thunderyaw Cinewhoop. PETG, ABS, PLA all just are not durable enough. I got tired of rebuilding them. The carbon fiber frames are just so much better, as Joshua described.
Try PP filament
For 2.5” to 3” cinewhoop style frames, I’ve been using PCTPE for the ducts with good success. The frame still use top and bottom carbon plates for structural integrity but doesn’t have carbon arms as the motor mounts are built-in the duct part. The PCTPE has enough impact resistance for most crashes. Unless you hit a concrete wall at 50mph you shouldn’t break a duct. But it doesn’t scale for 5 inch builds, once you pass the 400g AUW there’s just too much energy in the crash for structural PCTPE parts.
A new channel... Bardwell philosophy 👌🏼😜🙌🏼
Prototype it in 3D print, once you have the design right there are plenty of companies that will machine carbon fibre sheet if you incorporate this in your design..🤔🤔🤔
I agree about it being unsuitable for 5 inch freestyle or racing frames, at least just now and definitely if you try to use common filaments like PLA or ABS or PETG. There is a reason that commercial injection molded and 3D printed engineering parts are made out of other materials like nylon, polypropylene and polycarbonate, commonly reinforced with carbon or glass fibre.
I think that a clever design can probably get around the maintenance and repair problem by having the arms removable or by segmenting the design as much as possible like having all the electronics mounted to the same section that is separate from the arms, that way to replace the piece with the arms all you need to take off are the motors themselves
I agree. Up to 2" frames you should be golden, but bigger than that... Yeah, no.
i have a 3.5" RaceWhoop
works great
Exactly Racewhoop in 3 inch it’s very excellent ! How many time i’ve tuch or crached… and re-arm and go…
It’s amazing in bando… , in a tree 👌
And when you have excellent motors inside , it’s the fire !!
What about PLA plus?
I’m 3D printing one but with my resin printer and high impact resin!
Went through exactly this years ago. Had a lot of fun and learned a lot, but yeah, you will waste a lot of plastic
Note: Carbon fiber is a 'fiber reinforced plastic' as it is plastic with a carbon cloth submerged within it. (Not to say that carbon fiber isn't the best material for our drone frames)
Barwell... You really have to try the racewhoop, designed by freezillion.
It's completely 3d printed and almost unbreakable. We use it to race ledtracks in the winter and its super locked in. Also it's free for everyone to download!
The best frame to bash a track!!!
I printed several peon230 frames using PLA, Nylon, PETG, and ABS. All are useless materials for a frame. However, I have had luck with PP (Polypropylene). A bit tricky to print, so some printer setup homework is required.
anyone try carbon fiber pla? or abs for these frames?
Hi, i would need some help and you can help me with your ideas we have here in Peru a MD4-1000 drone that a guy broke an arm, is any possibility to try to repair this arm with 3D print, is difficult to get carbon fiber here. Hope you can answer thanks!!
This guy broke it in 2018 so we dont have any kind of guarantee and we are trying to check if we can turn to live this drone.
Waiting for the day I can realistically pick up just a small home CNC machine for frame building.
I've seen guys put them together like they are 3d printers and save a bunch of money versus something prebuilt from a name brand. Actually I think some 3d printer platforms come with a CNC head as an option.
Im just starting out. I'm printing my frames out of PA-CF for now. So, they don't hold up in a 70mph crash.. Ok, I'll 3D print a new one for $3.
4:26 do you repair carbon frames?
the RaceWhoop works quite well
PLA is fine
PCTPE is basically unbreakable
you can replace a carbon arm or a plate without trashing the whole frame. racewhoop doesn't have the weight and mass of a 5in quad.
@@Slowtreme you can replace individual parts of the RaceWhoop as well
the 3.5" version uses the same motors as a 5" and weighs more
The HGLRC RaceWhoop has a lot of carbon still, and for a 3" quad 152grams for the frame is, just like Bardwell said, very heavy.
@@hultaelit it's just the top and bottom plates, which can be printed as well, which i did
no doubt about the weight, but the electronics are very well protected
Racewhoop is un destruct able!
I think everyone is missing the point of the 3d printed frame. It not for the people that just buy their frames... Its for the person who can print their own frame thus when I crash I just print a new one in 6 hours or print 5 and be able to hotswap them for about 4 bucks in PLA a print.
Now I want to see a video of JB just crashing donated 3d printed frame after frame after frame...
What stream was this from?
Unfortunately all I got is that I think this was from months ago... I had thought this was new but it seems vaguely that I've seen it before.
Not very helpful I know but I would like to make the point that it would be nice if these short videos included the link for the original video.
Every time you fail, you design better one and try again. Try another material and try again. Combine materials and try again. Again. Again. Until you either run out of passion or succeed. Either way, as Bardwell said, you will learn something from it all
There is a frame made from TPU on the channel "Greg Makes Stuff"
Depends why you do it. If you like designing and building, or if you just want something to fly. I've printed some fairly OK 2" frames but not had much success with bigger ones as by the time you've got it stiff enough the PID loops don't go crazy, weighs too much. Also doing 75mm whoop style frames, but they are never as strong as a moulded frame, weight for weight. About to try CF filled polycarbonate, might be better.
CF has amazing strength and stiffness for its weight, but designing from a flat sheet compromises that a lot, at least with printing you can come up with a 3 dimensional design.
However, my experience so far has not been good, but I prefer my own designs rather than someone else's frame. Why? I just do, my choice. So, if you like designing stuff, want it the way you want it, not how someone else felt it should go, get a CNC router and design your own CF frames, much more likely to be successful than prints.
00:50 Damn you sound like a good dad. I wish mine was supportive like this.
"It wasn't done earlier" - Lol, several people like me did it literally five years ago. Can work, but perform waaaay worse than any carbon frame.
Someone make a Bamboo frame, must have panada rc vtx
bambu filament?
Did you say Uber Nero sent the pic of the "semi-viable" printed drones? I recognize that table, was that NERO 3D? If so this is an unexpected mash up of my favorite hobby RUclipsrs.
hello there
@@CanuckCreator Oh?
@@CanuckCreator Hey man! So I'm guessing that was your table lol
What about carbon fiber filament?
it also breaks easier than CF-sheet
@@combinacijus wonder if resin prints are better
@@DronePsyche even worser
Like someone else said it's really short fibers and is still susceptible to the other limitations of 3d printing. CF reinforced filament is virtually the top choice, though, as it does increase the stiffness quite a bit regardless of the other tradeoffs. There's other exotic high end engineering polymers to explore also like PEEK and the variants similar to that.
I'd say if you have a printer already than save the money and print your arms and just print extra arms. Those other frames are like 30 to 60$ when printing only costs a couple dollars.
Carbon fiber sheet quad frames are incredibly inefficient from an engineering perspective in the way they are commonly designed. If instead it was common to use carbon fiber to construct quad frames in the tradition of aerospace engineering methods and somebody said, Hey, I can build quad frames from slabs of carbon fiber, you would be saying you can't do that because it will be too heavy and is aerodynamically inefficient.
You did bring up a good point in that even slab type carbon frames break when they crash. Therefore the specifications for any quad copter frame should be they are stiff, lightweight, aerodynamically shaped and easy to repair. 3D printing methods can produce highly efficient structural shapes not achievable with any other method. What is important for success in the 3D printed frame is the combination of high strength materials (now common), proper use of that material during the printing process and proper engineering and design.
2025 will be the year of the 3D printed Quad Copter Frame......
Well put, even the real deal CF laminate is pushed to its limits for strength when hucking 3-4lb quad copters at 100mph+
For minis, and sub 250g in general the 3d printed stuff is an artistic niche which is worthwhile but nothing beats the current standard for carbon frames in strength, longevity, practality. At least the bones. Many drones could utilize aero kits and such in 3d printed application, mind you easily replaced body panels, air foils with carbon bones.
NylonX is a great material, but it can be a real PITA to print.
F450 frame is completely plastic with pcb pdb
Could be worse, it could be a resin printer!
W😂
id rather have an expensivr frame that rarely ever breaks than a cheap frame that breaks every time
3 inch 3d rinted frame is a max size you can do. 5 inch 3d frame is to big for its tencil strength
What would be the best 3d printer for the money I've heard the ender 3 pro is good
I am very satisfied with it. Worked right out of the box.