Yeah it's a strange term because it probably originated relative to fixed wing planes. Ie a VTOL plane. But now multicopters are the predominant species so VTOL can sound redundant to most drone builders today.
Aesthetics follows function in this case. And agreed VTOL is not beneficial at hobbyist scale for most because of the ease and short distances required to hand/runway launch and land an RC plane
Great question, but spinning lifting motors in cruise draws more power than it's worth for efficiency.
There's ways to use differential thrust for multiple cruise motors to roll if not positioned at spanwise Cg (e.g. wing mounted like in a commercial jet), but again, usually not efficient. Servos are a small mass fraction relative to other components.
A1, 256 x 256 mm lets me print these wings in four sections (including a double walled thin section for the boom mounts). With a high AR glider you'd probably need a few more. Carbon fiber spars + CA glue will do the trick for attaching them
Yeah I printed one of the Titan Dynamics airframes (before they closed up at access for the hobby market) on a Prusa MK3S using foaming PLA and CF spars. The fuselage came out in three prints, the wings as one print each, and then the two wing tip extensions got combined into one print.
It would definitely have been tight on an A1 mini but the full size A1 would work great for sure.
I actually managed to batch print the wing sections which you can see in the video in the rebuild chapter. That works really well for wing sections because each takes up a minimal bed area
Definitely! I would have done the same but it was my first time working with the Foaming PLA filament and didn’t want to waste too much of it if the print failed.
This actually has decent flight time! Could probably push close to 3 hours if using higher energy density (and cost) battery cells like the silicon anode ones I used.
