Hey guys,
I'm working on a personal project where I need to model a wing.
But I need this to be somewhat funtional.
Think model airplane here in size.

I am looking for a cross section of an airfoil, but in my own searches I am finding that
there are all sorts of styles and I have been concentrating now on something called a
"ClarkY" design.

Does anyone out there have any knowledge on these things.
Ultimately I will have a prototype printed out in 3d and I'd like it to be as functional as say
a wing you might have in a radio controlled toy or something along those lines.

thanks
Mike Fitz
www.3dartz.com

A quick Google image search turned up several. I'm sure Yahoo will work, too.

Generally, I've found that if you throw in a model name and the word "blueprint," these will work wonders.

A word of warning, though: The word "clarky" turned up quite a few guys named "Clark," too, but it's pretty easy to sort out the wings from the guys.

Cheers--
Mark

It depends on what the flight characteristics and the scale of the toy is that you need, and more importantly the wing loading.

I have several RC planes and have devoted lots of time to studying the problem, and I keep coming back to a semi-symmetrical airfoil, because they still fly nice even when upside down.

On toys you want the wing to be much thicker than the aero boys will tell you because, a thick wing will give you more strength. A thick wing will also give you more drag this keeps the toy from flying too far away and being lost. It also decreases the stall speed so it will crash to earth slower and also live longer. If the toy has a wingspan of around a foot or less, the air foil becomes much less critical, and I have seen good performing little toys work just fine with a smoothed piece of foamcore for a wing.

For animation Master I like to draw my airfoils using 6 control points, one on the leading and trailing edge and two on the upper and lower surface. I peak the trailing edge, then I adjust the points untill I get the airfoil shape I want. Then I f I am going to put detail in the wing like ailerons, I add control points while it is still just a profile. I usualy extrude this out like I was making a rectangular wing, and then add the taper using a distortion box. THe distortion box is great for tapering and sweeping wings.

Hey guys, thanks for the reply.

NF1NK,
as for the wingspan, I'm thinking 10inches.
the weight of the object would be very low, but I'm not sure what will make up the total body.
I think though, that it would be only a couple of lbs at most.

What would you think the best design would be for an object of this weight?

Thanks
Mike Fitz
www.3dartz.com

Mike
With a 10" wing span wing loading is a much bigger deal than airfoil shape. for a toy or other lightly powered object you don't want to exceed 5lbs/ft^2 or better for your project .55 oz/in^2. my guess is the whole toy needs to weigh in at around 11oz for good flight charactaristics.

For the wings I would build them out of foam board from an office supply store. I would insert bamboo BBQ scewers for spars at about 1/4 the way back from the leading edge. then I would put a strip of reinforced packing tape on the top and bottom (the kind with strings in it) length wise across the wing.

The advantage to building this way is that it is cheap so you can figure out the weight and balance issues and revise the wings several times without too much cost.