Might want to buy the expensive filament for flying
They should have not gone with the default 15% infill
but the PLA came with the printer for free! Might as well use it!
The part, which was 3D-printed, softened and collapsed
I thought people into avionics were kinda smart. Like there's no way the person with enough knowledge about the geometry and fastening fitment to print one of these, couldn't have known about the material shortcomings. I hope he's sees the inside of a jail cell for a little while. Not terribly long, but still they could've killed someone and likely will if they sold more of these.
They bought the part & the seller told them it was ABS (melts at 90°~100°C), but it was PLA (~50°C). The og part was made from fiberglas (~80°C).
ohhhhh shit that's fucked. seller should face real consequences for that shit
Gunna nerd out right quick.
Even if the og part was fiberglass, it would have to be have a binder to hold it together(which is usually epoxy resin).
But even then!
ABS is still a temperature sensitive polymer, deposited in layers!
The only 3d printing that could hold up reliably would be lithography via resin with a rising "bed" and extended curing (forgive me for not using the correct terminology, I'm an old school 5 axis CNC operator that's still learning about the new stuff)
Nothing that could fail catastrophically under stress should be used in the aeronautical industry.
Yes!
The nerds in the linked comments nerded out about that too - with fibre materials construction matters (the weave if you won't), it's not just about the material.
Hey! I've been thinking about a fiber reinforced plastic submarine used to send billionaires to go see the Titanic!
We will be using an Atari joystick to control forward, reverse, left and right. The button is for dive (downwards)
It's going to be great!
We will be using an Atari joystick to control forward, reverse, left and right. The button is for dive (downwards)
For anyone who didn't already know, Atari joysticks only had one button. Hehehehe.
Can I fund your Kickstarter?
I’m willing to join the kickstarter but only if we can get Elon to join the maiden voyage.
Yes, the joystick is of an appropriate girth. Although it can also be operated manually.
Oh fuck! I wasn't even thinking about the cross pattern! I'm a failure...
Edit: or extrusion manufacturing!
There are some crazy plastics you can 3d print (with high end printers) like PEEK. Most consumer grade printers can't print those sorts of advanced materials that would be suitable. Most consumer resin prints are very brittle and not very suitable either.
If you ordered it from a print shop with the right equipment and materials, FDM printing should be fine.
Fiberglass resin is good far beyond 80C. With the right resin they can rate to 200C.
Porsche used fiberglass resin in their lemans cars in the 70s.
Literally every 3D printing channel is making functional parts out of plastic without asking why the original engineering avoided plastic.
It's like modern cars made with plastic engine components. They are used because they will fail with a set number of heat cycles that just carries the motor (all German makers now do this) just past warranty.
Even Ford is now using plastic oil pans in heavy duty (LOL) trucks.
DIY mechanics think because it looks like a thing, it works like that thing.
This part could have been printed in PEEK but it would have been more $ than fiberglass.
well, somebody needed to watch more superfastmatt before using printed parts on a vehicle
specifically one in the fucking air
This is why you don't download a plane!
Its a home built plane from plans (not even a kit)
This seems like there must have been like... 30 levels of checks and protocols to prevent anything like this from happening. How does something like this even occur
Pilot and mechanic here. I'm American but this will apply in other countries too, just change to your language's acronyms.
On aircraft with standard airworthiness certificates, there'd be at least two people going to prison over this. Standard aircraft require approved parts that are identical to those the aircraft was manufactured with, or any modification from the original design must be done either under the signature of an aeronautical engineer, or much more likely per a Supplemental Type Certificate. If you want to put different sun visors in your Cessna 172, the manufacturer of those new sun visors has submitted paperwork with the FAA and gotten them to issue an addendum to the aircraft's type certificate to include that modification, which then must live with the airplane's logbooks for the rest of eternity. Getting that STC comes with some engineering and testing work, which obviously wasn't done here. If this were an aircraft with a standard airworthiness certificate, the person who sold the part, and the person who installed the part, have committed federal offenses.
This seems to be an Experimental Amateur Built aircraft, which is a Special airworthiness category and class. Most of the rules are out the window and basically anyone can do anything they want to with it, it's "Experimental." In exchange for limits on what the aircraft can be used for, generally Experimental aircraft cannot be used for commercial purposes, flight training of other than its owner, etc., the maintenance, inspection and sources of parts requirements are greatly relaxed. If they'd installed one 3D printed from a plastic with a higher glass transition temperature, there'd be an article somewhere praising this excellent application of this cutting edge technology.
Well, the article said it was a 3D Printed part bought at an airshow. Which I imagine is like a gun show, and you can buy as many add-ons as you want from individual people.
I would question whether or not they used high Temperature filament, like PETG or something better, Or if that shit is just thick PLA.
But I do agree that there should be 30 levels of checks and protocols to prevent anything like this from happening. I think if you attach something to the exterior of your airplane, it needs to be made by a manufacturer who knows what they’re doing.
I read through the report. The pilot believed it to be carbon fiber reinforced abs, which should have had a higher weakening temp than the stock fiberglass part. Apparently it didn't though. They don't identify the actual material in the report.
Well, the pilot was lied to. That is definitely not carbon fiber On top of ABS. You can see where the print is falling apart. I’m certainly no expert, but that poor photo in the article definitely looks like a cheap piece of shit… Relative to what I imagine aircraft parts are like normally
carbon fiber filament just has tiny chobbed fibers in it to stabilize the material. it's not really a strength additive, definitely not in the way an actual woven sheet is. and you can't always tell if a printed part is CF filament or not, though you often can have a good idea
Whoever made this should have just covered it in fiberglass, or used it to make a mold for a stronger material.
But I guess The point of this whole thing is that whoever made this was definitely not qualified!
"carbon fiber" filament usually has little shards of carbon fibers suspended in it. This makes the part less flexible than raw ABS...when cool. It's not like they do a layup of carbon fiber over 3D printed ABS, that would almost defeat the purpose.
If they'd done that, 3D print a mold or buck and then do a carbon layup over it, it'd be made of epoxy, which doesn't melt.
When we say aviation is the safest mode of transport we mean commercial airliners.
General aviation is much more lax both due to some people's attitude and lack of resources.
"Bought at an air show." Read: flea market booth.
Gun shows but tall.
I thought they were, like shows.
Snoozer, a homebuilt plane crashing is surprising only to the most ignorant
The people commenting that they'd expect a pilot to be smarter need only work on a flight line for 1 hour to have their worldview flipped upside down.
Was it home built? This article says it was installed during a modification to the fuel line, but I didn’t see if it was the plane owner or a 3rd party install.
The Cozy MK IV is a homebuilt aircraft, perhaps the owner / pilot had it installed, or perhaps it was done in house. Regardless I'd say this kind of thing is the rule and not an exception for homebuilt aircraft.
This used to happen to crown vics that cops would dog the shit out of, but it would “warn” ahead of time because the intake manifold would sound like a really shitty harmonica.
I learned this because my friends dad was a mechanic for the police and came home one day while we were smoking a blunt and made us lose our god damn minds from paranoia, then we got to go for a ride in a cop car while stoned.
Get AI to design the 3D-printed part.
AI fixes all! /s
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