Designing Airfoils

[imran1042]

Hey all,

  Currently, for me one of the hardest parts of designing a model is the airfoil. When I look at everyone's build threads I always wonder how you guys design them. I'd really appreciate if anyone can supply me with the steps and procedures to designing an airfoil.   

Thanks!

[sihinch]

Here is a very brief summary based on what I've learned you need to decide the objective or function of the model before you pick the airfoil. There are 4 basic categories (and uses):

Under-cambered - slow flying high lift
Flat Bottomed - trainers and sports models
Semi symmetrical - sports, scale, warbirds, racers
Symmetrical - aerobatic

Each is good for a different purpose. And then you also can play with sweep/chord and thickness (for speed/drag.)

Once you know the shape of the airfoil you can search for some common ones.

NACA airfoils are available for all 4 of the above categories and templates are available using a Google search. Or try here:
http://airfoiltools.com/search/index

For racing I've used a NACA 2410 and an SD6060

[imran1042]

Thanks Simon! I'm working on designing a model right now. I'll start a thread once i start building Might be a while