I’ve remixed this hub for the Flipsky Motor. 3 Blade Prop Hub for Flipsky 6384 by seagull_nz | Download free STL model | Printables.com
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Hey everyone,
I wanted to share a quick report from my session today regarding my DIY Foil Drive blades.
The blades are 3D-printed aluminum (from China) which I’ve spent a lot of time sanding and polishing. Today’s session was pretty remarkable, but not in a good way at first. I started by cleaning the rotor blades with glass cleaner and a microfiber towel.
The first half of the session was honestly terrible. As soon as I got near the surface, I had massive issues with ventilation. Overall, it felt like I needed way more energy just to keep the board flying.
Back on shore, I made a few tweaks. I redesigned the trailing edge (cable guide) with some tape and—mostly just for fun to see if it would counteract the degreasing—I sprayed the blades with silicone oil.
When I got back in the water, the system felt much better. Ventilation was significantly reduced, and the blades regained grip way faster after breaching. To double-check, I cleaned them again with glass cleaner at the end of the session, and the performance dropped immediately (though not quite as bad as the very first run).
My theory:
Even with all the sanding, 3D-printed aluminum has micropores that don’t just go away. These pores seem to encourage ventilation during surface contact. The oil/grease fills these pores, which leads to much less ventilation and better flow.
Would love to hear your thoughts.
Is there a cheap alternative? Maybe some kind of paint could fix that problem? I think cnced blades are much more expensive
Disclaimer: I used AI to structure my thoughts and translate it
are you sure that is the only issue?
I got alu printed blades and to try out I put them on as rough as they were and had no issues.
Am sure they got more efficient after post treatment, but noticed nothing like you experienced.
Not entirely sure. But the default blades were unusable. Sanding and polishing made them usable. I was wondering about the range of performance with these blades. Sometimes it worked like a charm and sometimes the whole thing felt inefficient.
Right now I have no other explanation for it.
I think something else, like mast or hub, must be causing ventilation.
When runing prop close to the board, ventialation in part of the game, but props handle it differently. Do you have a rmp limit set-up? I found that without it, the difference beween the prop unloaded RPM and loaded rpm causes to take longer to evcacuate air bubbles.
I don’t have max rmp since I use the flycolor Esc but the performances chsnges between sessions and I don’t change anything. Time will tell. I think I’m making some forged carbon ones and see how they perform.