Easy RC Paper Plane!

This instructable will teach you how to make a super simple, super easy RC paper plane for $20 or less!

This project involves no soldering or difficult electronics, and by having this project so easy, anyone who wants to do it from home can if they want to, with mostly things that you'll probably have lying around your house.

For the controls, the up/down stick of the controller controls the speed of the plane, and the left to right stick steers the plane. As it has no rudder, it turns by slowing down one motor and speeding up the other. Luckily, we can do this because drones already do this! To go up, simply increase the throttle of the plane and let it climb, and to descend and glide back down, simply decrease the throttle.

Supplies:

• Nano sized quadcopter - I used this drone from Sky Viper which was $20, but I already had a broken one lying around. You could also use any other nano sized drone, it doesn't really matter.
• Foam board or foam takeout container - gather this if you don't have a 3D printer. It doesn't have to be foam, just some sort of lightweight, somewhat rigid flat material, about 2 x 7 cm.
• Regular sheet of paper (A4)

Tools:

• 3D printer - This is optional, as you can use the foam board or other material instead.
• Hot glue or super glue
• Sharp Knife
• Scissors
• Tape
• Screwdriver
• Soldering iron (only if you broke the wiring of your drone)

In this step, we are going to turn the drone into the parts we need to complete our paper plane. This step requires no soldering, only a few tools like a screwdriver. Note: I had already disassembled my drone, so I used a 3d modelling program for the next couple steps.

1. First, get your drone out, along with your screwdriver.
2. Undo the 4 screws on the bottom of your drone.
3. Remove the 4 props, remembering which go where (you could take a photo beforehand, or just remember another way).
4. Unclip the tabs on the outside of the motors. (My photo doesn't do a good job of showing this, sorry.)
5. Take off the bottom of the drone. Everything should come out, including the board, battery, and 4 motors. Be careful not to break any wires.

After you have taken the bottom casing off, continue with these steps. Note: these do not have good photos because as mentioned in the previous step, i had to use a modelling program that didn't work very well.

1. Peel the board off of the top of the drone, being careful not to break anything.
2. Figure out which motors are the front motors.
3. As we only need the back motors, cut the front motors wires so that they are separate. You can now throw them away or save them for something else.
4. Put the back propellers on the back motors, but you have to switch them round, so that the back left prop is on the back right motor, and vice versa.
5. It should look like this.

(If you did break the wiring of your back motors, you will need to solder them back in place. Try not to break them in the first place, as it's quite a hassle.)

In this step, we will be transferring the drone electronics onto a platform that you can attach to the plane. If you have a 3d printer, you can download this file and print it. Then, continue to the next step. If you chose to build your electronics mount out of foam instead, you just need a 2x9 cm strip of your foam, and you need to cut it into a 5x2 strip and two 2x2 squares. Cut a slit down the centre of the 2x2 foam squares, about halfway down. Then, hot glue the squares to the 5x2 strip, as shown in the photo above. Then, cut the slits down the rest of the way till they are level with the 5x2 strip.

For this step, you will be attaching the electronics to the mount. First, figure out which way you want to be front, and then align the motors so that the props are facing forward. Then, hot glue them to the sides of the 2x5 strip. Then, hot glue the receiver to the bottom of the mount. Check that nothing is blocking the propellers, and then you're good to go!

This plane is just a standard plane, so here are the directions:

1. Fold it in half making sure the edges line up.
2. After every fold, run a solid object over the edge to strengthen the fold.
3. Open the paper back up.
4. Fold a corner in until its edge lines up with the fold line.
5. Do the same with the other side.
6. Fold an edge over again so that its inner edge lines up with the middle fold line.
7. Repeat with the other side.
8. Use small pieces of tape to tape down the edge of each side.
9. This keeps the wings uniform and helps the plane fly straight.
10. Fold the plane together in the middle.
11. Fold down one side to form a wing.
12. Repeat the same on the other side, lining up the wings so they are the same size.
13. On the back of the wings, fold up a little bump, as shown. This gives it more lift.

Now your plane is done! It is ready to fly, so just throw it like a normal paper plane, and let it fly!