Challenge: Digitizing the non-textured, organic surfaces of a vintage aircraft with sufficient accuracy to create a digital copy that, if necessary, can be used to make functional spare parts.
Solution: Artec Leo, Artec Studio
The result: A highly detailed 3D model that fully captures the plane's shiny, smooth fiberglass cabin, preserving its unique, experimental design in a virtual format.
Why Artec 3D?: Without the wireless Artec Leo scanner, the first of its kind in the industry, capturing the complex, partially hidden geometry of the Sadler Vampire aircraft would have been nearly impossible. With the advanced editing tools in Artec Studio software, surfaces as complex as this can be easily tweaked with a few clicks, yielding a highly detailed mesh ready for reverse engineering.
Have you ever dreamed of owning your own plane and flying wherever you want? The idea of such unlimited freedom has inspired numerous innovations in aviation, and the industry is full of attempts to make this dream a reality.
Since the LearJet 23 was launched in 1964 and popularized private jets, designs have progressed rapidly – some aimed at increasingly luxurious travel, while others prioritized functionality.
One of the more inventive aircraft appeared in the 1980s: the Sadler Vampire. Unlike many of its competitors, it had folding wings and a pod-and-boom layout. To this day, this aircraft remains popular with recreational pilots, and its design has undergone numerous adaptations. At one point, a version with a mounted machine gun called the "Piranha" was even introduced.
However, the experimental nature of the aircraft meant that its design was never saved in CAD format, which now makes finding spare parts difficult. Faced with this problem, one pilot decided to pre-empt future challenges – by digitizing his entire Sadler Vampire with Artec 3D scanning.
Digitization of the aviation icon
Since selling his first Sadler Vampire decades ago, this pilot has become more aware of the aircraft's rarity. Therefore, just in case, he decided to create a digital basis of the design - in order to be ready for possible repairs or his own modifications.
The structure of an airplane wing, with its ridges, is relatively simple to digitize. However, the white pod-shaped cabin, rivetless, textured and made of reflective fiberglass, presented more of a challenge. Photogrammetry was one option, but the resulting model would require significant post-cleaning.
After contacting 3DMakerWorld for help, Artec's longtime US partner suggested an alternative: the Artec Leo. Although the Artec Space Spider could also capture an aircraft with the precision needed for reverse engineering, the Leo's 35 million dots per second scan speed, built-in display and wireless versatility made it the better choice for the task.
"We had a fragile setup, the plane was on an engine mount with a long beam through it. I had to maneuver around it," explained 3DMakerWorld engineer Chad Mees. "With the Artec Leo, it was easy to flip it over, insert it into the cavities, and capture the internal features. Using the built-in screen, I could keep track of what I was doing and avoid bumping into anything!"
Another benefit of using the Artec 3D scanner was the high accuracy the team was able to achieve without the need for targets or tracking markers. This ensured that the Sadler Vampire remained intact during digitization, simplified their workflow and allowed them to collect all the necessary data in just a few minutes.
From scanning to CAD in Artec Studio
For advanced reverse engineering, companies often invest in additional tools such as those offered by Geomagic for SOLIDWORKS, but in this case, Artec Studio proved to be more than sufficient.
In particular, Mees points out that the feature brush in the 3D scanning and data processing software was excellent for eliminating artifacts. Normally this would be a challenging task due to the organic shape of the cabin, but with this tool he was able to ensure that the surfaces of the parts fit perfectly.
"In some places, where we may have had small artifacts, we were able to remove them using the smoothing tools in Artec Studio," Mees said. "Where the scans didn't come together perfectly, the software also connected the surfaces easily. Cleanup was very easy."
"The entire cleanup process, which included all these different components, was done exclusively in Artec Studio. I didn't have to do any additional mesh editing."
Looking back, Mees believes that the surface densification tools in Artec Studio could make the process even easier. "Vampire" had many tight geometries, where it was very difficult to grip both sides - a problem that could be solved by adding thickness in certain places.
But even without this feature, the resulting mesh could eventually be exported and turned into a fully textured 3D model, with the level of detail required for reverse engineering.
Analysis and opportunities for improvement
Looking ahead, Artec Leo is considered to have additional potential for 3D aircraft scanning, particularly in the areas of non-destructive testing (NDT) and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) .
Even if you were able to create a perfect model aircraft like the Vampire by hand, Mees explains, it "wouldn't really show if it was manufactured correctly." On the other hand, with Artec 3D scanning, you can capture curved surfaces and feed the resulting data into a CFD simulation, which enables analysis of the effects of turbulent air on aircraft performance.
For now, the Vampire's owner has no plans for a CFD analysis, but he now has a design file to refer back to should he decide to make upgrades or need replacement parts.
"The Artec Leo was the absolute perfect tool for this, thanks to its wider field of view and mobility," added Kevin Stuckey, 3D scanning consultant at 3DMakerWorld. "It would have been very inconvenient to go indoors or lug a laptop through our setup. The scan was also noise-free, and the incredible flexibility of the Leo device was a real refresher."
"Getting accurate measurements (as we managed here) would have been almost impossible without using the Artec Leo 3D scan."