How to Plot and Print a Full-Size Airfoil Plan with an Airfoil Plotter

Updated

Airfoil Tools' plotter generates a full-size SVG plan of an airfoil at your chosen chord width, with adjustable camber, thickness, and pitch, and it can be printed on a single page or tiled across multiple pages for large sections. Use it when you need a 1:1 paper template for cutting ribs, foam cores, or templates, or when you want to compare shapes before committing to a design. You need a browser session and either an airfoil from the site's database (1,638 airfoils listed) or your own coordinate data.

Before you start

  • Airfoil source: pick one from the database, or add your own via My airfoils by pasting dat file coordinate data into the form. Note that custom airfoils are stored only in your browser session and must be re-added when the browser is reopened.
  • Chord width: decide the actual chord of the section you are building, since the plan is plotted to that width.
  • Printer: know your printer's maximum paper size and whether it supports borderless or scaled printing, because tiled output depends on consistent page handling.
  • Reynolds number context: the site shows a Reynolds number range (default 50,000 to 1,000,000, adjustable via set). This affects the polar data shown for the airfoil, not the plotted geometry, but set it if you also want to compare performance.

Plotting the airfoil

  1. Open the Airfoil plotter application.
  2. Select the airfoil you want from the drop-down menus. Airfoils you added under My airfoils appear in these menus during the same browser session.
  3. Set the chord width to your target dimension. The plan is plotted full size at this chord.
  4. Adjust camber and thickness if you need a modified section rather than the stock shape.
  5. Set the pitch to account for wing angle of attack, washout, or wind turbine blade angle. This rotates the section in the plan so the printed template matches the installed orientation.
  6. Generate the plan. The output is an SVG (Scalar Vector Graphics) file, which stays sharp at any scale.

Expected result: a full-size plan of the airfoil at your chord, with the camber, thickness, and pitch you specified.

Printing full size

  • The SVG plan can be printed full size on a single page if it fits your paper.
  • For large sections, print it over multiple pages. The plotter tiles the plan so you can assemble the sheets into a full-size template.
  • Print at 100% scale (no "fit to page" or "shrink to fit"), or the chord will come out smaller than specified.
  • After printing, measure a known dimension — for example the chord line — against your intended value before cutting anything.

Comparing multiple airfoils

Use Airfoil comparison to plot two or more airfoils on the same plan for shape comparison. The combined plan can be downloaded or printed full size for better resolution. The same tool also compares lift and drag polar diagrams across a range of Reynolds numbers, so you can check both geometry and performance side by side.

Common problems and fixes

Symptom Likely cause Fix
Printed chord is not the size you set Printer scaled the page to fit Disable scaling; print at 100%
Tiled pages don't line up Inconsistent margins or scaling between pages Use identical print settings for every page; check alignment marks before gluing
Custom airfoil missing from the menu Browser session ended Re-add the dat file data under My airfoils
Shape looks wrong after editing Camber or thickness changed unintentionally Reset those values and regenerate the plan
Polar data seems off Reynolds number range not set for your case Use set to adjust the range

Related tools on the same site

  • Airfoil search: filter the database by thickness and camber, with preview images, and download dat file data in various formats.
  • NACA 4 digit and NACA 5 digit generators: create sections if you don't have coordinate data.
  • Reynolds number calc: work out the Reynolds number for your conditions before reading polars.

If your goal is a physical template, the plotter plus multi-page printing covers it. If your goal is shape selection, start with search and comparison, then plot only the finalist.