From XFOIL to SolidWorks, here’s why I needed a better way to design drones—and decided to build it.

As a mechanical engineer and drone developer, I’ve spent years navigating the fragmented ecosystem of tools for aircraft design. My workflow has often involved a mix of SolidWorks for 3D modeling, XFLR5 and XFOIL for aerodynamic analysis, and spreadsheets for sizing and performance estimates. These tools are powerful in their own right, but combining them into a cohesive workflow is a challenge. Each step often involves manual data transfer, approximations, or even redundant redesigns—especially when iterating quickly during conceptual phases.

Designing a drone starts with selecting the right airfoil. Airfm is a software tool created to streamline this process by allowing users to create, manipulate, and analyze airfoils with ease. It aims to bridge the gap between fragmented utilities and offer a foundation for smoother iteration, design consistency, and exploration.

This struggle led me to build my own preliminary sizing tool during my undergraduate thesis drone design project, DroneDesign, which automates early-stage aircraft sizing calculations.

I will gradually be migrating features from DroneDesign into Airfm over the next couple months.

Airfm Main User Interface
The clean and functional UI of Airfm.

Airfm’s Key Features

  • Airfoil Library: Access a wide range of standard airfoils.
  • Manipulation Tools: Scale, rotate, and modify airfoil geometry.
  • Visual Feedback: Real-time plotting of airfoil profiles.
  • XFOIL Integration: Enable direct aerodynamic analysis such as lift and drag coefficient plots.

  • CAD Export: File export into formats that can be readily used by popular CAD software (Solidworks, Fusion 360, etc.)

    Airfoil library in Airfm
    Airfoil library in Airfm.

Airfm aims brings together a suite of tools tailored for airfoil-based UAV design. And with a clean architecture built on Qt/QML’s model-view design and powered by Python, Airfm is built for extendability, usability, and efficiency in early-stage aircraft design.

In this series, I’ll be documenting the journey of building Airfm—starting with the motivations like this one, and moving through the technical architecture, challenges, and eventual roadmap. Whether you’re an aircraft design hobbyist, a student in aero/mechanical engineering, or someone trying to build better tools for makers, I hope this series will resonate with you.

Note that Airfm is still in development, and so contributions are much welcome.

What’s Next in This Series?

Post 2 – The Architecture of Airfm
Qt/QML, Python, Model-View structure, and design philosophy.

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Read more about the project on the Airfm Project Page.