Vrftjkry

I am trying to draw a wheel-like figure like this. I had used xfig.

I wonder whether I can also use LaTex tikz or other ways to get similar figure with the additional criterion

• the area enclosed by the four red rectangulars/squares --- should have been filled in with a gray shaded but still transparent color (like tunable transparency 10%, 30%, 50%, 70% for each wing of the 4 wings of the wheel) or so.

Do any experts know how to do this?

Thank you! (I will accept the answer very soon)

Yes, LaTeX can do such things.

documentclass[tikz,border=3.14mm]{standalone}

usepackage{tikz-3dplot}

usetikzlibrary{decorations.markings}

begin{document}

tikzset{->-/.style={decoration={

  markings,

  mark=at position #1 with {arrow{>}}},postaction={decorate}}}

begin{tikzpicture}[thick,scale=5,>=stealth]

tdplotsetmaincoords{70}{60}

begin{scope}[tdplot_main_coords]

 draw[thick,blue] (0,0,0) -- (0,0,1.7);

 foreach X/Y in {0/0.2,90/0.3,180/0.4,270/0.5}

 {tdplotsetrotatedcoords{X}{0}{0}

 begin{scope}[tdplot_rotated_coords]

  draw[thick,->-=0.075,->-=0.575,fill=gray,opacity=Y] (0.1,0,0) -- (1.6,0,0) -- (1.6,0,1.5) -- (0.1,0,1.5) -- cycle;

  draw[thick,red,->-=0.4,->-=0.9] (0.2,0,0.1) -- (0.2,0,1.4)  -- (1.5,0,1.4) --

  (1.5,0,0.1) -- cycle;

 end{scope}}

 draw[->,blue,thick] plot[variable=x,domain=20:-200,samples=31,smooth] ({0.3*sin(x)},{0.3*cos(x)},1.8);

end{scope}

end{tikzpicture}

end{document}