Paper airplane designs

[alexander]

So, just wondering if any of you guys ever get bored and decide to come up with paper airplane designs... if you do, i would like to see what you have come up with, and i will share some of my creations, hey, maybe something really neat can come out of this :eek:

 

Now, i use the following rules for all of my designs:

1 Letter-size sheet of paper

3 inches of 1 inch wide tape

 

allowed use of scissors, but you must use the whole sheet of paper.

 

hope you guys enjoy this challenge when you are bored as much as i do, and you don't have to be a kid, this is not simple try and error, for me, it's a challenge to put what i read about avionics, into possible designs that sometimes fly pretty well (some fail, infact most do, sometimes pretty badly :D )

[CraigD]

Here’s one from a single sheet of standard letter size printer paper, torn by hand, no tools or tape used.

 

All dimensions by guess. 1 test flight to set trim, another showing the need for the small vertical stabilizers on the main wingtips. Trail flew once just now, wind under 2 m/s and random-ish, from a height of about 2.5 m, released at about normal flying speed. Flew straight, about 19 m (all the way to into the street), for a glide ratio of about 7.6:1

 

My favorite paper airplanes look much like full size ones. This one has a canard (main wing to the rear) wing configuration, with a relatively large canard and a moderately low aspect ratio main wing, a configuration that lends itself to stability. A high aspect ratio (long and narrow) main wing with the smallest possible canard can have a better glide ratio (I’ve managed over 20:1) but are less stable, especially in gusty outdoor conditions.

 

Tape, or course, improves their performance. White glue, including a coating sanded and wax polished, improves it even more, but begins to border on the silly, as with that much work, you might as well forgo paper and use wood, foam, glass and carbon fiber and epoxy resin coats.

 

Apologies for the awful lighting of my hasty cellphone cam shot.

[alexander]

Very cool, yes, i tend to make paper planes that look closer to gliders, though i have a huge problem with exactness, since i am only making test models (i've made quite a few), i find them hard to fly past one-two tests, and sometimes something that looks pretty promissing can turn out to be something that does not work at all. my biggest problem is that my planes seem to generate too much vertical lift or the trim is out of wack they end up going straight, then sharply turning up, then running out of speed and yeah plummeting down or doing a loop, stalling, crashing, either way...

 

i was playing with a 2-winged design yesterday, it did not seem to work all that well though, unless it was a big wing in the front and a much smaller wing in the back.

 

my planes suffer 2 major problems i am working out:

ballancing, it is important to have enough weight in front of the wing apparently, and this limits my designs by either having to have two big wings in front and back, or making my plane in a way that will make the center of the wing, the center of ballance of the plane

control, it seems that without striding to make a precise plane, having control over it is crucial, so yes, i will have to figure better control :hyper:

 

here is one of my later designs, yet another one that's going in the trash for now

[alexander]

actually, talking about more realistic stuff, this is so far the better flying design i have

 

uses about an inch and a half of tape btw (mostly to affix the wing)

[alexander]

first seemingly successful canard design for me here, this one glides pretty well, at least in my short-range shots, though i have not long range tested it yet, hopefully the picture here provides enough info for you to build one and try it, please notice the slanted fold of the front wings here, it does seem to make a difference in the way it flies :confused: (everything eye balled but yes i did use scissors and since the 2 inside folds of the front wings did not hold all that well, i taped them on the inside of the center fold, to the center :) (very little tape needed)

[alexander]

seems to have problems with higher speeds... gotta solve that, modifying design a bit...

[alexander]

quite excellent videos, i might give a couple of those a go, i am currently working on a reverse swept wing design myself. I dont get them to the perfection those vids show but i am the experimenting around type of guy myself :)

[nuker2guy]

here is my design, I got ideas from the best paper airplaine as well as many others. It suprisingly flies very well. I will probably post a vid soon.

its at photobucket dot com and slash nuker2guy

[alexander]

TS, its not simple, the best way to go about it, that i have found, is to create a reverse swept wing glider with a front set of regular, smaller wings, and then a larger set of reverse swept wings, with rather large preferably twin, and i have played with tripple tail... when i figure a design out, i'll post.... but its something to think about

[alexander]

Here's my newest and flyable design

 

if anyone wants to test it for me, i can post steps as to how to construct it

 

i am still working on a reverse swept wing, this is just a side product

[PlanePassionate]

Hey, thanks for your site. It's really great.

 

I love to know all I can regarding aerodynamics.

 

That's why I wrote about aerodynamics of paper airplanes.

 

Check it out, even Google thinks it's good!

[zoogle11]

I have a design that glides 16 seconds from 5 feet with a light push.(Paper clips needed 1 big paper clips or 2 regular paper clips)

 

First fold in half shorter way. Then unfold.

 

Second fold corners into middle on both sides. Make sure to make a very tight crease to minimize chord.

 

Third fold it back in half with your original crease.

 

Forth pull down one wing and make a hold about 1/2 or an inch. Do on other side too.

 

Fifth make side flaps about 1/2 to 1 inch long.

 

Sixth staple front and back together. And paper clip the front (as instructed above).

 

Last make minor adjustments to the plane as you fly and flatten out wing creases as flat as possible and you've got it!

[htimsnahtan]

I think this UFO design is really cool! It also floats and glides very well:

[harleycurnow]

Had a dream last night that me and a friend won a paper airplane contest with some advanced paper planes. One had a tiny jet engine and other impractical stuff like that on. The other however used more practical methods and i am going to try and recreate it. It had adjustable control surfaces and a strange part at the back that worked a little like the wings on the F 14 Tomcat. Has anything like this ever been done?

[CraigD]

Welcome to hypography, Harley :)

 

Had a dream last night that me and a friend won a paper airplane contest with some advanced paper planes. One had a tiny jet engine and other impractical stuff like that on. The other however used more practical methods and i am going to try and recreate it. It had adjustable control surfaces and a strange part at the back that worked a little like the wings on the F 14 Tomcat. Has anything like this ever been done?

I remember something like this back in the 1970s, not a folded or folded and glued/taped paper airplane, but a paper, wood, plastic, and glue flying model rockets. The Estes hobby company made a kit version – you can view it in PDF here at Jim Zalewski’s site – and lots of people scratch-built variations on the idea.

 

A good paper folder can make a fairly realistic model of an F-14 out of paper, but this is more an origami skill than an aerodynamic design one, and the results don’t fly very well.

 

AFAIK, variable-geometry wings aren’t much use on ordinary, hand-launched paper airplanes, because they fly in about the same flight domain all the time, gliding at about the same speed. Planes, usually plastic, with wings that fold back so they can be launched, usually with a big rubber band, to a good height, that then unfold so the plane glides back down, are pretty common toys, and are a sort of variable-geometry design.

 

Rather than dwelling to much on the past, though, I’d say you should just get some paper and get folding. That, and showing off the results, is really the fun of paper airplanes, IMHO.