Paper Airplane Designs

I agree. I didn't know it had a name. Thanks for it.

Also plus points. 1) It was easy to remember how to fold it. 2) It had good structural resistance and could withstand several flights and bumps. 3) It provided the first lesson in aeronautical engineering i.e. you could slightly tilt the one or the other wing in order to make flight behavior corrections.

My real love was one model that I didn't know how to make. An older cousin did. It was a tailed design. Best Flight Ever... See, when you are 5 it is easy to impress!

One of my favorite research projects on the subject. This research publication from the 2014 siggraph conference covers a ML backed design optimization approach to design novel paper airplanes designs, and simulate flight paths.

[Research]: http://www.nobuyuki-umetani.com/publication/2014_sigg_pterom...

[Video]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-KJUVJAUY8o

When I was little (about 20 years ago) I found a website where you could download sheets to print out. They contained parts to cut out that would make an elaborate little glider airplane. You layered multiple layers of paper together and glued them. It included many different parts, but all of them were just paper in the end of the day.

I think the site is gone, I can't find it anymore. It had a blue background and about 10-20 designs available for download. It was either German, Swiss, Austrian, Italian or French, but I'm pretty sure it had multiple Languages.

Anyways, I found something very similar: http://www.zovirl.com/paper-airplanes/

Hey, I've made quite a few of those. They fly pretty decent if you aim at something irritating and throw it in a fit of rage.

I made hundreds of paper airplanes as a kid.

This design scheme was consistently among the best (not on the website above directly): http://www.10paperairplanes.com/how-to-make-paper-airplanes/...

You could also just do what I did and just fold only the top over itself, and use a bit of the back wing for the winglets, folded out. Tiny, tiny grip, enough to hold, deeper in the back than the front for stability, tiny y in the wings and winglets going out slightly. The wings need to make a y when you drop it in the air (you can simulate this while holding this so you don't mess up your shot at a perfect first flight!). Make sure to fold the front extraordinarily tightly. Otherwise it starts to tank.

Then it's a matter of how hard you launch it. As a child, I was getting shockingly long flight times, and on those special days where there was a breeze...oh boy. What a world.

Super stable, super easy to make, super easy to teach, the hardest part is the arm, the patience to keep trying, the luck that it doesn't catch in a tree, and the patience to adjust the winglets for a nice little spiral.

A lovely part of my engineering days as a child, definitely helped get the creative juices going for this field! I had a white trash bag at one point with all of these novel little designs I came up with just for funsies. :)))) :D :)))) <3