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Paper Airplane Designs

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Re: Paper Airplane Designs

#71
post #65

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…

Thanks for sharing. You made me make my first paper airplane in years. Oh joy.

Oh my gosh, no way. You have no idea how much you just made this stranger's day. Thanks so much, dear! If you have trouble with flight time, you might enjoy having some flaps on the back too. Just ever so slight, almost little bumps that you'd push up subtly with your thumb in the back. If you do it perfectly, it just sails, almost sitting on the air itself. Too strong and it does little swoopy up and downs, too little and it goes straight down.

I'd ask you to send pics of your creation but I guess this is the Hacker News comments section! Super proud of you either way, dear! <3 :)))) :D :)

Re: Paper Airplane Designs

#72
post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for sharing. You made me make my first paper airplane in years. Oh joy.

Oh my gosh, no way. You have no idea how much you just made this stranger's day. Thanks so much, dear! If you have trouble with flight time, you might enjoy having some flaps on the back too. Just ever so slight, almost little bumps that you'd push up subtly with your thumb in the back. If you do it perfectly, it just sails, almost sitting on the air itself. Too strong and it does little swoopy up and downs, too litt…

Well, I just went outside and had a ton of fun for 30 minutes or so with a paper airplane outside of my neighborhood's tennis courts. I forgot how hard elevator tuning was, as well as the apparent unfavorability of the wind sometimes (and how hard it hurts to really chuck something). Super sweaty and happy now, thank you for encouraging _me_ in turn to go out and build a paper airplane for the first time in years. Total blast! Thanks again! <3 :)))) :D :)

Re: Paper Airplane Designs

#73

Something I've been curious about, are there paper airplane designs that translate to usable full scale designs? If not, why not?

(disclaimer: not an aeronautic engineer) when you double an object, its weight increases by 8x (all three dimensions increase by 2x) but the wing area surface only becomes 4x larger. You thus end up with a worse lift-to-weight ratio. In addition, the purpose of a regular plane is to transport goods and people while the purpose of a paper plane is to just float. The closest full scale objects to a paper plane would be…

makes sense, thanks!

Re: Paper Airplane Designs

#74
One time during a summer camp at my middle school I won a paper airplane contest with the basic because time aloft was a major contributor to scoring and a gust of wind caught my plane after I threw it and held it in the air for a while.

I mentioned after I'd won that I felt bad, it was luck that the wind came when it did and held it the way it did and the judge replied that other planes might not have caught the wind like mine did because mine was designed in such a way that it caught wind better.

The prize, ironically, was a book on how to make paper airplanes. I felt like that should have gone to the loser, but it was still cool.

Re: Paper Airplane Designs

#76
That's cool! This reminds me of my experience in middle school when I used cardboard, bamboo sticks and rubber bands to make power paper airplanes, and the problem at that time was that in a short time after the plane was released, the propeller in front of the plane was driven by the rubber band to rotate very quickly, and if it could spin slower and lasts longer, the plane could fly farther, but I have not found a solution to this problem until now.

Re: Paper Airplane Designs

#77

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…

why you guys always presume my paper have a solid size. do I missed some information like best paper for papers airplanes?

Re: Paper Airplane Designs

#78

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…

> This design scheme was consistently among the best

What paper size do they/you assume? The only easy available here in my part of Europe is 21×29.7 cm (A4).

Re: Paper Airplane Designs

#79
post #33

I'm surprised they don't have the "lock fold" or "Nakamura Lock" design. When I was younger, that was the most consistent design for a good plane. Not always the best, but never the worst. Somebody talented could fold up a dart to beat it on distance, or a glider to stay up longer, but everybody could make a decent "lock fold". https://origamimag.com/nakamura-lock-paper-airplane/

My Grandfather worked at the Forestry Service and would come home with reams of used type paper (filled with statistics and reports, I assume). My grandparents would put the paper in the toy cabinet for us. I've made thousands of that design of paper airplane and just today learned that it had a name. Thanks!
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