School Assignment

[BadAir]

Second child has to design a paper airplane for school. Printer paper, tape, glue (unspecified) and paperclips are only materials allowed. His first iteration.

 

[BadAir]

 

[BadAir]

It flys! It's heavy, but it flys straight. The wing has lots of lift. I'm going to put a motor on it!

 

[Piotrsko]

Is that 1/2" plastic pipe?

What would happen if it was cleaned up without all the bendies and creases?

 

[BadAir]

It's just folded and rolled paper.
I sat down this morning and tried making a cleaned up, lighter, scaled down version, but it didn't work as well.

We'll work on it this weekend.

 

[BadAir]

This is based on the one we messed around with before school. Trusses on the wing fixed the flexing and work refining cg and angle of attack.

 

[BadAir]

This afternoon's attempt has some interesting features and is light, but is a work in progress. This morning's skinny stick is actually a fair little glider.

 

[quorneng]

Building a paper plane is an interesting topic but I have to ask who is designing this glider?

As a 10 year old I fell fowl of this sort of thing in a "bring something you have built" school competition.
I took a stick and tissue scale static model of the R101 airship that my Dad had drawn up plans after I has expressed interest in an article in a news paper. I was perfectly able and did build it all myself.
To my mind it was streets ahead of anything else entered. Did I win? no.
The head master knew my Dad was a serious model engineer so he felt it was unfair. He did explain to me the reasons before the prize giving. As a consolation I was awarded "special mention". No matter as the R101 model did impress my school mates which was far more important!

 

[skymaster]

Second child has to design a paper airplane for school. Printer paper, tape, glue (unspecified) and paperclips are only materials allowed. His first iteration.

View attachment 243179

you can make the fuselage, more sturdy if you get a pipe or anything that is round. are you aloud to use water to dilute the glue. if yes then use it to roll the paper on the stick and as you roll it add a little bit of glue to the paper. Make sure to not get any glue on the stick, once it dries you'll get a sturdy pipe of paper. do the same to make the spars on the wings. make sure you get the stick out of the paper.

 

[BadAir]

Building a paper plane is an interesting topic but I have to ask who is designing this glider?

Not me. I just think it's a neat project and he's come up with some creative solutions to the material shortcomings. These have all been made at school, although we did build a similar one at home to try some fixes.

 

[BadAir]

you can make the fuselage, more sturdy if you get a pipe or anything that is round. are you aloud to use water to dilute the glue. if yes then use it to roll the paper on the stick and as you roll it add a little bit of glue to the paper. Make sure to not get any glue on the stick, once it dries you'll get a sturdy pipe of paper. do the same to make the spars on the wings. make sure you get the stick out of the paper.

The one with the small tube fuselage is stiffened in the manner you described.

 

[Piotrsko]

Well someone has an eye for what actually flies. I'm impressed.

 

[BadAir]

Well someone has an eye for what actually flies. I'm impressed.

15 and looking at going into engineering.