Imagine my surprise when I'm reading down the HN list like I do every day and I stumble upon my own website. Thats a pretty cool feeling! Im happy to answer any questions people may have. This was my Angular learning project back when Angular just came out. I think Angular ended up being the wrong choice for this project, but it works and I learned Angular, so its all good.
I've recently started running a STEM club for girls. One of the lessons is about flight: what makes an airplane fly, and can we design a better airplane than the standard 6-fold-arrow?
I've been searching the internet for a website that ranks paper planes both difficulty AND purpose. You just saved me a lot of time. On behalf of the girls in my club: thank you!
My only problem with this website is that when I used it with a class of students, there were pornographic advertisements in between the plane types. That was really upsetting. Please reconsider your ads.
I just wanted to say that your portfolio is amazing [1], and you've had the coolest career ever [2]! I was wondering, are you still the sole developer of Toodledo, or do you have some employees now?
It would be great to have some data on these designs, for example avg time aloft, max distance travelled. May be users should be able to report this and you can do average or median?
Some of these look so similar to the ones I used to design. We used to call a single "swoop" where it would go down and glide back up a "neener-neener". The peak of our design was the "neener-neener 9", which I recall would do a full 9 neener-neeners on a blustery day.
Nice diagrams. Do you know the book "Kids' Shenanigans" by Klutz? [1] I grew up with it, and it has three paper airplane designs, corresponding to your "Basic Dart", your "The Square Plane", and one called the "Nakamura Lock"[2] (also mentioned elsewhere in this thread), which you don't seem to have but bears some resemblance to your "Tail Spin".
You might already be aware, but when toggling some of the tag filters, mixed in with the normal square images, I get several empty squares that don't link to anything.
I used to make one like the square plane, except at step 4 I would fold the outer points on more time toward the center line then fold the tip while inserting the previous folds into the folded tip so it makes a thick triangle. You could then fold the wing tips up or down to make the vertical surfaces. I'm not sure I'm describing it well.
I just want to say thank you. Your site just made my teaching job a lot easier.
PSA: am working with kids on some optimization stuff.
Teaching not daily.
In the 90's I went to a small middle school, the 8th grade class was 21 people. Once, the school had a contest in the indoor gym, we each designed paper planes and the one who flew it the farthest won a prize. We argued with teachers over an allowance for a little bit of tape, which some of us used just as nose weight. However, each kid was the one to "fly" his own plane, a big oversight.
Almost the last kid, when it was Sam's turn to "fly", he stepped up to the line, crumpled up his design very tightly into little ball, and hurled the paper mass as far as he could.
Strangely, I can't remember what happened or who won! But his genius observation of the rules stuck with me.
The plane I designed is not among these designs, but a totally square design that I had learned earlier from an origami book. This is the closest one: https://www.foldnfly.com/17.html#The-Square-Plane
Similar story from a university aero course that ended with a paper airplane competition.
There were some remarkable paper airplanes, making amazing flights, all sorts of research and time went into developing the ideal model.
One guy comes up representing his team and he gets out a piece of rolling paper and a lighter. Tears the tiniest portion off the rolling paper, sets it alight, and then follows it with his finger through the air as it took forever to land on the ground.
I believe the incident led to a rule change for later years.
I thought this was a fantastic eggcorn[1], until I realized that it is the actualy origin of the word 'pastime'. So, it sort of is, but isn't at the same time.
Question: there is a "rule" separating "no cuts" from others, let's call it a purity class. Is "no arbitrary folds" also an established purity class? When I was a kid with too much paper at my disposal, arbitrary folds felt like chatting. Arbitrary folds would be any fold not defined by either a side or existing fold aligning with another side or existing fold or by a corner aligning with another corner. Many intermediate folds would be done just as guidelines for layer folds, and four the structural effect they would have after getting undone. A bit like the "only lines and circles, no measurements" rule in geometry.
Hi! There's a paper airplane I've made which I learned out of a book a while back - the book called it either a "condor" or "albatross", I forget which, but searching for either of those names turns up different designs. It's an excellent glider, and one of the few designs I know that start with the paper in landscape orientation.
If you're interested, here's how to fold it:
- With the paper in landscape orientation, fold the top corners to meet in the middle.
- Fold the top corner [just created] down to the point where those two corners meet.
- Fold the two new obtuse corners on the top to meet in the middle. Tape into place.
- Fold in half left-to-right, so that the taped corners are on the outside of the fold.
- Fold the edges back down to the centerline.
- Unfold, and smooth out to give it the profile of an upside-down flattened W. The flatter, the better it will glide, but if it's too flat it will spin.
Launch by holding the back, as it has no vertical surface to grip on the bottom.
I actually "invented" another paper airplane design called the Nakamura Hammer (because it combines the designs of the nakamura lock and the hammer). I made it to the frontpage of Reddit, so that were my 15 minutes of fame. Here's the tutorial
In high school we used to receive printed notices aka 'circulars' from administration to give our parents (do they still do this?) -- our classroom window overlooked a cabin used for temporary classes with a corrugated asbestos roof. After promptly turning my circular into a plane and flying it out the window, exclaiming "hey i got to the 5th row on the cabin roof!"
Thus began the hottest aerodynamics contest in my academic life, we experimented with so many designs, tried all kinds of crazy modifications.
The interesting thing was, our classroom window was an entire story higher than the cabin roof -- the usual "paper plane contest hack" of rolling a paper ball and chucking it as hard as you can was not very good compared to a functional aerodynamic design with some lift.
The "contest" ended when a week later someone reported our antics and the school was aghast to find 40-odd paper planes roosting on the portacabin roof and our entire class was given some stern warnings but luckily noone sold me out as the instigator.
From one of the example videos on the site, I got suggested this fun video where the maker of the world record distance paper airplane a few years ago shows off and explains a bunch of different designs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2n4xq0DnbHI
The record flight is shown at the beginning, with more info on the plane at 13:55, but the whole thing is a fun watch.
Fantastic! I love the design of this site: the way it greets you immediately with big thumbnails of actual paper airplanes.
I was flying some "Basic Dart" and "Square" planes (those are the only two designs I know by heart) with my kids the other day and I was thinking, "I bet there are a bunch of great designs online somewhere..." And here we are!
I didn't have the right tools or expertise to build most of his planes (most notably rubber cement), but I do wonder how these planes stack up against currently popular paper airplane models.
He talks a lot about his invention (and patenting) of the Kline-Fogleman airfoil, which creates a vortex that influences the laminar flow and increases stall resistance.
Notice how it has a high air time and distance. I used to launch them them from my 8th story apartment in the city. On a right day, some would take off and would be carried by the wind to where I lose sight of them.
Pop-up books are works of art, but they rely on a vocabulary of a few dozen mechanisms, each of which operates in relation to an opening fold between two pieces of paper or card. Birmingham is a great, systematic expositor of the analytical prerequisites for the wildly creative stuff you might come across in a bookshop these days (there's a boom in spectacular pop-up books, see http://www.bestpopupbooks.com/)
I should add: pop-up books are still assembled by hand (in the Far East), not by robot; so if they seem inexpensive, there's a bit of a story there which might not flatter the book trade. A microcosm of globalization.
When I used to teach AP Computer Science, I'd have my students make paper airplanes on the first day.
I'd have them write down the instructions to make their airplanes. Then I'd follow their instructions in the strictest, most literal sense possible, resulting in some lopsided airplanes.
Over the last two years I made a lot of paper aeroplanes for my nephew, after that I started to build my own glider planes and now we're into RC planes.
If you want to get a bit more of a hobby I highly recommend Flitetest community, they made awesome things, and is a great resource to get kids into the hobby.
I tried for the longest paper airplane flight in history - from the top of the Space Needle in Seattle. Unfortunately, the plane hit the anti-suicide mesh, lost all momentum, and from there went straight down. I took the elevator down, walked to the plane, picked it up, and threw it in the trash can. (Don't litter.)
[+] [-] offsky|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] alex_stoddard|7 years ago|reply
(And not the A4 size common in the UK and elsewhere. http://betweenborders.com/wordsmithing/a4-vs-us-letter/)
I remember the frustration as kid getting a book of designs from the US and having none of them work quite right.
[+] [-] dirktheman|7 years ago|reply
I've been searching the internet for a website that ranks paper planes both difficulty AND purpose. You just saved me a lot of time. On behalf of the girls in my club: thank you!
[+] [-] romwell|7 years ago|reply
https://classicreload.com/win3x-greatest-paper-airplanes.htm...
Do you plan on doing something like that with your website?
[+] [-] Endy|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nathan_f77|7 years ago|reply
I hope this HN bump has been good for Fold N Fly!
[1] http://www.jakeo.com/portfolio.php
[2] http://www.jakeo.com/about.php
[+] [-] amatecha|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sytelus|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kevinSuttle|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cknoxrun|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] waterhouse|7 years ago|reply
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Kids-Shenanigans-Approve-Whoopie-Cush...
[2] https://www.instructables.com/id/Paper-Airplane-The-Nakamura...
[+] [-] xelxebar|7 years ago|reply
You might already be aware, but when toggling some of the tag filters, mixed in with the normal square images, I get several empty squares that don't link to anything.
Anyway, happy folding!
[+] [-] corpMaverick|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tke248|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] icsllaf|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lightlyused|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] quakeguy|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bwldrbst|7 years ago|reply
Time to pick up a few more.
[+] [-] scoot|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] qwerty456127|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stretchwithme|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TomK32|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] taherchhabra|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rustoo|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] madeuptempacct|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ttty|7 years ago|reply
Also is missing the most important thing. A video of the plane flying.
[+] [-] simonsarris|7 years ago|reply
Almost the last kid, when it was Sam's turn to "fly", he stepped up to the line, crumpled up his design very tightly into little ball, and hurled the paper mass as far as he could.
Strangely, I can't remember what happened or who won! But his genius observation of the rules stuck with me.
The plane I designed is not among these designs, but a totally square design that I had learned earlier from an origami book. This is the closest one: https://www.foldnfly.com/17.html#The-Square-Plane
[+] [-] iaw|7 years ago|reply
There were some remarkable paper airplanes, making amazing flights, all sorts of research and time went into developing the ideal model.
One guy comes up representing his team and he gets out a piece of rolling paper and a lighter. Tears the tiniest portion off the rolling paper, sets it alight, and then follows it with his finger through the air as it took forever to land on the ground.
I believe the incident led to a rule change for later years.
[+] [-] verta|7 years ago|reply
Windtunnel to test: https://www.instructables.com/id/Paper-aeroplane-wind-tunnel...
Project form: https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-fair-projects/project...
Another page with slightly different features: https://www.origamiway.com/paper-airplanes.shtml
[+] [-] scoot|7 years ago|reply
I thought this was a fantastic eggcorn[1], until I realized that it is the actualy origin of the word 'pastime'. So, it sort of is, but isn't at the same time.
[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eggcorn
[+] [-] usrusr|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] romwell|7 years ago|reply
The Greatest Paper Airplanes[1], a virtual interactive encyclopedia for Windows 3.1
Of course, you can use it in the browser these days[1].
It goes through basics and history of flight, basics of paper folding, and gives you dozens of interactive, animated, step-by-step designs.
Loved it as a kid, and was thrilled to see it preserved online.
[1]https://classicreload.com/win3x-greatest-paper-airplanes.htm...
[+] [-] skykooler|7 years ago|reply
- With the paper in landscape orientation, fold the top corners to meet in the middle.
- Fold the top corner [just created] down to the point where those two corners meet.
- Fold the two new obtuse corners on the top to meet in the middle. Tape into place.
- Fold in half left-to-right, so that the taped corners are on the outside of the fold.
- Fold the edges back down to the centerline.
- Unfold, and smooth out to give it the profile of an upside-down flattened W. The flatter, the better it will glide, but if it's too flat it will spin.
Launch by holding the back, as it has no vertical surface to grip on the bottom.
[+] [-] woah|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tobr|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] SmellyGeekBoy|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Rainymood|7 years ago|reply
https://imgur.com/gallery/b2Q8X
It flies really really well inside.
[+] [-] keerthiko|7 years ago|reply
Thus began the hottest aerodynamics contest in my academic life, we experimented with so many designs, tried all kinds of crazy modifications.
The interesting thing was, our classroom window was an entire story higher than the cabin roof -- the usual "paper plane contest hack" of rolling a paper ball and chucking it as hard as you can was not very good compared to a functional aerodynamic design with some lift.
The "contest" ended when a week later someone reported our antics and the school was aghast to find 40-odd paper planes roosting on the portacabin roof and our entire class was given some stern warnings but luckily noone sold me out as the instigator.
[+] [-] tempestn|7 years ago|reply
The record flight is shown at the beginning, with more info on the plane at 13:55, but the whole thing is a fun watch.
[+] [-] davegauer|7 years ago|reply
I was flying some "Basic Dart" and "Square" planes (those are the only two designs I know by heart) with my kids the other day and I was thinking, "I bet there are a bunch of great designs online somewhere..." And here we are!
[+] [-] TimTheTinker|7 years ago|reply
I didn't have the right tools or expertise to build most of his planes (most notably rubber cement), but I do wonder how these planes stack up against currently popular paper airplane models.
He talks a lot about his invention (and patenting) of the Kline-Fogleman airfoil, which creates a vortex that influences the laminar flow and increases stall resistance.
[+] [-] wafflesraccoon|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rdtsc|7 years ago|reply
For example I grew up with this one as the "basic" / default:
https://www.origamiway.com/plane-nakamura-lock.shtml
Notice how it has a high air time and distance. I used to launch them them from my 8th story apartment in the city. On a right day, some would take off and would be carried by the wind to where I lose sight of them.
[+] [-] theoh|7 years ago|reply
Pop-up books are works of art, but they rely on a vocabulary of a few dozen mechanisms, each of which operates in relation to an opening fold between two pieces of paper or card. Birmingham is a great, systematic expositor of the analytical prerequisites for the wildly creative stuff you might come across in a bookshop these days (there's a boom in spectacular pop-up books, see http://www.bestpopupbooks.com/)
I should add: pop-up books are still assembled by hand (in the Far East), not by robot; so if they seem inexpensive, there's a bit of a story there which might not flatter the book trade. A microcosm of globalization.
[+] [-] svdr|7 years ago|reply
Throw planes around the world: https://paperplanes.world
[+] [-] mncolinlee|7 years ago|reply
I'd have them write down the instructions to make their airplanes. Then I'd follow their instructions in the strictest, most literal sense possible, resulting in some lopsided airplanes.
It was a great beginning lesson in algorithms.
[+] [-] eloycoto|7 years ago|reply
Over the last two years I made a lot of paper aeroplanes for my nephew, after that I started to build my own glider planes and now we're into RC planes.
If you want to get a bit more of a hobby I highly recommend Flitetest community, they made awesome things, and is a great resource to get kids into the hobby.
https://www.flitetest.com/
RC-Plane from cardboard pizza box https://www.flitetest.com/articles/flying-wing-made-from-a-c...
Flite test Steam https://www.ftstem.com/
[+] [-] tomesposito|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] AnimalMuppet|7 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Udo_Schmitz|7 years ago|reply
https://www.worldcat.org/title/great-international-paper-air...
It has designs from this competition:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8gWE8wHhkE
There is also a second book:
http://www.worldcat.org/search?q=The+Paper+airplane+book+the...