Paper Airplane Designs

When you're just starting out with folding paper airplanes, it's a good idea to just follow the steps to the letter. As your skills improve and your confidence grows, you can start being more creative and experiment with new designs of your own.

There are some important things to keep in mind when designing paper airplanes and this article will arm you with information to help you get a headstart in your fun journey.

Paper Airplanes Don't Really Need Tails

Some people think that tails are necessary for paper airplanes to become stable. This is simply not true. Most paper airplane designs do not include tails and even some real airplanes do not have tails. The B-2 Bomber comes to mind.

However, the angle of the tail has a direct effect to the flight of the paper airplane. If you bend the end of the paper airplane's wings up, this would make it fly slower. Bend it down and it'll go faster.

The paper airplane model dubbed as "The Best Paper Airplane In The World" has a tail.

Wide Wings Are Good For Paper Airplanes But . . .

Aviation terminology alert! The width of the wings from tip to tip is called the wingspan. Easy enough? Good. Now the distance between the front of the wings to the back is called the chord. Piece of cake!

Now this is when it gets interesting. The ratio of the wingspan to the average chord is called the aspect ratio. Simply put:

wide wing span + narrow chord = high aspect ratio

. . . and vice versa.

"But why does paper airplanes have low aspect ratio?" You may ask, observant reader. It's because paper isn't the best material for building flying things. A paper airplane with too high an aspect ratio can easily crumple with the force of the launch.

Also, paper airplanes with low aspect ratio are easier to fold than the ones with high aspect ratio.

With Paper Airplanes, Fancy Shapes Are Ok Because . . .

Real paper airplanes are designed for very specific purposes. The basic configuration of wings, tail and fuselage is the most efficient for most real airplane purposes.

On the other hand, the purpose of building paper airplanes is to give the flyer a good time! You can let your imagination run wild. Just check out the list of all the paper airplanes in this site and you'll get some inspiration. There are several exotic paper airplanes here that actually fly.

If you want more technical information about designing paper airplanes, you can head on to Ken Blackburn's website where he provides more technical information.  

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