Make It Fly: Experimental Aerodynamic Optimization of Existing Paper Aeroplanes through Flight Analysis

The aim of this paper is to analyse existing paper aeroplane designs and improve their performance which are evaluated through a fixed set of quantitative and qualitative criteria while being launched similarly. To do this, three different existing models were tested: the Basic Dart, the V-wing and the Hunting Flight. The chosen criteria for success was whether the design could fly for 4.67m consistently across 15 trials with a total success rate higher than 50%. First, the planes were flown with no modifications to establish the baseline and then, based on visual and wind tunnel observations, would be improved upon by making changes to control surfaces and other launch characteristics (launch velocity and angle of attack). Post-modifications, the Hunting Flight had the most significant success rate increase from 6.7% to 93.3% after the addition of a dihedral angle to the wing and removal of any angle of attack. The key finding of these experiments was that most paper aeroplanes fly best when launched with a negligible angle of attack, showing how minimal modifications can significantly improve flight.