Paper Airplanes

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Barbara J. Feldman

What makes one paper airplane better than another? Should we judge our paper planes on ease of construction, length of flight or distance traveled? Personally, I vote for the fun factor. And hopefully, you'll have plenty while visiting this week's paper airplane picks.

Alex's Paper Airplanes

5 stars

From Alex's gallery of two dozen paper airplane designs, visitors have selected the Dragon Plane and Paper Helicopter as their favorites. The Dragon, an original design, flies "true and fast" and is "the best plane to hit your teacher with." The Helicopter is popular because it is both simple to make and simple to fly. You can peruse the rest of the planes by difficulty of construction (easy, medium, hard) or jump right to the fastest, longest flying, or most unusual designs.

Best Paper Airplane

4 stars

During the summer of 1950, eight-year-old Michael O'Reilly watched in amazement as his sister's boyfriend made the best paper airplane in the whole world. "When he started folding the paper, I knew this was something different, something special. He never explained how he did it but every move, every fold, every detail was burned into my memory." Today, Michael shares the secrets of the DC-3 paper airplane: how to build it and how to fly it.

Joseph Palmer's Paper Airplane

5 stars

Joseph Palmer's planes are "designed to fly," not look like real airplanes. As a paper airplane purist, none of his designs require cutting, taping or weights: just a single sheet of 8.5" by 11' paper and your fingers. There are only four designs here, but the illustrated instructions are excellent, and judging by visitor feedback, all of them are great flyers.

Ken Blackburn's Home Page

5 stars

In 1998, Ken Blackburn's 27.6 second paper airplane flight set a new Guinness Book record for time aloft. It all started at age thirteen, when Ken created a paper plane that could fly over a quarter of a mile. He kept refining the design, and while in college won his first world record. It takes Ken "three months of working out and airplane-tweaking" to prepare for a record breaking. And yes, he does share the plans for his record breaking planes. Look for them in Paper Airplanes You Can Fold, Planes From Workman.

Paper Airplane Hangar

5 stars

"The most important thing when making a plane is not making the folds in exactly the right place, although this is important. More important is making each fold well." The Paper Airplane Hangar is filled with good advice on how to fix common flying problems such as veering left, right, or flying into the ground. It also includes safety rules, things your mother always told you like "Never throw planes at people." Since most of the danger lies in the point of the plane, Ben Yeomans recommends the sharp nose be either cut or folded down for kids.