How to Make a Dart Plane

The dart plane is a classic paper airplane design. It is stable, quick and easy to build. Thrown from a good height, it can go quite a distance before reaching the ground. It also does well with added fins and flaps, allowing you to tweak the flight characteristics to make it do loops and rolls like a stunt plane.

Things You'll Need

• Paper
• Paper clip
• Scissors

Instructions

1. Fold a piece of paper in half lengthwise. open it again.

2. 

   Fold one corner of the paper into the crease to make a triangle.

3. Repeat with the opposite corner. You now should have a plane shaped like a triangle on top of a rectangle.

4. 

   Bend in one side into the crease over the triangle you have already made. This will form a more acute triangle that goes most of the way to the back of the plane.

5. Repeat Step 4 on the other side of the plane. You should have all the folds sandwiched inside the first bend you made.

6. Hold the plane in the middle and bend the wings down. You should get two bends that are parallel to the bottom of the paper.

7. Throw the plane from the middle.

Tips & Warnings

• By folding bigger or smaller wings, you can make a quick, short-distance flier, or a plane which glides better.

• Try weighting the plane. Attach one or more paper clips to it. You can pinch the nose or the center of the plane.

• Make fins by folding up the wing tips so that they are parallel to the center line of the plane. Alternately, you can fold them down.

• Make flaps by making two parallel tears on the trailing edge of each wing. Fold the little rectangle of paper between them (up or down).

Resources

• Other Paper Airplane Designs