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Hand holding a folded paper plane.

Can you make your plane do loops?

This paper plane isn’t very fast, but with practice and adjustment, you can make it do loops!

You will need

  • A4 paper

 

What to do

  1. A plain piece of paper.Rotate your paper so it’s wide, not tall.
  2. A piece of paper with a fold down the middle.Fold it in half and unfold to get a centre crease.
  3. A folded piece of paper.Here’s a tricky step! Fold the left top corner down so it touches the centre line. At the same time, make sure the crease goes through the bottom left corner.
  4. A folded piece of paper.Now, fold the right top corner down so it touches the centre line. At the same time, make sure the crease goes through the bottom right corner.
  5. A folded piece of paper.Fold the top edge over, about a centimetre down.
  6. A folded piece of paper.Fold the top edge over a second time.
  7. A folded piece of paper.And a third time.
  8. A folded piece of paper.And a fourth time.
  9. A folded piece of paper.Fold the plane in half down the centre line.
  10. A folded piece of paper.Fold the wings down, then out. In the plane we photographed, the wings are folded with creases about two centimetres from the centre line on each side. This will make the wings quite big. Try adjusting the wings to be bigger or smaller to work out which flies or loops the best!
  11. A folded piece of paper.Bend up the back edge of the wings to get some lift.

Did you know?

Loops aren’t perfect circles! The plane loses speed on the way up and speeds up on the way down, so the loop will be tighter at the top. If your plane runs out of puff before it finishes a loop, try throwing it harder, or bend up the backs of the wings to make it turn upwards faster.

More paper planes!

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2 comments

  1. can you please show me how to make a paper airplane in a YouTube video.

      Reply
    1. This isn’t my video, but I Think it’s pretty similar to this plane design:

        Reply

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