Overview Using AERY, a glider design software, I designed a glider that would fly well.

My materials were balsa wood, tacky glue, and red clay, as well as markers for decoration. I chose not to use any tapered or sweptback parts due to the fact that it would be simple to mis-make those. To achieve good lift, I used a high aspect ratio and kept the glider relatively light by pushing the wings back and decreasing the nose mass. After much testing and refining of the wing length and nose mass, my glider was ready to fly! Procedure In a controlled environment, trial flights were flown at an initial velocity of 20km/hr with an angle of attack at zero degrees. The gliders were launched from a rubber band launcher down a twenty-one meter long stretch of hallway. The hallway was about eight feet wide. Five total trial flights were flown, not counting the ones that hit other people or had launching mishaps.
Flight Time (sec) 1.3 Distance (meters) 5.18 Velocity (m/s) 3.99 Pitch Stability Good Directional Stability Leans left Changes Made and Why Decrease nose mass because glider is slow Sand down left wing tip to straighten glider flight Sand down right wing tip to straighten flight Decrease nose mass to make it fly farther Add back nose mass because taking it off did more harm than good

1.7

9.45

5.56

Good

Leans left

1.8

10.67

5.93

Good

Leans right

1.7

10.06

5.92

Good

Straight

1.9

9.15

4.82

Hits ceiling

Straight

Conclusion From observing how my glider flew and how other gliders flew, I have learned that larger wings increase lift and allow the plane to glide longer. I have also observed that if an aspect ratio is too high, a plane will NOT fly better. In fact, it might barely fly at all. Also, it seemed as if the gliders with sweptback wings generally did better than the gliders without sweptback wings, although the glider that flew the farthest (18 meters) did not have sweptback wings. I also noticed that, in general, the size of the glider as a whole did not have any affect on how far it flew. However, smaller gliders were more affected by air currents.