Wings of Madness
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Student Handout
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Winging It
The wings on modern commercial aircraft are attached to the plane at a slight
angle known as a dihedral. This angle allows the plane to achieve the lift it
needs to fly, and at the proper angles, keeps the plane stable. This activity provides you an opportunity to experiment with how
different dihedral angles and wing shapes affect plane flight.
Procedure
Use your "Airplane Template" handout to create a set of four models. When
folding the front edge of your airplane, run your ruler over each fold to
flatten the fold as much as possible. You can use the gum eraser as a guide for the angles of the dihedral in
models 2-4.
Once
your fold the wings upward on those models, the airplane should sit level on a
tabletop between the two erasers. Use your "Wing Angles" handout to help you
create your four models. You will test your planes at four different angles (0°, 10°,
20°, and 40°). On a separate sheet of paper, write down
the four angles and note which one you think will work best and why. Your goal is to find out which of the models has the most stable flight.
Conduct ten trials with your models. Describe the behavior of your models on a
separate sheet of paper. After completing your trials, compare the behavior of your models to the
behavior of models tested by other teams; then answer the questions below.
Questions
Write your answers on a separate sheet of paper.
Describe the behavior of your team's models at each angle you tested. What are some variables that affect the flight behavior of the plane? Compare the flight stability of the different angles you chose to test. At
which wing angle(s) was the flight most stable? At which angle(s) does the
plane fail to fly well? What may be the reason? What
may be causing any wind currents in the room? What effect may these currents
have on the models? How can the effect of wind currents be determined in the launching area?
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