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There is a ring design that will beat any dart for distance. Particularly when thrown gently from a height where its glide ability can be exploited. https://ww

by dwd 8y ago

There is a ring design that will beat any dart for distance. Particularly when thrown gently from a height where its glide ability can be exploited. https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/edu/teach/activity/ring-wing-glider/ https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/edu/teach/activity/ring-wing-glider...

phs318u 8y ago
This! Haha. Way back in my 2nd year at university (1985!), these were all the rage. Myself and a couple of friends made a giant version out of 6 university calendars. It had a diameter of about 40-50cm. We launched it one day (when the lecturer was facing the board) from the back of a math lecture. The slope of the lecture hall was a gentle 20 degrees, slowly tapering off towards the front. Initially it cleared people's heads with a few cm to spare, then about halfway it was clearing the backs of chairs - fortunately there were quite a few rows from the middle to the front with no one in them - until it finally found the back of some poor guy's head sitting in the 1st or 2nd row. The ring clunked him square and he ended up wearing it. We all exploded in laughter. It wasn't aimed at him mind - he was just in the wrong spot at the wrong time. I still smile when I think of that (does that make me a bad person?). EDIT: got the year wrong (memory is fading...)
- dwd 8y ago
  I first saw one back in the 70s as a kid at a summer activity. I had made a sharp double folded dart that I would throw furiously towards the rafters to trace a ballistic arc and land almost point down. I was easily beat by a ring an older kid gently launched from the elevated stage that glided and swooped well past where my dart landed.
jeremy_wiebe 8y ago
I used to have a paper airplane book and this was one of my favourites. The other was a plane made with a drinking straw and two paper rings. It always flew really far also! https://sciencebob.com/the-incredible-hoop-glider/ https://sciencebob.com/the-incredible-hoop-glider/
- dwd 8y ago
  I believe I had the same book when I was a kid, as I remember that one.

by dwd 8y ago

phs318u 8y ago

This! Haha. Way back in my 2nd year at university (1985!), these were all the rage. Myself and a couple of friends made a giant version out of 6 university calendars. It had a diameter of about 40-50cm. We launched it one day (when the lecturer was facing the board) from the back of a math lecture. The slope of the lecture hall was a gentle 20 degrees, slowly tapering off towards the front. Initially it cleared people's heads with a few cm to spare, then about halfway it was clearing the backs of chairs - fortunately there were quite a few rows from the middle to the front with no one in them - until it finally found the back of some poor guy's head sitting in the 1st or 2nd row. The ring clunked him square and he ended up wearing it. We all exploded in laughter. It wasn't aimed at him mind - he was just in the wrong spot at the wrong time. I still smile when I think of that (does that make me a bad person?). EDIT: got the year wrong (memory is fading...)

dwd 8y ago
I first saw one back in the 70s as a kid at a summer activity. I had made a sharp double folded dart that I would throw furiously towards the rafters to trace a ballistic arc and land almost point down. I was easily beat by a ring an older kid gently launched from the elevated stage that glided and swooped well past where my dart landed.

jeremy_wiebe 8y ago

I used to have a paper airplane book and this was one of my favourites. The other was a plane made with a drinking straw and two paper rings. It always flew really far also! https://sciencebob.com/the-incredible-hoop-glider/ https://sciencebob.com/the-incredible-hoop-glider/

dwd 8y ago
I believe I had the same book when I was a kid, as I remember that one.