ANN/THE STAR – Most of us folded paper aeroplanes for fun when we were kids, but it has always been Julian Chee Yie Jian’s childhood dream to design such planes and break records.
And recently, he did just that.
Currently based in Kansas, the United States, Chee, 24, has put Malaysia on the world map by earning a Guinness World Record (GWR) in the “Farthest Flight by a Paper Air-craft” category.
His paper plane design flew 77.134m, beating the previous record of 69.14m held by Americans John Collins and Joe Ayoob in 2012.
“It feels long overdue to put Malaysia in the GWR. It’s no moonshot but I represent Malaysia to the best of my ability. It’s definitely not going to be my last,” said Chee in an email interview recently.
Asked if he had ever expected to break the GWR, he said, “Yes, I did. Back in 2019, I tested my design in an airplane hangar and I hit approximately 90 per cent of the 2012 record distance on the first day alone. So I knew it was within reach with a bit more refinement.”
Chee, a design engineer with Airbus, teamed up with his South Korean buddies Kim Kyu Tae and Shin Moo Joon to tackle the challenge. The trio achieved their incredible distance in Daegu, Gyeongsangbuk-do in South Korea on April 16.
The guys each had a specific area to focus on – Shin (a paper aircraft veteran) folded the plane, Kim was the thrower, while Chee was the designer.
“I have known Shin for nearly a decade now, and we’ve constantly been discussing, via email and social media, new ways to fly higher, further and longer. So in 2019, I did some tests at my university’s indoor baseball park and an old Boeing hangar in Wichita, Kansas.
“Unfortunately, I didn’t continue the project as school and work kept me busy. Shin was the only person who knew my design and he introduced me to Kim with the plan to break the record. The community in (South) Korea also started noticing my design, so we wanted to quickly get it in the record books, and we did,” said Chee, who graduated from Kansas’ Wichita State University in aerospace engineering last year.
The former SMK Taman SEA (Petaling Jaya) student took months of research to conceptualise the design. He explained there are a few factors influencing the performance of any aircraft but in the end, it boils down to the balancing act between the mass and how big the wing area is.
“The heavier the paper, the more inertia it possesses to keep it going, and the better the structure. The smaller the wings, the faster it flies too. For this application, the wings must be sized so they can still glide at a particular speed, or they’ll just hit the ground like a dart,” explained Chee.
He said throwing a paper airplane seems easy, but thrusting it at high speeds with minimal distortions, consistency and endurance is much more complex.
