Category: Boomerangs

Print-n-Snip Boomerang Template

boomerangs-sm.pngThis PDF includes templates for three boomerangs: a scaled down version of the quad-blade fast-catch boomerang in Snip, Burn, Solder, Shred, plus two new tri-bladers). Each fits on a single sheet of standard 8.5-by-11 paper (and, as a bonus, each of these designs scales pretty well; if you have access to a printer that can handle bigger paper, then you can scale these up and make bigger boomerangs).

To use the Print-n-Snip Boomerang Template:

  1. Print out the boomerang that catches your eye (slightly heavier paper—like resume stock—makes for a slightly easier to trace template)
  2. Trace the design onto light-weight cardboard (such as poster board, a cereal box, a Krispy Kreme donut box, etc.)
  3. Carefully cut it out
  4. Crimp the quarter-line on each blade (as described in step 7 of Project 18 in the book)
  5. Tune and throw!

If you come up with a boomerang design you like and want to add it to the template, drop me a line! (My email is in the “About the Author” box.)

Boomerang Success Story!

Make A Simple Cardboard Boomerang | Apartment Therapy

(credit: Richard Popovic)
I remember when my brother got a foam-rubber boomerang at the circus one year. We spent hours throwing it at each other in the backyard, desperately trying to get it to come back to us with little success. I figured I just didn’t have the knack. As it turns out, it was the boomerang’s fault (I knew it!), and I can make one in a few minutes that is guaranteed to work. Sign me up!

FACT: Hearing about folks’ success with one of my projects is just *insanely* gratifying–and all the more so when it’s a boomerang success story. My introduction to boomerangs as a kid was *also* a circus souvenir, and I had *exactly* the same experience as Richard; soured me on the damn things for ~15 years.
Do you have a boomerang success story? Send it my way; we need to push back against all the terrible boomerang karma drifting around out there.

FREE SAMPLE: Build, tune, and throw cardboard boomerangs

Learn to make, tune, throw, and catch two different cardboard boomerangs in this FREE SAMPLE from Snip, Burn, Solder, Shred:

 

PROJECT 18: Cardboard Boomerangs

Generations of American children wrongly grow to believe that building and throwing boomerangs is very difficult. This flies in the face of reason: Using less-than-ideal materials, human beings have been building, throwing, and catching returning boomerangs for more than 11,600 years. . . . They are, in fact, among humanity’s longest-standing ways of showing off. . . .

Boomerangs are absurdly easy to make; the real trick is in tuning and throwing them (all of which I cover in detail in this free sample). With the aid of the Print-n-Snip Templates (link below; includes two new tri-blade designs!) this is a great all-ages project: I’ve had a blast running boomerang workshops with teens and adults at sci-fi conventions, middle-aged family guys drinking beer, and dozens of elementary schoolers on the verge of Snow Day Insanity.