On 08/08/2011, at 12:52 PM, Adam Woolley wrote:
Why were AAT’s designed in the first place? I thought it was for the
CB/TS days where a certain sector was so unpredictable, that they
couldn’t have a fixed turn-point that could guarantee the completion
of a task. Then again, there’s normally always a way – I’ll always
remember (sadly only saw it from the ground) the massive TS day @ the
Narromine 2000 MCN! Pity there were no airborne photo’s taken,
would’ve been a magic flight :)
A small piece of history (also known as 'loss of corporate knowledge'):
[others will no doubt have a different reading and can speak for
themselves:-]
Back in the days when $A bought 4DM (DeutschMark; pre-euro) and gliders
were cheap, there was a viewpoint in the sport (with its 5000 pilots at
the time) that if you wanted to fly comps (ie were serious about it),
you would get yourself one of them new fangled plastic fantastic
jiggers (and have a club barbie with the old stuff).
Nothing has changed really.
But at that time there were people who quite enjoyed the challenge of
making <40:1 go cross country, and wanted to play. At the time there
were state level comps but no national in that category.
(At the time no serious pilot would enter one into nationals, and the
comp committee would reject such entry anyway)
So people got together informally at (correct me if I misremember -
1979 NSW state comp) from a number of states, and subsequently had
nationals informally until these were recognised in the mid-80s by the
federation; progressively then getting representation at national pilot
rep, etc. levels up the chain of seriousness.
At the time, the sport's view was that handicaps had never worked in
gliding and never would.
In that adjacent informal environment however, R&D and conversation was
able to flesh out thoughts about what handicaps could and couldn't do.
The one thing they can't do, is give the lower performance ships an
upwind leg, or get them home at the end of the day (whereas the top end
of the fleet sails overhead).
So tasking in this category headed toward pilot selection of task daily
from the available turn points list.
Even then there were advocates and critics. For a while advocates won
with the reduced traffic density and few interactions at turnpoints.
The critics won when turnpoints could be approached from any other
turnpoint, ie head on cruise conflict was possible.
Across this same time start procedures evolved from time limited
overhead gates to cameras to GPS 'open' start.
Thus the sport has tried many different things.
As more and higher performance ships entered this category at the top
end, the understanding of the European approach (+ & - 10% of the
scratch type) and precursor to Grand Prix, saw AATs as a variant on
pilot select task take favour, for some.
(Such as avoiding the head-on cruise potential and traffic conflict
over turnpoints)
With the exit from the field of the barbie starters, the issue of
upwind penetration and final glide at the shut down of soaring
conditions still applies; but as it is all GRP now, the obvious
discrepancy no longer is in your face (as it was when one ship had
struts, another was angular wood fuselage, and another rounded
metal/glass); and since we've lost the corporate knowledge
it is no surprise that reversion to the pre-1970s mindset is back.
(No, you are not new or revolutionary after all)
With the re-emergence of the 'if you're serious, you get a real glider'
(since juniors borrow gliders rather than buying their own) it will be
interesting to watch the early glass go off to do its own informal
thing in a few years time
(called history repeating)
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