In a message dated Mon, 12 Aug 2002 11:40:36 AM Eastern Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
> --- "James V. Bacus" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Just a flying contest... I think about this quite a bit.> > > When electronic loggers and telemetry become readily affordable, > > (which we > > are on the threshold of now), maybe there could be a format that > > emphasized > > flying alone with each contestant having a logging device onboard. > > I'll bet that some form of Jim's idea becomes the contest of the > future. For the price of a winch/retriever, a club can buy a few ALTis > or LoLos. Maybe soon there'll be a micro-GPS unit (I have a Garmin > Vista, which is cool, but it's not practical for this use). That would > open up even more possibilities. > > Anyway, it's obvious that the present F3J format, for example, will > have to be changed. Planes are on the towline for 5 seconds, they max > whatever time is required, and then get 95 or 100 landing points. The > field is bunched so that the 5th place flyer has 99.7% of the winner's > score. The WC may well be decided by a slow or quick punch of a timer's > button. > > Fiddling with target times, relative importance of landings, and launch > mechanisms won't change the fundamental issue. Adding speed, as Daryl > slyly suggests, would turn F3J into F3B. Jim's suggestion is, in my > mind, the one that could promise to spread out the field, clearly > identifying superior flying. Let's probe the muddy bottom of this crystal clear vision. Who is the superior pilot? The guy laying down tickling the bottoms of the clouds for 10 minutes, or the guy dancing on the treetops for 10 minutes? > > So what's the task? A pure calculation of cumulative altitude gained > creates a need for energy compensation, which complicates matters quite > a bit. How about this: a 10-minute task, with points for duration and > additional points for the maximum altitude gained during any 180 > seconds during the flight. > How about this, additional points for the least altitude gained for a max flight? > Altitude gained over any 3-minute window would be less subject to > fiddling. If you found strong lift, you could dive, zoom back up, then > circle and climb. Sure, an uncompensated vario would credit you with > the zoom. But only the first one would count, since your gain would be > from the bottom of that dive to the window's end 3 minutes later. And > there would be lots of tactical decision-making involved in such a > task. Think about the many dilemmas that would face the pilot -- it's > quite interesting! > > Anyway, we need good new ideas for a contest format. Cool techno > gimmicks are present everywhere in this sport -- why have our > championships determined by a thumb-operated stop watch, > and a ruler? Don't mind me, I'm a little giddy from qualifying for F3B (actually, not a bad contest format, though a little labor intensive, and a fair measure of piloting skills to boot, with plenty of opportunities to "spread" your score) with my first 4 flights on Saturday. I had to relaunch in distance... Bill Wingstedt RCSE-List facilities provided by Model Airplane News. Send "subscribe" and "unsubscribe" requests to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
