SEN 2454 - Flying with your batteries to the Skyscrapers for a Flyoff

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Table of Contents SEN 2454

Flying with your batteries to the Skyscrapers for a Flyoff

Batteries and air travel
Batteries again
Skyscrapers Annual
The Fly-off Problem

Batteries and air travel

From: Tapio Linkosalo

For several years now I have packed my flight batteries (mostly for timer,

but recently also E-36) in a plastic sorter, individual compartment for

each battery, and take it as carry-on luggage. The airlines rules about

carrying batteries are ambiguous, as they say that consumer electronics

should have their batteries installed, but I do not know if my models count

as consumer electronics. Thus I pack no batteries in the model box, but

carry-on.

The carry-on rules give a rather large allowed total capacity, easily

covering all the flight batteries. I also have a 5Ah 3-cell (12V) lipo for

field-charging E-36 batteries, and last time I checked it also fits into

the capacity/energy limit of carry-on. WIth each flight of E-36 (or F1Q)

taking only a couple hundred mAh:s maximum, the 5Ah battery should provide

enough energy to do all the needed field charging. With a mains adapter, I

can then use my lipo charger to charge that battery at accommodation

overnight.

-Tapio-

Batteries again

From: Jim Lueken

Another battery concern...

Technically, Li-Poly batteries cannot be put in an airliner unless it has been DOT approved. This is extremely expensive and probably not done by model companies. The airlines are becoming very sensitive about this subject. Every year there’s a surprising number of cabin/cargo fires cause by batteries, mostly from laptops and cordless drills. Just something else to think about.

Have fun, Jim Lueken

Skyscraper’s Annual, June 23-24,2018

America’s Cup,National Cup

Saturday

F1B, F1C, F1S

10 AM start, 5 rounds. F1B and F1C first and fifth round with a 4 minute max+

7 PM flyoffs.

Sunday

F1A, F1G, F1H, F1J, F1Q

8 AM start, 5 rounds. F1A first and fifth round with a 4 minute max+

Flyoff time and max to be determined.

AMA, NFFS, SAM Events*

P-30, HLG, Catapult glider, E?36, Electric B, Mulvihill, Dawn Unlimited (sunday 6:45am), Classic towline, 1/2 A – AB Gas + Nostalgia combined, Pee Wee 30, 1/4A Nostalgia? 020 Replica Combined.

*These events can be flown on either day, but must be completed within one day.

$ 25 Entry fee covers all events.

Awards to 3rd

+Weather permitting

Dave Acton CD. (Cell) 914 393 7491

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

The Fly-off Problem

From: Charles Markos

The rules structure of FAI Freeflight competition has been under assault in

recent SEN communications.

(a) Numbers in fly-offs may approach or exceed half the field and that

strains the management of a contest.

(b) Over the years changes to the specifications of the airplanes have

not accomplished the objective of reducing their performance. Quite the

opposite in fact.

of loss.

(d) Many contest venues are not capable of containing the aircraft during

afternoon extended flight tines.

These problems bring to mind a proposal many years back by Richard Lyons,

who was once on the USA WCh team in the FAI power event as it was known. The

fly-offs back then mandated engine runs of 10 (maybe 8, but I cannot

remember) seconds for the first 7 rounds then reduced by 2 seconds for each

fly-off round. Richard dropped the fly-off flight at the 4-second engine

run.

His proposal was to allow each competitor set a personal max for every

flight, not just the fly-offs. It could be any whole minute time from 2

minutes to 10 minutes. Make the max and it is recorded. If not, that

round score is recorded as zero. Such an arrangement would certainly

reduce the numbers in fly-offs and perhaps even make a fly-off unnecessary.

It would also provide some interesting possibilities for tactics. Perhaps

legacy aircraft may be rescued from obsolescence since risk of flying them

would not be as expensive as the risk with today’s aircraft.

There is precedent for setting the standings of a contest by means other

than a fly-off at its end. Consider that most of the F1G-H-J contests

employ an early morning fight timed down to the ground to settle ties that

would otherwise need flyoffs in mid-afternoon conditions that would

increase the risk of lost models, place them in difficult retrieval

locations, or (often not the least) interfere with contestant travel plans.

There was also a formal “supermax” proposal a number of years in the past.

However, it was not well accepted by many and was rejected by volt of the

CIAM. To my way of reasoning, it did not go far enough. The time is

past for half-measures. In the immortal words of Pogo, “We have met the

enemy and he is us.”

Chuck Markos