SEN 97-02 - 2 Jul 1997

 SEN 97-02 2 July 1997

Greetings from Rinkaby and about rubber heating again.

I've just arrived back from Rinkaby in the southmost Sweden, where we had
two World Cup competitions the last weekend. On arrival in friday evening
the weather was overcast and very windy, and remained so until next
morning when the competition was due to start. Just that time a strong
thunderstorm arrived, and the heavy rainfall made everyone find shelter in
the cars. Half an hour later a delay until afternoon was decided. This
proved to be a good decision, as the windspeed was dropping, so that after
two rounds one could fly calm weather models.

Five rounds were flown on saturday, the remaining two were flown on sunday
morning, in nice, sunny weather with slight wind. The flyoffs took place
soon after the last rounds, at midday, as the forecast told about
increasing wind in the afternoon. Glider was settled with five minutes
flight, wakefield took a second round of seven minutes to find a winner
(Piet DeBoer and H=E5kan Broberg). In power there was only one full house.

Bror Eimar had been using his rubber heater all the day heating the
*fuselage* of the model before inserting the rubber (in my understanding
this is not banned, at least in the wording of the rules latest
published), but Anselmo Zeri claimed that the rule has been re-worded in a
recent CIAM meeting, banning also such activity, and gave a protest
against Eimar. The competition jury approved the protest, but Eimar still
flew an unofficial flight in the second flyoff (the decision had been
made just before) which would have won the competition. He is going to
take the business into CIAM, claiming that the rule could not be enforced
as only a handful of people attending the meeting knew about it. Time will
tell how things turn out, but it looks like the rubber heater rule is far
from it's final state at the moment. I'm glad that this thing came out
this early, and will be settled before the World Champs.

On monday the Dane's Nordic Cup was flown. This was sceduled to start at 5
am, but the start was delayed until 9 due to - you guessed it - high wind.
During the day the wind was reasonable, from 3 m/s in the middle turns
up to 6-7 in the first and last rounds. Clear skies and sunshine made the
lift picking quite challenging, with fly-off fliers half of that in Scania
Cup. Again the start of fly-off was delayed due to wind, and all of a
sudden (maybe due to sea-wind turning into ground-wind) the wind died
completely for the fly-off. In glider 5 minutes was enough, but in
wakefield 7 minutes was needed to find the winner. Broberg gave up, as he
had broken his fourth model of that weekend in the 5 minutes round.
Roksonok started early, but his model was lost in the dark (it was past 10
pm by now) at 5+ minutes. Eimar broke a motor (and a model), could launch
a few minutes later, climbed maybe a bit lower with less boyant air, and
was lost at 4+ minutes. It seems likely that Roksonok's flight was indeed
better, but still an unhappy ending for that competition.

-Tapio-
=20