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- Weather will be fine ...
- Muncie Finals
- Next Finals
- UK Team Trials part 2b
Weather will be fine for the Eastern States Freeflight Champs at Barron Field November 10-11
I have carefully checked the weather status for the field. A small storm went through the area Wednesday and put down 2 or 3 inches of snow, per the map at http://www.weatherstreet.com/city_snow_depth/10941-Middletown-NY-snow-depth.htm
The forcast for Friday, Saturday, Sunday show sufficient tempurature that the snow should be largely melted away. Both Saturday and Sunday show calm winds from the SSW or South (which are good directions for us). The low temp will be just above 40 degrees and the high will be about 60 degrees on Sunday, as you can see at the site
http://www.weather.com/weather/seekend/Middletown+NY+USNY0916:1:US
If you go to this site friday afternoon it will have updates that include hour-by-hour forcasts through the weekend which are generally accurate.
We made need to keep cars parked on the farm roads to avoid getting stuck.
Likewise, we may need to restrict retreival carts and motorcycles to the farm roads.
Many November Thermals,
Andrew
Muncie Finals
Every so often, the topic of holding a team Finals at Muncie comes up.
Chuck Etherington's recent post here indicates that there may be folks at the AMA who think that since we hold FAI events at the Muncie NATS, this must mean Muncie is an acceptable venue for a Team Selection Finals.
That logic is flawed.
At the NATS, the contest management has the capability of shortening the rounds to make sure the models stay on the field. The east-west width of the field is slightly under a half mile. That also is the prevailing wind direction. If the wind is out of the west and is blowing anywhere near 10 mph, this is a two minute field. Add to that strong thermals and the models are high enough to assure an off-site landing.
The surrounding areas include crops, impenetrable brush and tall trees.
I've put models into the river that runs near the southwest corner.
Add to that the fact that our current program requires two separate contests be flown to completion. This would mean a single contest, with flyoffs,could take two or more days to complete in less than optimal weather conditions and wind direction.
This isn't to say that the Finals couldn't be held there, just that getting the contest completed in the same amount of days as we can in Lost Hills would be unlikely.
Bill Shailor
Next Finals;
Of course there are issues with every site in America, as far as weather is concerned. But weather around late October appears to be for the most part very good in Boulder City. As for Muncie, I have not heard from one flyer that it is an acceptable site for the Finals. If they are out there post the reasons why they think it is. At this time Lost Hills is and will be a mute point with the trees upcoming. There are fields in the Lost Hills area, but it will take time to relocate. That being said, Boulder City appears to be a venue that offers all we hoped for and has the bonus of cheap travel, car rentals, food and lodging. And if there is a blowout day there is sure a lot to do in Vegas. If we can get bike rentals then we will have the best of all scenerios.
Would still like to see us move the Sierra Cup there this year as a test contest before or after Bills contest. It is a wonderful site and in my opinion all would be pleased with the trip. Its a pretty cool place to go for a model contest and more flyers should put it on their contest list.
Thermals,
Michael
UK Trials part2 , revised
Following my round robin email on BMFA Free Flight Trials 2012 I am pleased
to report a most satisfactory outcome.
Having read my email the competitor rechecked his rule book, agreed with my
reading of the rules and immediately contacted the Free Flight Technical
Committee requesting that his Round 6 score be amended to a zero. A most
admirable decision.
In extensive dialog between the competitor and myself it was felt that my
report of the incident, based on what I had seen and heard, could be
updated by the competitor’s own experience. In particular:-
I did not intend to imply any wrongdoing by the timekeepers (2) one of
which I had spoken to.
The competitor returned to the flight line with the hatch in hand, but not
the model which was some way downwind.
‘In Round 6’ and ‘towing early’ could be misread and should be ‘towing
early in Round 6’.
Reference to scorecard should be for the Official Score Sheet.
Delivery of the CD’s pack is debateable as to what constitutes a couple of
minutes so should be deleted.
Here follows my revised BMFA Free Flight Trials 2012 now that I have had
the benefit of informed advice and the flight timing issue having been
satisfactorily resolved by the competitor himself.
BMFA Free Flight Trials 2012
So yet another Trials ends in controversy concerning the F1A results.
After a weekend on the wet, lonely, extremely cold and occasionally windy
ex USAF Sculthorpe six rounds were managed to be flown in the 2nd Trials
under the watchful eye of contest director Paul Flynn, a late volunteer to
run the event in the absence of FFTC having anyone to run it. Personally I
thought Paul did an admirable job in difficult circumstances.
For F1A the controversy occurred in Round 6 being flown to a three minute
maximum.
Here one competitor was seen to start towing early in the round, progress
some distance downwind (100-200 metres) and launch. His model later DTed
down well short of the three minute maximum.
The competitor returned holding in one hand the fuselage hatch, explaining
that the hatch had detached in flight. His timekeepers allowed the
competitor to refly assuming the first flight was a non scoring attempt.
The competitor’s second attempt scored a maximum and on the official
scoresheet the round was shown as one flight of 180 seconds (maximum).
This was controversial as the competitor’s timekeepers had not seen the
hatch detach during flight.
At the time I left the airfield (13.15 with the contest due to close at
13.30) Round 7 had been on hold since the end of Round 6. The competitor’s
Round 6 score at this time was shown as 180 seconds on the official
scoresheet.
Relevant Free Flight Rule Book sections are:-
3.1.6.1 – Scoring Attempt – Flight DTed will score actual time recorded.
3.1.6.2 – some part of the model becomes detached – Who decides this? In
this case the timekeeper(s) did not see the hatch detach and took the
evidence of the flyer that the hatch had detached in flight.
Ruling Rule
Following the controversy in the 2011 Team Selection Trials concerning the
use of rcdt there are new rules in the 2012 Free Flight Rule Book:-
3.1.6.1 – see above.
3.1.7 e a model equipped for radio transmissions shall score a ZERO (my
capitals) if any part of the model becomes detached during flight.
QED the sixth round flight of this competitor, flying a model equipped to
receive radio transmissions, should be recorded as a zero under rule 3.1.7 e
I would request that the FFTC arrange that the final results of the Team
Selection trials 2012 for the 2013 Team show this competitor’s sixth round
flight score as zero.
Thanks you for your attention.
David Brawn
......................
Roger Morrell