SEN 3155
- Lost Hills detour
- UnZapping Fliers
Lost Hills detour
From: Mike McKeever
Heads up…there is a road closure at the aqueduct West of Lost Hills on 46…those coming from the North should take Twisselman offf I-5…those from the South can take the right at the Community Center in Lost Hills (Lost Hills Road) and get to the field on the back road (GP Road) to avoid the closure. .
Mike CD Sierra Cup
UnZapping Fliers
By Aram Schlosberg
When a flier’s model fails a spot check by a fraction of a gram or by a few square centimeters the flyer is zapped – erased from the score board, as if they were never there. A recent example is a top Israeli B-flyer that was a bit underweight in a spot check at the French World Championship. Being eliminated by a spot check is a demeaning experience that has led fliers to quitting free flight.
In contrast, the general sporting code paints a radically different picture (Section 4 – Aeromodelling, CIAM General Rules, Jan 1, 2023, C.19 penalties). Technical infringements are divided into two. (C 19.1)
Minor – mistake or oversight and from which no significant advantage has been gained or deliberate, assuming no advantage could have been gained.
Serious – repetition of minor infringements, unintended dangerous behavior.
Cheating is defined as an intentional or deliberate breaking of the rule(s) to gain an advantage over other competitors. However, the boundary between serious infringements caused by sloppiness and cheating is fuzzy. Cheating and unsporting behavior entail disqualification.
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CIAM’s General Rules also prescribe technical infringement penalties as time deductions relative to the max that round – at least 2% for minor technical infringements and 5% for serious technical infringements – to be determined by the Contest Director together with the Jurey.
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(Repeated minor infringements caught in a second spot check are considered serious because the flyer was aware they were flying a model with an infringement.)
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Minor and serious infringements and their time deductions in the General Section are conceptual guidelines – incompatible with our binary punishment system. I’m suggesting that we quantify infringements and penalties for free flight models in Volume F1 Free Flight Model Aircraft as follows:
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Define minor infringements as being under 1% (see my 2020 Sympo article) and serious infringements from 1% up to 3%; that larger infringements would disqualify the flier. For example, a 1% under weight of an A-model is 405.9 grams. A 3% over area of a B-model is 19.57 dm^2 and a C-model with loading of 18.8 gr/dm^2 would disqualify the flier.
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The corresponding mandatory time deductions could be 5% of the round’s max for minor infringements, 15% for serious infringements. A 5% deduction in a 3-minute max is 9 seconds while a 15% deduction in an 8-minute max is 72 seconds that would almost certainly eliminate a podium position.
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In the case of B-motors, a motor weighing [30.1-30.3) grams is a minor infraction; a motor weighing [30.3-30.9) grams is a serious infraction – each with their corresponding mandatory time drops. Motors weighing 31 grams or more disqualify the flier.
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These specifications retain the incentives to comply with the rules. Penalties are proportional to infringement and consistent with the General Rules. Eliminations/ erasures are confined to cheating and unsporting behavior. ///