What to Do for Nationals in Wisconsin...

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daydreamer0023
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What to Do for Nationals in Wisconsin...

Post by daydreamer0023 »

For those out here headed for Nationals in Wright Stuff, I was wondering what your thoughts would be for flying in the SFC 50 (MPR). It purportedly has a fairly low ceiling (though I may stand corrected), so I'm interested to see what others are thinking. Also, is this (the low ceiling) perhaps why the dime bonus was proposed?
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Re: What to Do for Nationals in Wisconsin...

Post by chalker »

daydreamer0023 wrote: Also, is this (the low ceiling) perhaps why the dime bonus was proposed?
No, we don't create rules based upon venue characteristics.

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Re: What to Do for Nationals in Wisconsin...

Post by bjt4888 »

The Nationals site webpage indicates that the fieldhouse to be used for Wright Stuff competition has a ceiling height of 25 ft. - 32 ft. It appears from the picture that the 25 ft. height would be to the underside of the nets that are suspended from the ceiling and 32 ft. may be the height all the way to the underside of the rafters. It would be nice if the event supervisor would explain and detail this on the Nationals website.

Without any additional information from the event host, you would be well served to prepare for flying under the nets at below 25 ft. as a worst case scenario and also for flying as high as 30+ ft. should Wright Stuff be in the section of the gym without nets (if I am seeing correctly in the picture). As hitting netting like this can potentially cause a bad result, you may want to plan to go no-touch for the first flight under netting and possibly more aggressive on the second flight. It appears in the picture that there may not be any ceiling netting in the back half of the fieldhouse. If Wright Stuff is to be flown in this section of the site, and you don't have a 32 ft. ceiling site to practice in, you could do partial motor testing to determine the best combination of prop pitch, rubber x-section, launch torque, etc. You could fly at 2/3 motor in a practice location that allows a 20 ft. climb in order to estimate flight character at 30 - 32 ft. of climb.

If Middle School Elastic Launch Glider is flown in the same site at the same time as Wright Stuff, the gliders should of course be given the section of the gym without netting (if there is a section without netting) as glider launch hooks tend to get caught in netting pretty easily.

Good luck and keep testing,

Brian T.
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Re: What to Do for Nationals in Wisconsin...

Post by jander14indoor »

The dimes were an explicit step to force students to understand and deal with the effects of payloads on flight characteristics. That change was made without any reference to competition venue.

I second bjt4888 suggestions on preparation and event strategy.

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Re: What to Do for Nationals in Wisconsin...

Post by r00ki316 »

The 32' is wrong and is the measurement to the actual ceiling. The bottom of the rafters are roughly 28'. Bigger issue are basketball hoops that are slanted in and downwards to maybe 23-24'. Between the hoops, you have maybe 50' of space. They have Air Trajectory, Glider and Wright Stuff all sharing the space so you may be forced to choose between navigating the hoops or other aerial obstacles. There also seemed to be currents nearer the walls up in the air.
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Re: What to Do for Nationals in Wisconsin...

Post by fifty_missions »

The organizers at nationals are considering two options for handling the basketball backboard issues. These can be-

1) leave the backboards in their "down" position which also leaves the brace that connects the support pole just above the backboard and angles towards the center of the building. This arrangement will help in retrievals but will reduce the orbit diameter at the ceiling.

-OR-

2) consider building and attaching "bumper boxes" that fit around the backboards' edges so that when raised-up, the boxes will allow models to bump the sides, drop below the backboard and continue flying. These "bumper boxes" can be fitted so that the gaps between the "face" of the backboard and the rafters is "blocked-off" and will reduce the chances of an airplane landing on the backboard when they are in raised positions. If they produce these "bumper boxes", they plan to use foam core sides which are lighter weight and somewhat forgiving with impacts.

This solution can open the orbit diameter of the models so that with the generally lower ceiling, models trimmed for larger orbits can fly slower and use the airspace height more effectively. Here's hoping that they pursue this option.

Tom
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