FxRES April 2024 2m F3L/F5L Monthly Duration Challenge

[martynk]

FxRES Monthly Postal Rules

This is a “for fun” challenge for UK based pilots. Anyone may enter with:

1. a bungee-launched F3L specification glider using the reduced length Hi-Start. The reduced length Hi-Start bungee has a maximum of 10m of 6/4mm surgical tubing and 50m of static line (minimum 30lb breaking strain). Lighter/smaller/shorter bungee rubber may be used.

OR

2. an Electric motor launched F5L specification glider fitted with an Altitude Limiter set to 60m and a maximum motor run time of 20 seconds.

Object: Fly your F3L or F5L glider for as long as possible from a flat field. Each monthly challenge will commence on the 1st day of the Calendar month and  the person who's time is unbeaten at the end of the Calendar Month 'wins' and a new challenge will start. The annual challenge league will end on the 31st December of each year. A new annual challenge league will then commence on the 1st of January.

Rules:

Models must comply with the Model Specification rules for F3L or F5L as appropriate.

You may self-time your own flights

Flight times begin when the tow-line falls from the tow-hook  for F3L or in the case of a F5L glider when the motor stops.

The model must land in the launch field or (if there is no field boundary) within 150m of the launch position for times to count. There is no landing bonus.

If you are using a bungee launch (for this event or any other), then the launch line MUST be secured using a corkscrew dog tether or similar bungee stake to minimise the risk of injury caused by a loose stake.

Scores must be submitted on the relevant monthly postal event posting on the FxRES forum at www.barcs.co.uk/forums/   

Scoring flights must be submitted within 24 hours of the flight taking place.

A flight log graph from the Altitude limiter should also be submitted if entering with a F5-RES glider.

All scoring flights must start with a hand release from Ground Level with (if applicable), the motor running.

No flight information telemetry permitted except for Received signal strength and Receiver battery status.

Submitted scores will be amalgamated into an annual league. Points will be awarded as follows:  1st -25 points, 2nd - 22points, 3rd - 20 points, 4th to 22nd, 19 to 1 point respectively.

You may enter as many times as you wish using as many different models as you wish, but only your longest duration flight will count towards the league position. Separate entries (best flight in each) will be recorded for those who fly both F3L and F5L.

Please enter your best/latest monthly scores below in the following format...

ON THE FIRST LINE OF YOUR POST

Model Name : Class (F3L or F5L) : Date of flight : Time Claimed

Any text or commentary or images please add afterwards.  Thanks  

 

Note: A separate mini league will be maintained for the F3L scores in addition to the combined F3L/F5L league.

[Will_A]

Medina : F5L : 01-04-24 : 18mins 57secs 

Had a great morning flying Medina and CX5 this morning in Ashton Court Bristol. First time I've got the Medina properly high and starting to worry about getting down and whether I've set the airbrakes up well enough that I can yank them on, without being able to see exactly what the model is doing as it's so high... All went fine. But unfortunately when I got home, my Altis Nano was only showing the log of flights after the second battery and not the first. First flight and earlier ones from Saturday were not visible on the download or on the Altis USB drive. Must have been some corruption or file loss....

I'm new to these Altis devices and would appreciate some advice on how to avoid losing data.  I can only assume that I must have pulled the battery connection when it was writing the log file and I have to admit I did not properly check the screen message before pulling battery out.

On reading the manual again now, I see it says "When logging data, there are times when it is dangerous for the device to be disconnected. If the Altis nano is disconnected at these times, there is a danger of losing all your data on the device. This is indicated by the "Do not disconnect screen" Do not disconnect the device when you see this screen!!!"

Does anyone know how the log files are written to the device. I can only assume it is done on a certain interval and the message will pop up every time it writes, to warn you not to pull battery at this time? How could you avoid the scenario, where you pull battery, just at same time as message pops up? Or maybe there is a small delay between message and start of writing?

Also would also lose any data between last write cycle and when you pull power.... It can't be writing continuously....  Or maybe it doesnt work like that?

This device behaves differently from the FrSky Taranis logging, which always just works and you can turn off the transmitter at any time without losing log data. I can only assume this is because Taranis does an orderly shut down and closes log file before powering off, unlike the Nano which is a much simpler device, which just loses power when you pull the battery.

In any case, although I did not have the Altis Nano log, the above reminded me that I did have the log from my GR6+ RX on my TX SD card and so I have attached this file and graphs from Excel analysis as an alternative proof of flight. I use S1 slider for throttle, so you can see that no motor was used during flight and Nano was set up properly to cut at 60m/20 sec. I know the rules say that F5 flights require graph from altitude limiter and restrictions on telemetry allowed, but I can assure you that I don't use the Altitude or Vario in flight, but just have it logging in background.  I'm happy if someone tells me that it is not allowed

Sounded like you guys had a great days flying on Sat. One day when I'm not flying F3K I'll join. For now still getting used to RES and enjoying it a lot.  Also in process of building a Electric Purito, which is very satisfying.

Cheers Will

Overall flights showing Altitude & TX Throttle out (slider S1)

Zoomed version, showing submitted flight. Time was calculated between 60m and 0m in excel. File attached.

RES_100_V-2024-04-01.xlsx

[Carl]

Resco : F5L : 2 mins 33 secs

I'll say well done to Will first for a great start to his month 

I wasn't going to bother sharing this flight, but then I thought I should as the way weather patterns seems to be it may be my best 

Anyway, this was literally a last moment popping down the field after lunch for an hour as it 'looked' so calm. There was a slight breeze coming across the long and narrow field, with tall trees lining the full length on both sides the field. I'd just setup the Resco and I got hit by a shower for about 5 mins at most. Scrawly winds picked up as well, and although the shower stopped the scrawly winds didn't. So it was extremely challenging, when these winds were blowing across the field, pushing the glider towards all the tall trees. The Resco was really getting knocked about.

For my best flight, there was a brief moment of calmer wind and I launched towards the corner of the field towards the wind direction and found I was in something that maintained altitude, but the nasty scrawly winds picked up again and quickly made it dangerous, and my priority was to get the glider away from the trees.

Following this flight, the sun really did get some small, very active low level thermals going, but the wind direction just made it difficult for me. So much turbulence from the trees. Anyway, I enjoyed getting out there for an hour and getting to know the Resco better. I just need 'one' day where it's forecast to be dry and not windy to drive out to a different location that is nice and open, so I can concentrate on finding and using thermals, rather than avoiding trees.

Carl

[martynk]

Well done both and thanks for getting an early start

 

[Will_A]

Thanks for allowing the flight Martyn.  

I'd appreciate any tip & tricks from anyone regarding avoiding data loss on the Altis Nano. I've had it happen twice now.

BTW after the incident, I did reformat the device and reset & saved the settings, in case of any other corruptions.

[Richard Newsham]

16 minutes ago, Will_A said:

Thanks for allowing the flight Martyn.  

I'd appreciate any tip & tricks from anyone regarding avoiding data loss on the Altis Nano. I've had it happen twice now.

BTW after the incident, I did reformat the device and reset & saved the settings, in case of any other corruptions.

Not had any data loss. I'm always concerned about the 'do not disconnect' screen. I use a PicoSwitch to remove power from my F3L glider so don't monitor the screen as applying the magnet from outside the fuse means I don't need to go in the fuse to disconnect the battery leads. F5L is a different matter where I do have to disconnect the battery. To date I have only seen the programmed F5J screen displayed. 'Touch wood',  I haven't had any problems. I always eject the device when I'm using it on the computer before pulling the USB lead. 

Richard

[mark_r]

Measured f5l flight time: 9m 23s. Harden moor, very light easterly breeze, dull/overcast conditions. Model: Polires

Conditions today didn't look great having rained all morning, leaving dense cloud and cold air. However, this weather has been around for such a long time so went out for a few flights anyway. It was much more enjoyable than anticipated - more buoyant than expected with lots of very small weak bubbles moving through very quickly, with occasional strong sink. Most flights had lost of wing tip wobbling as the little bubbles passed through, but very little to grab hold of.

This flight started in fairly typical fashion, but the light easterly breeze (3-5 mph) suddenly changed direction by around 90 degrees so I changed tack pretty quickly to try to find the suggested lift. Thankfully it was there, although it tracked downwind fairly quickly so withdrawal was necessary to avoid a potential out of sight downwind land out.

Really nice to get a decent flight considering my low expectations. Flight times gradually got shorter on average after this as the temperature dropped - shortest was just less than 3 mins, typical around 4m 30s.

 

 

[Richard Newsham]

Purito-E : F5L : 4th April 2024 : 335s 5m 35s

Harden moor - Time 17:00 - 4 - 6mph E - temperature: my finger ends were cold - Leaden sky

The little moor birds were chirping away.  A good sign.  But too late in the day for anything to lift my model.  More a case of arresting the decent. Better than I had hoped for.

Earlier than forecast rain stopped play.

Richard

[martynk]

Good scores.

 

For info, I'll be on holiday from next Thursday, 11th April, returning on the 21st April. Its unlikely that I'll be able to update the table etc as there is no Internet most of the time that I am away.. Don't worry, just keep posting scores and I'll  update when I get back.

 

     

[Richard Newsham]

@martynk hi Martyn. My time should be 5m 35s. I was on the moor at 17:00.

[cirrusRC]

Maybe head down to the field at 23:59 tonight 

[martynk]

Sorry about that... Corrected

 

     

[Richard Newsham]

I'm venting my frustration. The Met Office says 7 to 8mph and XCWeather shows 16mph for the same location. I can obviously walk out of where I work and make a real time assessment but come on you two weather sites, what is going on! 

Anyway, it's too overcast for me to want to go out in a narrow available time slot so I'll find something else to do. 

[Carl]

Richard, for me around 10am the local live readings were showing between 4 and 5mph and thought great, I'll pop down to my local field. By 10:30am it was already blowing stronger. Checking data when I got home, yes indeed the wind quickly increased to 13mph, then to 16mph by 12pm, with gusts in excess of 25mph. To be fair the forecast was for these kinds of winds, but took a little while to get going.

I use windfinder.com for live wind readings, both wind strength and direction. Always found this useful for slope soaring which always saves me wasted trips to a slope.

Also I use https://www.netweather.tv/live-weather/radar for live rainfall. 

Anyway, today really seems to be the start of spring at last!

Carl

[cirrusRC]

F5RES | Medina | 14th April  | 27 mins 21 seconds

8-10 mph, increasing through out the day.   Quite a pleasant morning with plenty of sunshine and periods of lift induced calm.    Some brutal lift and sink,  very turbulent.      Forgot to reset my ALTIS from last comp, so had to guess motor cut off.   Best flight below,   launched a little high but came down to 20 meters before finding some lift.      Was chatting most of the flight so can't remember much about it.

Flew DLG in the afternoon for first time in a long time,   dang the performance in the wind is exceptional!

[JBF]

Well this looks like fun, I might have to join in.

Quick question.  Why the 60m/20s limit rather than what I believe is the FIA limit of 90m/30s which would seem to keep things simpler in terms of one configuration for the ALTIS and warm people up for F5L comps?  I get it's a different type of task, but given the target is as long of a flight as possible rather than 6 mins 30s, I wouldn't have thought it necessary to reduce the launch height - whereas if the goal were a 4 minute flight then it would make sense to reduce it.

[cirrusRC]

The postal is for F3 and F5.  Not many people have a field big enough to handle full size bungee, so launch heights were reduced to handle the high start we use.

[JBF]

Understood, that makes sense then

After seeing your last flight, and comparing to my flights yesterday it doesn't seem worth entering for this month.  I guess it's the taking part that counts

[Richard Newsham]

27 minutes ago, JBF said:

Understood, that makes sense then

After seeing your last flight, and comparing to my flights yesterday it doesn't seem worth entering for this month.  I guess it's the taking part that counts

Definately take part. This simple challenge makes me fly. You'll note that even a 2 minute or so flight is logged. All good fun. 

[cirrusRC]

Yes certainly take part.  My flight is very beatable at this time of year.  High pressure due this weekend coming. 

Are you the one on RC groups with the purple and yellow Medina?