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Posted

I have been noticing that in the US, at least, they have been allowing F5K/eDLG's to fly alongside F3K models in many contests using a launch height limiting device.  This is happening at the IHLGF this year.   It got me thinking about what we could do here and whether that would get more pilots coming to contests.  

I feel that right now, it might be tricky to fly F5K/eDLG's in the same heats as F3K, mainly due to the league and effect on the team selection process.  But, what if we ran an additional slot each round for F5K/eDLG?  Having F5K/eDLG pilots at a contest means we have more timers, which means we can pretty much always run 2 heats for F3K then an additional heat for F5K/eDLG, so we should get enough rounds in.  And if we started to get too me F5K/eDLG entries for one slot, we can deal with that lovely problem when it arises.   It would just be nice to have more pilots at events and might encourage some crossover between the disciplines. 

Thoughts?

  • Like 1
Posted

Personally, I've always thought that there should be a way to integrate electric launch into our events. On the flip side, I've also heard some other pilots suggesting that it was a complete non-starter.

With some restrictions on launch/re-launch techniques (as I believe they are implementing in some of the US events) such as:

  • a sensible height restriction
  • a requirement to launch in a "DLG style" (i.e. not using motor power to range out horizontally)
  • perhaps a requirement to land rather than hand catch (to avoid a "touch and go")

I can imagine it working, even within the same flight group as hand launched DLGs. With the launch part of the competition less of a concern, the logical conclusion would be that the barrier to entry would be lower and therefore we would expect more pilots to be competing. We'd never know for sure without taking that plunge, but we could probably canvas opinion.

It would need some careful thought around team selection which might result in it not being practical but we'd have to have that conversation either around how the league results count or perhaps even some hand launch only events for team selection?

I would like to hear the counter-arguments to fully understand what concerns there might be.

  • Like 1
Posted

Just to clarify, I propose running the eDLG slot as a separate contest, at least for now.  I don’t see how we can run eDLG in team selection events at the moment. 

  • Like 1
Neil Harrison
Posted

I have some thoughts on this, please give me some time to process my ideas into written form.

  • Like 1
thechalster
Posted

Would we also allow a double entery so you can fly in both the f5k and f3k?   This would encourage some of the current f5k pilots to get a f5k model put together. Oh I already have one. 😀

  • 2 weeks later...
Neil Harrison
Posted

Following interest in an Electric F3K competition, here are my thoughts......

There already exists a new class for electric F3K models, it is called F5K.  Although some of the tasks are similar to F3K it is specifically for electric models, Brian van der Gouw has put in a lot of hard work and effort creating a class which is amazing fun to compete in, there are a few of us that travel to Holland to compete in contests over there.

Just to clarify, we will NOT allow electric models to compete in F3K as this remains one of the only pure gliding disciplines in the FAI portfolio.  Therefore we need to keep the two classes completely separate, however I do anticipate there being a lot of crossover from F3K to F5K and visa versa.  With this in mind, we also need to avoid any reduction in pilots competing in F3K.

My aim is to try and manage that we fly a mixture of of both F3K and F5K at different times but on the same weekend.  Out of the 10 scheduled competitions, 5 of them are 2 day events which lends the opportunity to fly both classes, one round of F3K followed by one round of F5K, or two rounds and one round, I am sure we can work out the exact ratios based on interest in F5K.

The next 2 day event where we can trial this idea is the Superfly Cup at Buckminster 20th-21st July, this gives everyone plenty of time to pull out those old F3K models and chop off the nose to install a motor.

Not to dilute the F3K forum, we can discuss details and promote this on the F5K forum.

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