Helicopters C

[retired1]

That is not shocking as those are the students that will spend a considerable amount of time testing different options or tweaks. Freedom Flight kit instructions have always said that the kit could be improved on and that would be a result of "fly, fly,fly". Dave's kits have always been optimized to be competitive with an ease of building largely from the use of jigs. Remember, he sells several hundred kits a year so they have to be built for the masses and not the top 1%.
This year's choppers are relatively wide open. The medalists are going to be from those that fly enough to come up with an optimum prop-rubber combination.

[calgoddard]

The medalists in the 2017 Helicopters event will be those teams having well built helicopters that use optimum rotor-rubber combinations AND that avoid the bad luck of having both of their helicopters hang up on a beam, light fixture or other obstacle. Unlike WS, there will be no winner that puts up a beautiful "no-touch" flight unless the competition venue has a super high ceiling, like the Armory at the University of Illinois.

[Bazinga+]

The medalists in the 2017 Helicopters event will be those teams having well built helicopters that use optimum rotor-rubber combinations AND that avoid the bad luck of having both of their helicopters hang up on a beam, light fixture or other obstacle. Unlike WS, there will be no winner that puts up a beautiful "no-touch" flight unless the competition venue has a super high ceiling, like the Armory at the University of Illinois.

If only it were as simple as building it well and getting the optimal rotor-rubber combination. There are way more factors that contribute to a successful helicopter.

[chalker]

The medalists in the 2017 Helicopters event will be those teams having well built helicopters that use optimum rotor-rubber combinations AND that avoid the bad luck of having both of their helicopters hang up on a beam, light fixture or other obstacle. Unlike WS, there will be no winner that puts up a beautiful "no-touch" flight unless the competition venue has a super high ceiling, like the Armory at the University of Illinois.

One of the nice things about helicopters is that ceiling height DOESN'T have to factor into the competition in most cases. A 'clean' ceiling is much more preferable than a high one, since most helicopters will just walk on the ceiling for the majority of the flight (as indicated in rule 4.a.). At Wright State, we typically run the event in a racquetball court that has perfectly smooth ceilings.

[calgoddard]

Bazinga+

You stated:

"There are way more factors that contribute to a successful helicopter."

Please explain.

[Bazinga+]

Bazinga+

You stated:

"There are way more factors that contribute to a successful helicopter."

Please explain.

Well helicopter length, which opens up possibilities for different body designs and materials. Also there's winding; just following the correct and optimal winding procedure can add 20-30 sec to your flight. Also the ceiling disc mechanism is a big one; there are many ways of attaching the disk like simply having it connected to a stick on the top blade, or having it be shaved down so its super thin right on top of the blade so the whole blade creates friction with the ceiling (there are some others). Also the pitches and sizes of both blades sometimes need to be different depending on whether you have a two part or three part helicopter. This is just to name a few, and many important factors I haven't even touched upon. Helicopters is not like write stuff where you really just have to make a well built plane and find the perfect pitch for your ceiling height.

[DoctaDave]

Bazinga+

You stated:

"There are way more factors that contribute to a successful helicopter."

Please explain.

Well helicopter length, which opens up possibilities for different body designs and materials. Also there's winding; just following the correct and optimal winding procedure can add 20-30 sec to your flight. Also the ceiling disc mechanism is a big one; there are many ways of attaching the disk like simply having it connected to a stick on the top blade, or having it be shaved down so its super thin right on top of the blade so the whole blade creates friction with the ceiling (there are some others). Also the pitches and sizes of both blades sometimes need to be different depending on whether you have a two part or three part helicopter. This is just to name a few, and many important factors I haven't even touched upon. Helicopters is not like write stuff where you really just have to make a well built plane and find the perfect pitch for your ceiling height.

I would say Wright Stuff is a bit more involved than Helicopters in terms of the complexity that can be reached in the trim. Wright stuff involves finding an optimum pitch for the propeller just like in Helicopters, but there are also things to consider such as flight attitude, circle diameter, intentional torque-rolling, flaring props, etc., where helicopters really only need to fly up and down. In Wright Stuff, you need to match the propeller to your rubber but also find the optimum torque to launch at for a specific ceiling height, but in helicopters you can pretty much launch at whatever torque your copter is designed to handle. It doesn't matter a whole lot if it goes into the ceiling (in fact that's what we want). The only major trim variable that I can think of off the top of my head in helicopters that isn't present in Wright Stuff is that in this class you get unlimited rubber, where it is usually limited in Wright Stuff.

I am not quite sure what you mean by two and three part helicopter, but I assume you mean something like a chinook? where each rotor has its own axis of rotation? Might need some clarification before I can comment on that.

But I think I would have to overall agree with calgoddard on this one. I would say a large majority of the performance of the helicopter is going to come from just matching the rubber to the rotors and winding well. Even if you keep the rotor pitch the same as the stock freedom flight kit, but match the rubber very well, you will be very successful, and things like rotors scraping the ceiling vs. not scraping will have very little impact on the overall flight time comparatively.

But of course this is not including the bonus, which I think will be a huge challenge to get the full 75% increase in time as that introduces many more variables and engineering challenges to overcome, but it does not seem impossible either.

[daydreamer0023]

Speaking of chinooks and the like, would they be considered good designs to try to get the 75% bonus?

[Bazinga+]

Bazinga+

You stated:

"There are way more factors that contribute to a successful helicopter."

Please explain.

Well helicopter length, which opens up possibilities for different body designs and materials. Also there's winding; just following the correct and optimal winding procedure can add 20-30 sec to your flight. Also the ceiling disc mechanism is a big one; there are many ways of attaching the disk like simply having it connected to a stick on the top blade, or having it be shaved down so its super thin right on top of the blade so the whole blade creates friction with the ceiling (there are some others). Also the pitches and sizes of both blades sometimes need to be different depending on whether you have a two part or three part helicopter. This is just to name a few, and many important factors I haven't even touched upon. Helicopters is not like write stuff where you really just have to make a well built plane and find the perfect pitch for your ceiling height.

I would say Wright Stuff is a bit more involved than Helicopters in terms of the complexity that can be reached in the trim. Wright stuff involves finding an optimum pitch for the propeller just like in Helicopters, but there are also things to consider such as flight attitude, circle diameter, intentional torque-rolling, flaring props, etc., where helicopters really only need to fly up and down. In Wright Stuff, you need to match the propeller to your rubber but also find the optimum torque to launch at for a specific ceiling height, but in helicopters you can pretty much launch at whatever torque your copter is designed to handle. It doesn't matter a whole lot if it goes into the ceiling (in fact that's what we want). The only major trim variable that I can think of off the top of my head in helicopters that isn't present in Wright Stuff is that in this class you get unlimited rubber, where it is usually limited in Wright Stuff.

I am not quite sure what you mean by two and three part helicopter, but I assume you mean something like a chinook? where each rotor has its own axis of rotation? Might need some clarification before I can comment on that.

But I think I would have to overall agree with calgoddard on this one. I would say a large majority of the performance of the helicopter is going to come from just matching the rubber to the rotors and winding well. Even if you keep the rotor pitch the same as the stock freedom flight kit, but match the rubber very well, you will be very successful, and things like rotors scraping the ceiling vs. not scraping will have very little impact on the overall flight time comparatively.

But of course this is not including the bonus, which I think will be a huge challenge to get the full 75% increase in time as that introduces many more variables and engineering challenges to overcome, but it does not seem impossible either.

By the two or 3 part helicopter I meant that the bottom/top blade could be attached or separate from the body. What I meant by the contrast between helicopters and wright stuff was that Wright stuff was a lot more about calibration than building (like you pointed out circle diameter, starting torque etc.). I also agree that there definitely will be successful helicopters that use the provided kit's materials + pitch, and rubber combination will play the major role with that. But the best helicopters will surely capitalize on the other factors to try to reach the time cap. Just as an example, for the last few years of helicopters being an event the best times have been around 2:45-3:00. Helicopters is inspired, or at least incredibly similar to other independent competitions for rubber helicopters with the same dimensions, and the winning times for those are often in the 4 minute, sometimes 5 minute ranges. This is because they have many years of experience and don't have other events to worry about, and often go as far as to use carbon fiber bodies or hollow balsa bodies and have incredible knowledge of rubber winding, able to squeeze 10-15 extra winds on a 1:15 winder than the most experienced helicopter/wright stuff competitors. Overall I would encourage manipulating factors other than just the rubber length.

[peanuts]

Well helicopter length, which opens up possibilities for different body designs and materials. Also there's winding; just following the correct and optimal winding procedure can add 20-30 sec to your flight. Also the ceiling disc mechanism is a big one; there are many ways of attaching the disk like simply having it connected to a stick on the top blade, or having it be shaved down so its super thin right on top of the blade so the whole blade creates friction with the ceiling (there are some others). Also the pitches and sizes of both blades sometimes need to be different depending on whether you have a two part or three part helicopter. This is just to name a few, and many important factors I haven't even touched upon. Helicopters is not like write stuff where you really just have to make a well built plane and find the perfect pitch for your ceiling height.

I would say Wright Stuff is a bit more involved than Helicopters in terms of the complexity that can be reached in the trim. Wright stuff involves finding an optimum pitch for the propeller just like in Helicopters, but there are also things to consider such as flight attitude, circle diameter, intentional torque-rolling, flaring props, etc., where helicopters really only need to fly up and down. In Wright Stuff, you need to match the propeller to your rubber but also find the optimum torque to launch at for a specific ceiling height, but in helicopters you can pretty much launch at whatever torque your copter is designed to handle. It doesn't matter a whole lot if it goes into the ceiling (in fact that's what we want). The only major trim variable that I can think of off the top of my head in helicopters that isn't present in Wright Stuff is that in this class you get unlimited rubber, where it is usually limited in Wright Stuff.

I am not quite sure what you mean by two and three part helicopter, but I assume you mean something like a chinook? where each rotor has its own axis of rotation? Might need some clarification before I can comment on that.

But I think I would have to overall agree with calgoddard on this one. I would say a large majority of the performance of the helicopter is going to come from just matching the rubber to the rotors and winding well. Even if you keep the rotor pitch the same as the stock freedom flight kit, but match the rubber very well, you will be very successful, and things like rotors scraping the ceiling vs. not scraping will have very little impact on the overall flight time comparatively.

But of course this is not including the bonus, which I think will be a huge challenge to get the full 75% increase in time as that introduces many more variables and engineering challenges to overcome, but it does not seem impossible either.

By the two or 3 part helicopter I meant that the bottom/top blade could be attached or separate from the body. What I meant by the contrast between helicopters and wright stuff was that Wright stuff was a lot more about calibration than building (like you pointed out circle diameter, starting torque etc.). I also agree that there definitely will be successful helicopters that use the provided kit's materials + pitch, and rubber combination will play the major role with that. But the best helicopters will surely capitalize on the other factors to try to reach the time cap. Just as an example, for the last few years of helicopters being an event the best times have been around 2:45-3:00. Helicopters is inspired, or at least incredibly similar to other independent competitions for rubber helicopters with the same dimensions, and the winning times for those are often in the 4 minute, sometimes 5 minute ranges. This is because they have many years of experience and don't have other events to worry about, and often go as far as to use carbon fiber bodies or hollow balsa bodies and have incredible knowledge of rubber winding, able to squeeze 10-15 extra winds on a 1:15 winder than the most experienced helicopter/wright stuff competitors. Overall I would encourage manipulating factors other than just the rubber length.

@Bazinga how many chromosomes you got?