Wright Stuff C

[lechassin]

I'm assuming that launching a practice flight/just throwing it without the rubber band still qualifies for the 5% bonus?

If you're correct than absolutely take advantage of it, but that would mean to me that the rule is poorly worded.

The intent of that bonus should be to reward those who are willing to tackle the risks of a prompt official flight, and it should have been worded to reflect that.

Either way, Luke easily launched his first official flight within the 3 minute window, so I would say not to worry about it. Even if you intend to wind the motor aggressively and risk breaking it, just have a team mate wind a second motor simultaneously that you can use in the event of breakage or keep as back-up on the second flight.

[coachchuckaahs]

Based on the sheet, the 5% bonus is applied to both flights base time combined. I'm assuming that launching a practice flight/just throwing it without the rubber band still qualifies for the 5% bonus?

Xiangyu

Rule 5b indicates this is still the case, "powered or unpowered".

Be SURE to discuss with the judges the time periods BEFORE you start flying. There is ALWAYS confusion on this issue. Last year at NATIONALS they started both the 3 minute and the 8 minute clocks when the rubber was handed back. I have seen this confusion at all levels of competition. Better to resolve ahead of time than when on the clock.

Coach Chuck

[xiangyu]

Based on the sheet, the 5% bonus is applied to both flights base time combined. I'm assuming that launching a practice flight/just throwing it without the rubber band still qualifies for the 5% bonus?

Xiangyu

Rule 5b indicates this is still the case, "powered or unpowered".

Be SURE to discuss with the judges the time periods BEFORE you start flying. There is ALWAYS confusion on this issue. Last year at NATIONALS they started both the 3 minute and the 8 minute clocks when the rubber was handed back. I have seen this confusion at all levels of competition. Better to resolve ahead of time than when on the clock.

Coach Chuck

Sounds good, thanks!

[scioly2345]

One question about rules:
Is it required to buiLd a plane with normal design(wing, stablizer,... etc.)

I guess the regular design they give us in the rules is just like the basic minimum you do for wright stuff.
In comparison, boomilever has compression and tension piece and gravity vehicle has 4 wheels.
It’s just like a given format, which most people tend not to step outside that box, rather they take that format and build atop that minimum, aka keeping it simple

[lechassin]

Rule 5b indicates this is still the case, "powered or unpowered".

So you can let go of the plane 1" off the floor, call that a flight, and get the bonus? Why do they do that, just to see if kids will read carefully and catch an easy bonus? That would be kinda cheesy

[coachchuckaahs]

Rule 5b indicates this is still the case, "powered or unpowered".

So you can let go of the plane 1" off the floor, call that a flight, and get the bonus? Why do they do that, just to see if kids will read carefully and catch an easy bonus? That would be kinda cheesy

Essentially that is all it takes to get the bonus. But, remember, at launch of the test or official flight, the 3 minute pre-flight time period ends, and the 8-minute flight window starts. So it becomes an issue with time management.

In prior years (before the unpowered rule), we had a second plane and second winder (more expense) and would have one team mate wide a light load on the test flight plane. However, that takes away from the teamwork in winding the primary motor, especially important with thin motors where the winding may be at such a distance that seeing the torque meter is hard.

Last year, with careful wind/unwind to our specs, we were closer to 4 minutes winding, so "launching" a dead test flight just before 3 minutes was definitely needed to get the bonus. The intent of the bonus is to speed things along. Prior to that, there was no preflight clock, and preflight sometimes took 15 minutes for some teams, causing an issue with logistics. The preflight bonus was introduced to speed things along.

Similarly, the colored panel bonus is simple and a given. In prior years, it was a construction violation (tiered) if a panel was not colored. It is far better to make it an easy bonus, rather than tiering an otherwise acceptable plane. With the preflight bonus, it simply makes things move along faster, and with unpowered option is pretty much a freebie.

Last time we did Heli they introduced preflight, but they did not specify unpowered. That was with a Chinook style heli, so already 2 pieces of rubber, and generally a 2-person job. Having to wind a second heli to do a test flight was a huge issue, but there was little chance of accurately winding two motors int eh 3-minute preflight, so it had to be done. We came up with methods. Similarly we ahd a non-torque method of winding a test flight on backup plane in WS (B division). I think it became a question of how many winds constituted a "powered" flight, so they gave option of unpowered.

If you do this, yes, do a low (several inches) slow toss. One of our kids tossed from shoulder and broke the prop unpowered!

So, just keep in mind, the bonuses may not be technically minded, but rather a logistics issue to move things along.

Coach Chuck

[lechassin]

I figured folks who are running a science-minded event must have some logic, so there it is! Thanks for the explanation, makes sense now.

[jander14indoor]

Yep, Coach Chuck is absolutely right.
3 minute pre-flight bonus is time management driven.
Black panel is for visibility.
Flight log penalty is to get message across on data.
All done as EASY to get or avoid. We don't mean for the students to miss these. The first two are for the benefit of the event supervisors, the third is to send a message that was missed in the early years of the flight events.

The only technical bonus for WS this year is the right and left circle, meant to make the event harder as WS has been in the rotation a while now.
ELG got canard bonus as their technical challenge. Fuselage length, hmm, actually don't remember the rationale for that one.
These challenges ARE meant to be challenge to student and we don't expect everyone to get them. The size of the bonus is meant to motivate the students to try.

Jeff Anderson
Livonia, MI

[madhavaniyengar]

Hey guys,

I was testing my plane today (FFM, monoplane), and it was flying to the left pretty decently, and then when I switched it to the right, it started stalling and bobbing up and down, unable to climb at all. I only had enough time to run it twice to the right before I got kicked out by sports, so I don't have any videos rn. It was also hard for me to get it to fly to the right at all, I had to turn the stab all the way to the right on the protractor, and even then, it was a bigger circle than leftwards, It was with a pretty low torque btw, about 120 x 15 winds with one de-wind.

Any idea what could be causing this? I'm just looking for some solutions before I test again because I don't have many days left to test before invitational.

Thanks!

[xiangyu]

Hey guys,

I was testing my plane today (FFM, monoplane), and it was flying to the left pretty decently, and then when I switched it to the right, it started stalling and bobbing up and down, unable to climb at all. I only had enough time to run it twice to the right before I got kicked out by sports, so I don't have any videos rn. It was also hard for me to get it to fly to the right at all, I had to turn the stab all the way to the right on the protractor, and even then, it was a bigger circle than leftwards, It was with a pretty low torque btw, about 120 x 15 winds with one de-wind.

Any idea what could be causing this? I'm just looking for some solutions before I test again because I don't have many days left to test before invitational.

Thanks!

My plane behaves similarly in terms of the turn. (ish) Yes, the right circle is much harder to turn as the torque is fighting the turn as the way the rubber unwinds favors it to turn left (someone correct me if I don't have the exact reason down, but I know it was something along those lines) . For my plane, when I put the rudder all the way to the right, the circle, while still big, is only the diamter of a basketball court which would allow me to fly in most competitions.

For you problem, have you tried adding shims to the wing to cause intentional slight wing warp to help your plane better turn? Also, make sure your wing is perfectly straight without warp before you add it to the plane. I'm not entirely sure why your plane would stall, but I bet others on the forums who are much more experienced probably knows why.

Hope this helps.
Xiangyu