Beyond 2004

This is the thread to aid in development of new ideas and classes. Post working rules and gather feedback!

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aseaholm
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Post by aseaholm »

Beyond 2004:

A sport’s history is very important to its future. I’m not going to rehash old arguments but do plan to present my latest and greatest ideas. With out stepping back from to time to time to evaluate where we’ve been, it’s hard to figure out a good direction to head.

I won’t bore you with to much specific history but will instead use it to help support my opinions. I think these ideas will work especially based on Nvillrod’s comments, thanks for input by the way. I know these forums can seem intimidating at times, but feedback and fresh ideas like yours is greatly needed.

I’ve identified 3 basic categories of combat competitors over the 7 years I’ve been around the RCCA and ASDA.

1) Adrenaline seekers – determined to take their RC enjoyment to the next level. This group doesn’t find excitement from simply boring holes in the sky. They want to challenge their friends and have some fun in a new area of the hobby. Winning is secondary as long as they can cut their friends a couple times a day. They need the perception that they can beat their buds with what they’re flying at a minimal time and monetary investment.

2) Top Gun pilots - determined to be the best. These individuals have god given talent and skill developed by years of practice. All pilots competing in RC Combat are skilled, but this group excels above the standard combat skill level. Class structure and rules are secondary. This individual competes for the challenge, wants to win, and is always seeking a way to improve their chances of winning.

3) Scale enthusiasts – enjoy the history and the thrill of reenacting WWII dog fights. This group typically enjoys building and the research aspect of the sport as much or more then the competition. Winning and points is very often secondary to enjoyment of the scale aspects. They enjoy the pure satisfaction of seeing their Stang or Jug on the six of a FW-190 lining up for the kill.

As this organization has matured focus has shifted through these groups. When the focus or emphasis changes, one group has typically been alienated and looses interest. Take the development of OPEN for example. As OPEN began to take shape new ideas and technologies learned in the much more rapidly developing OPEN began to trickle over to SCALE. Soon, the scale portion of the event gave way to strength, performance and point chases. Scale realism and recognizable aircraft were lost and the lure of SCALE combat was gone for many. Many are gone.

The road map for the future should be one that includes and offers classes to cater to each one of these groups but still allowing for cross over between each. Let’s face it, many of the die hard “Top Gun pilotsâ€
Lou Melancon
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Post by Lou Melancon »

AJ,
You are a prophet, you knew I would pop right up. As usual, your insights are clear, easily understood, and accurate. My only worry is that they do not match the existing trends. We will have to reverse the trend in SSC growth to accomplish what you suggest. Please see the other forum about "Trends in Participation", as it was posted to try and figure out what is really happening.

We continually seek to solve flight performance issues with displacement. That is one solution, but not the only one, nor even the most desireable one in every case.

I don't believe we will see any performance difference in SSC or Limited B - if all the parameters restricting either class or equal. If we allow lighter planes with more powerful motors then of course we will see an increase in their performance, but not due to displacement, instead due to thrust to weight rules.

Lou Melancon
Alpharetta, Georgia
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Post by Hat Trick »

Excellent post AJ! You said it all! I agree completely!
Bob Leone
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Post by Bob Leone »

<b>Let's fly some combat.</b>
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Ed Kettler
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Post by Ed Kettler »

nvillerod,

Welcome to combat, and welcome to the discussion! I hope you stay engaged in both as a newcomer's perspective is often not jaded by the past.

AJ,

Great discussion of the personality types and flying! I'm into scale and a secondary adrenaline junkie with no hopes or talent for Top Gun, but I'm happy with that![:D]

All,

I think we need to get outside of the current focus on NPS and reach out to other communites, both combat and non-combat. At Sherman in July, we flew a 2548 demo with two Focke Wulfs and two Mustangs, and the Sherman club members loved it when the planes flew in team combat. Afterwards, we got to talking about team combat, then other ideas flowed, and the conversation turned to "Wouldn't it be cool if ...?". One of the ideas revolved around a bomber with multiple streamers that had to be cut to 'shoot down' the plane, then someone talked about escorts, and other floated an idea about bombing, and then we packed up and went home. I had a nice drive ahead of me, and thought through the ideas on the way home. Below is the result of two weeks of part time work: a B-24 Liberator for team combat.

Image

At a club event, you could have some Glenn Miller going with a running commentary as the Luftwaffe tried to shoot down the bomber before it reached Berlin, escorted by fighters, and it would be a low intensity, fun event for both pilots and spectators. You could let the other pilots try their skills at shooting down the bomber (use very long strings!) as a way to introduce people to the thrill without the pressure of a contest.

Check out the 2548 section for more details on the bird.

Ed

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Ed Kettler
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Feathers
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Post by Feathers »

Mike,

I agree with everything you posted.

A.J.,

I agree with your entire post- every word. Great post.

Nvillerod,

Welcome to the RCCA forum. I hope you have had a chance to go to an RCCA meet to shake hands and meet RCCA members in person. There isn’t a better group of folks involved in anything. The engine room of even the finest ship gets a little noisy at times.

Ed,

I agree that there is a vast potential in team combat that hasn’t been tapped. We’ve flown it at our club numerous times and it was a lot of fun. It allows a newer pilot to be teamed up with someone with more experience and helps even the playing field. I also think that the idea of having one or two teammates would be very attractive to new pilots- especially at fields where combat isn’t being flown presently. The furball goes away as you have to be sure you’re not targeting your teammate, and spectators can enjoy it more as they have a better understanding of what’s going on.

Lou,

I really don’t know what to say…
sgilkey
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Post by sgilkey »

Well, I stand behind what Mike and Aj have said. Lou, nobody is saying SSC isn't fun. Yes, it has been very popular, and you are to be commended as the prime mover for the event. We like flying SSC. But i think a big part of its surge in popularity is that it was new, and it offered the promise of less shop time, more flying time. The reality, after two seasons, is that shop time is indeed down, generally, but a lot of folks just don't think the performance level (engine thrust, not plane speed) and less user-freindly nature of the .15s is worth it. We keep plugging with SSC in our area, it's getting more meet time than any other event. But it's near universal that the combat veterans dont find it as satisfying, and it is not drawing and retaining the newbies that we had hoped. We all have fun when we fly SSC. We just have more fun when we fly the other classes.

Now, if you can have the thrust and user-friendly engines of the other classes, along with the reduced shop time of SSC, you would have a nice hybrid. Hey, that sounds like Limited B!

Scott Gilkey
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Post by boilermaker »

As someone who flies combat with nvillerod on a frequent basis I'd like to toss in a bit of my perspective. I probably see things a bit differently than he does, but I cut his streamer more recently than he cut mine, so that will have to be the tie breaker. [:D]

If the goal of the RCCA is to grow combat as a sport "beyond 2004" then the focus needs to be on exactly two points.
1. Putting streamers on the planes of new pilots.
2. Keeping the streamers on the planes of existing pilots.

I’ll let you guys who’ve been in it a while to work on #2

From what I see, major issues for beginners are cost, workshop time, and availability of information. Cost being the sum of three components, 1)cost of equipment, 2)cost of rebuilding, 3)cost of obsolescence. Workshop time being made of initial building and fleet maintenance.

As far as bringing new pilots into combat, cues could be taken from the spad guys (It seems that if you say something about spad or coro around here, unless you’re talking about tailfeathers, people are going to look down their e-noses at you, but it has some great grassroots importance)

My guess is that if you take a group of people completely new to combat a link to the spadtothebone site and the rcca site, that group is more often than not going to begin their club combat with a spad. Why? Because in a matter of minutes of looking at both sites they’re going to know how to build one, what they’ve learned will likely make it cheap, quick, and easily. Its not likely that they will be in any way concerned with national standings, national classes, etc. As long as they all can build some planes and get them in the air.

Does spad have its drawbacks? Sure, the performance of the average spad wing will be lesser than that of the average foam wing. Coro vs. Coro survivability isn’t going to be that of foam on foam. Odds are if they find out after the fact that guys at the club down the road are flying combat, the planes won’t be on the same level, so one group will have to spend money and time to get to the same levels, much less step up to national levels.

This is my view because this is what happened to our group. The first thing that got us was the arms race. Rudder ships with cheap or old engines made way for ailerons, then aileron and rudder coupled, to stock OS and Irvine engines with mousse can mufflers, to Magnum and Norvel engines with tuned Kentucky pipes, From aluminum fuses to fencepost fuses, to bat fuses to flying wings with no fuses. From Hershey bar wings to those with tapered chords tapered spars. What was the result? One week into combat this year, and only one of last years planes was left flying, and half of last years pilots had hung up their streamers. Not only that, but now we’re going “scary fastâ€
Lou Melancon
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Post by Lou Melancon »

Boilermaker,
Thank you for giving us the perspective of someone not yet involved in NPS, and telling us what we need to think about to make the sport better.

I have read your comments several times and appreciate them greatly.

Our Treasurer tells me we cannot pay humongous consulting fees, but we freely award "attaboys".

Thank you.

Lou Melancon
Alpharetta, Georgia
Jimbo
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Post by Jimbo »

Boilermaker did you notice that everyone that is promoting Limited-B also flies SSC ? Did you read ALL of their reasons for wanting to give Limited-B a try? Don't worry, you'll catch up. Thanks for your imput anyway. By the way have you givin Limited-B a try yet? I tried SSC thats how I was able to form a real opinion.

Limited-B
Try it,you'll like it !
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Post by boilermaker »

Wait, is it everybody promoting limited b also flies SSC, or is it everyone promoting limited b also tried SSC and then sold off ther .15 engines?

If I remember correctly, the purpose of limited b as stated was to slow the planes and thereby reduce carnage, maintain excitement, and gain new pilots. Its also going to extend the life of aircraft by bringing new building techniques and materials? Its intended to bring in new pilots, and get the past combat pilots with 25's laying around back into it. Its going to build off of SSC and be better because its got a .25 instead. Its also purported to elminate furballs and create pursuit in its stead thereby reducing carnage even further. Did I miss anything, or am I up to speed?

This whole thread is about beyond 2004 so the key is whether or not this class by virtue of its design will bring new people into combat.
<b>Retired combat pilots with old .25's around</b> This only works if the outstanding reason the person quit combat was speed and carnage, and the reduction will be significant to make that person change their mind. What percentage of ex-pilots will this have an effect on? How many people are out there right now saying, damn I like that SSC and I'd get back into it if only they used .25's because I don't have 55 bucks to spare?
<b>New combat pilots</b>This is where the fruit is because its a much larger group, and everybody in the retired group already knows at least one reason to not fly combat anymore. I just don't see where in the proposal of limited-b one can find the magic beans that will get new combat pilots climbing on board any more than what already exists in SSC. The speeds will be faster, the destruction will be greater. Are the thousands of people not flying combat really not doing so because of downwind launches with a .15?

Have I flown limited B? Sure did. Although I broke the rules by having a pipe on it, we adjusted the throttle throw down to get into the 15K range on the open B ships. What we found was that we liked the speeds and being able to fly closer to us. Hell, we liked it enough that we all bought .15's so we could fly that way all the time.
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Post by Jimbo »

boilermaker, whoever you are, if SSC is your thing thats great. Stick with it. In my opinion .15 size engine are weak(not durable)finicky crap. I'm very glad you have good luck with yours. Sounds to me like SSC is more your speed anyway.[;)]
By the way were you that the Paris SSC meet this year, or the Winter Nats SSC?

Limited-B
Try it,you'll like it !
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Post by BigCountry »

<i>BigCoutry said-</i> <blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">It is built upon the success of the SSC class and is meant to offer combat fliers a choice in how they choose to slow down their combat.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Man that's got to be pretty egotistical to quote yourself[:D][:p][8D].
Boiler, I'm glad you've had great success with your SSC birds in developing some new folks for combat. We've had some luck doing the same with the Limited B concept. I think even in a small group such as ours when things become to narrow vision wise that we won't look at and try different approaches to see what works and what doesn't then we're not seeing to far "beyond 2004".

SSC is and will continue to be a great success for the RCCA. I'm sure it has both brought in new pilots and probably kept some old ones around that were on they're way out the door. I've been flying SSC for just about a year now. I was one of the holdouts initially but eventually tried it for the very fact I mention above (Narrow mindedness[;)]) and quite frankly even though my first actual taste of it went about as badly as it could possibly go stuck with it and have come to enjoy it a good deal.

We have not had the luck with pitching the idea around here that you have. One case in particular Jim and I spent about 3-4 hours flying combat at Grun's club in Beaumont, Texas to introduce some folks to combat. Grun and another of his club members had planes and flew against Jimbo and I. We both brought both our SSC planes and essentially what we are flying now in Limited B and once we realized that both Grun and his friend were flying SPAD's powered with 40 sized motors we elected to put up our SSC birds against them rather than the other planes. Now while all the guys had a great time it wasn't till we eventually broke out our Limited B planes did we get that "Hell ya" response from them. What's the point? I guess I'm just trying to say that even though the RCCA is a small group relatively speaking we're "advertising" to too big of a market to think that one or two ideas will suffice.

I have no idea if the Limited B concept will go anywhere. So far it's had a good response with those who have chosen to try it. Do I expect folks in the southeast part of the country i.e. Georgia to drop their SSC birds and start flying it, NO but in those areas that want it it provides them with exactly what my quote says and that is just a choice. Not one better than the other, just a choice.

Thank you for offering you perspective, I hope that while you can see that I don't totally agree with all your viewpoints that I do respect them and hope that you continue to enjoy combat in whatever form you choose [:D]...

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Post by Feathers »

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Wait, is it everybody promoting limited b also flies SSC, or is it everyone promoting limited b also tried SSC and then sold off ther .15 engines?<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

What I don't understand is this: Nobody promoting Limited B has suggested the elimination of SSC. If SSC is the best a limited class can offer there's no reason to bash the Limited B idea. I suspect the amount of ruckus raised is in direct relation to how good of an idea a limited .25 class is.

Tim Feathers
(owner of six RTV'd, thread locked, retapped 4/40 muffler, new internet-ordered hardware, leaking washered backplates that need to be tightened every three flights, busted plastic nipples, bladderless, new-pilot friendly, fairly new .15's)
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Post by boilermaker »

I’d like to point out that Boiler and Boilermaker are two different people, just to make sure his name is clear of my comments.

That said, when it comes to vision “Beyond 2004â€
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