On Thursday, February 13, 2014 7:27:03 PM UTC-5, MNLou wrote:
Although I enjoyed the discussion in my previous thread on drag and handicaps, I was trying to create a discussion about the benefit of having a reliable propulsion system versus a pure glider. For this discussion, please assume that someone created an FES system that had no drag and no additional weight. Thus, an FES equipped ship and an non-FES equipped ship had identical polars. Also assume that the FES system was 100% reliable. Do you think the FES ship would have a competitive advantage over a pure glider because of the ability to stretch the "safe flight" envelope? Lou

Of course it does for the simple reason that there are always opportunities to improve the score by adding risk to the flight. For the purpose of my comment let's assume that we are talking about risk of not completing the task and not of extending the risk to potential accident. Many times we might consider risking the flight, but don't because of the added issue of landing out and needing a retrieve, on top of getting a poor score. For crewless pilots this can be an even bigger consideration.
If I have a way to retrieve myself, and I think it will probably will work, of course I might cross that dead area. Without the retreive capability, it is a much harder decision.
Throw in high risk weather, or bad terrain, and the potential advantage is obviously increased.
Is there a way to quantify it? Not that we've found yet.
Why let them play in our races? Easy, we're too small a sport to send people home.
The guys with engines will also argue that they have to quit higher in order to safely use the engine. Obviously not so with FES.
And we even like some of them. LOL

UH