FLARM in Stealth Mode at US 15M/Standard Nationals - Loved It!

One other thing for people to chew on. I believe it was the paraglider folks who solved for this leeching thing in a very different way. They instituted 15-minute start time windows. Your start time is rounded back to the nearest quarter-hour. This leads to pilots starting in packs every 15 minutes. If you start 5 minutes late to try to catch the pack you get no credit for the later start time, so there's no benefit. If you can make up 15 minutes on the pack in front of you, well good for you. I don't know if everyone tends to leave at once or if it splits the field up nicely.

Worth pondering. It doesn't just solve for electronic leeching, it solves for the eyeball type too.

9B

9B, that's a really excellent point about ADS-B. Flarm Stealth mode may be a completely moot point in 5 years. Thanks for pointing it out.

-John, Q3

On Thursday, August 6, 2015 at 2:41:21 PM UTC-4, Andy Blackburn wrote:
Ultimately, FAA action notwithstanding, you will see gliders equipped with ADS-B Out. These will offer ranges of many tens of miles, not the 3-5 miles offered by Flarm. All of that traffic information will be picked up by your PowerFLARM and go straight to your flight display and will include gliders as well as any power traffic equipped with ADS-B 1090ES. There's no stealth mode for ADS-B and ADS-B doesn't discriminate aircraft type. It does, I believe, transmit an ICAO code.

I'm guessing we don't want to be in the position of requiring pilots to turn off their ADS-B gear or banning its installation. You might be able to filter out glider ICAO codes using some sort of registration database like FlarmNet (not a current Flarm capability), but that starts to get pretty complicated and I'd bet the FAA would have something to say about it.

Not an immediate issue, but 5 years from now it could be very real.

9B

At 18:03 06 August 2015, John Carlyle wrote:
Could someone please clarify - if a PowerFlarm is in Stealth mode, does
tha=
t affect the display of PCAS and ADS-B information? If it does=
, then to my mind there's no sense in using Stealth mode at all, ever.=20

Assuming Stealth affects Flarm signal display, I think we need to co=
nsider why people would want Stealth used in contests. I think there are
t=
hree basic types of pilots at contests - those that are hyper
competitive,
=
those that are trying to learn competition flying, and those that are
just
=
out for fun. It's clear that hyper competitive pilots will probably
always
=
want Stealth, so they don't give up any advantage. Those that are trying
to=
learn competition flying will most likely want Stealth used, so they=
get a better idea of what's going on around them in real time so as to
lea=
rn/improve faster. Those out for fun would probably also want Stealth=
, but most likely only for situational awareness.=20

It's the learning pilots that I think are causing the angst in this
thread.=
Perhaps a good compromise would be to allow Stealth only in Regional
conte=
sts, or perhaps only in Sports class? =20

-John, Q3

In my experience competition pilots are optimists. They tend to think that
they will gain more competitive advantage from situational awareness than
they give away. In competition when stealth is optional most comp pilots go
'open'

Jim

On Wednesday, August 5, 2015 at 10:31:51 PM UTC-4, John Cochrane wrote:
On Wednesday, August 5, 2015 at 6:49:23 PM UTC-7, Papa3 wrote:
Wow - I would have thought it completely self-evident that having this information via a screen was/is "bad" relative to what we (I) traditionally think of as "the sport of soaring".

The "sport" often involves highly tactical decisions of followng other gliders. Is it necessarily better that this is limited by the mark IV eybeball, so gliders have to follow very closely to stay with gaggles? Is it not possibly better to have a wider view, a chance to go off on your own and still keep track of others?

Yes, people do use flarm for tactical advantage. Right now, really, the display of where other glders are within 4 miles is the main use. The climb rates, as others have pointed out, are next to useless.

Cost is a non-issue. Advantage is a non-issue. We have the flarms anyway. We either artificially disable their capabilities or we use them at no extra cost for their full ability, and everyone has them. If you're worried about cost, $160,000 new gliders are orders of magniutde more than any electronics we are contemplating.

Let's worry about hypothetical new 100k instruments if and when they arrive. For now the issue is, do we use the full capabilities of an instrument everyone has anyway or not?

So just how terrible is it to have a slightly better situalational awareness of where the gliders are within 4 miles -- and especially behind where you can't see?

One thing I like about full flarm is it actually breaks up gaggles. people can go off on their own for a bit and not worry about being alone all day..

Yes it's different. Yes it's new. But our job is not historic preservation. Our job is to have fun and enjoy soaring and advance the sport.

What I have not seen in the case for stealth mode is a clear statement of just what is the awful problem that we're trying to fix. Not hypotheticals, what have you actually observed in flarm contests that is a terrible problem requiring banning this interesting new technology?

Yes, you can see start gaggles that you otherwise might have missed unless you sat off the back of KS tail all day. Yes, you can see some other gaggles forming that you might have missed if you weren't looking very hard. So can everyone else. Just how terrible is this?

Personally I find the greater situational awareness of what others are doing makes the contest more enjoyable. The big complaint, especially when we moved from AST to time limited tasks is that nobody knew what anyone else was doing, you went and flew and waited for an 8 pm scoresheet. Well, now you know a lot more about what others are doing.

But that's my view. All I've heard is grumbling about how terrible it is that the sport is changing. That's not a problem. I've heard hypotheticals about new instruments someone might make someday. That's not a problem today. Just what is the real problem we're trying to fix here?

John Cochrane BB

Not EVERYONE has flarm bruh.

....
But that's my view. All I've heard is grumbling about how terrible it is that the sport is changing. That's not a problem. I've heard hypotheticals about new instruments someone might make someday. That's not a problem today. Just what is the real problem we're trying to fix here?

John Cochrane BB

Let me make my case another way, using an example from this past week at the 15m/Std. Nat's. On day three the sky looked great. I started alone with high hopes of blasting down the course line to catch others.

It turned out the day was much trickier than that. I failed to recognize this early, failed to properly evaluate the risk/reward, kept my water too late and landed out on the first leg. My performance was not good enough that day and I paid the price receiving 136 out of a possible 1000 points.

I would have loved to have had full FLARM capabilities as I got lower that day. I might have headed directly for someone's thermal and climbed out of a bad position. This would have effectively spackled over a major divot in my soaring performance.

Instead others who truly performed better were rewarded with a better score.. My hat is off to the pilots who figured it out consistently at Harris Hill, you can be proud of your performance. I'll learn from mine.

Again, I feel that using the full capabilities for FLARM smoothes out these lows and highs, making for a duller contest with less valid results. Plus, I may never have visited Almond, NY.

XC

One thing to keep in mind: Pilots can always use stealth mode on their own. If it bugs you that someone may follow you, then turn on stealth. The issue is mandating it for all.

John Cochrane BB

On Thursday, August 6, 2015 at 3:36:28 PM UTC-4, John Cochrane wrote:
One thing to keep in mind: Pilots can always use stealth mode on their own. If it bugs you that someone may follow you, then turn on stealth. The issue is mandating it for all.

John Cochrane BB

If you are in Stealth, and your competitors are not, you are strongly disadvantaged from my experience. I stubbornly tried it. If the Flarmleechtool is in use, one can not afford not to be using it.
And- dirty little secret- pilots are covering their antennas when they think they are in the lead so as to not give away information. One well known world champion has been doing this, according to those I believe are in the know. "Whats the aluminum foil hat for?"
UH

On Thursday, August 6, 2015 at 3:31:54 PM UTC-4, XC wrote:
...
But that's my view. All I've heard is grumbling about how terrible it is that the sport is changing. That's not a problem. I've heard hypotheticals about new instruments someone might make someday. That's not a problem today. Just what is the real problem we're trying to fix here?

John Cochrane BB

Let me make my case another way, using an example from this past week at the 15m/Std. Nat's. On day three the sky looked great. I started alone with high hopes of blasting down the course line to catch others.

It turned out the day was much trickier than that. I failed to recognize this early, failed to properly evaluate the risk/reward, kept my water too late and landed out on the first leg. My performance was not good enough that day and I paid the price receiving 136 out of a possible 1000 points.

I would have loved to have had full FLARM capabilities as I got lower that day. I might have headed directly for someone's thermal and climbed out of a bad position. This would have effectively spackled over a major divot in my soaring performance.

Instead others who truly performed better were rewarded with a better score. My hat is off to the pilots who figured it out consistently at Harris Hill, you can be proud of your performance. I'll learn from mine.

Again, I feel that using the full capabilities for FLARM smoothes out these lows and highs, making for a duller contest with less valid results. Plus, I may never have visited Almond, NY.

XC

really well said sean!