IGC Decision on 13.5 meter class - Yes or No?

I'll be racing 15m until the lights go out. *Took me long enough to
get here, I ain't leaving the party that easy. *I invite y'all to join
me. *It's good fun.

-Evan Ludeman / T8

Yeah, 15 meter is now the "one design" "cheap" class that people
wished for for so long. Top level competition, half the price of a new
18m glider, and it will be ASW27 and Ventus2 forever; no hot new
glider is going to come devalue your investment. Plus you can go fly
with the 18m guys if you don't mind losing 30 points a day or so.

John Cochrane

On Mar 9, 4:31*pm, T8 wrote:
On Mar 9, 5:18*pm, John Cochrane
wrote:





I don't understand the purpose of this new class. *I suspect neither
do the people who promoted it, because my sense is these guys were
more interested in lightweight, lower cost gliders, were generally
opposed to water ballast and generally okay with handicapping.

-Evan Ludeman / T8

I don't know, but I can guess. This is the successor to the world
class. They wanted some place to put the PW5s, not out to pasture, and
for some reason they did not want to create something like the US
sports class with a wide handicap range. Given that decision, I second-
guess they did not put in handicaps or a water ballast restriction,
because handicaps would have killed development and a waterballast
restriction would mean that winning gliders would be lead bombs
unsuitable for club use.

But the end result is a *a new class, and the obvious gliders that
will do well in it have not even been designed. The class winner here
will be something like a sparrowhawk with waterballast.

13.5, standard, 15, 18, 20, open, club, junior, feminine is WAY too
many classes. No country can have nationals and field teams in all
separate classes. The task for the IGC is to figure out how to reverse
this insanity and end up with no more than 3 classes, without
devaluing the existing fleet, not how to add more classes. *I'm afraid
"merge classes with handicaps for gliders produced before x date" is
the only way to do it. Flame suit on -- or suggest a better way.

John Cochrane

Well, clearly the IGC as it currently exists isn't going to do that.

Technology and cost have made Std irrelevant: the ships are at least
98% as good as 15m... and cost 98% as much. *Me, I'll keep my landing
flaps, thanks. 15m is still relevant, but anyone with enough scratch
to buy a 15m (or std) ship at today's new prices demonstrably isn't
bothered by the incremental cost of going to 18m, often with a motor.
Open is an interesting niche, relevant mostly because of the wonders
that guys like Dick Butler will spend tens of thousands of hours of
labor to produce. *It's cool just because it is the absolute limit of
the state of the art and they are great fun to watch. *Unfortunately,
the only place you can assemble a large enough grid of these ships to
have a meaningful race is at the Worlds.

Personally, I agree with Charlie Spratt that the best racing class we
ever had in the US is 15m. *Still is, although attrition will slowly
erode our numbers. *I don't think there has been a new 15m racer
licensed in at least two years and no meaningful number in five or
six. *I can't justify 4x the price of my current ship to buy a 2 or 3%
better 18m sled.

I'll be racing 15m until the lights go out. *Took me long enough to
get here, I ain't leaving the party that easy. *I invite y'all to join
me. *It's good fun.

-Evan Ludeman / T8

Evan,

I agree. The one thing the US can do is decide to not participate in
all the classes. As a country we can decide to not field a 13.5 M or
20 M class and we can start to focus on a limited number of classes.
As my mom used to ask, "just because all your friends are jumping off
the bridge, does that mean you should too?". The answer is that the
IGC will keep making as many classes as the manufactures ask (pay)
them to. The 20M decision is a great windfall for Schempp-Hirth, no
other manufacture has a competitive glider in the class.

There was no need to make an 18M racing class, it was just a platform
for motorgliders and to sell more gliders. As you said the Standards
are now 98% of the 15M and Open has become just an irrelevant special
class for a few.

Awww man, I shoulda kept my Russia AC-4!

What was I thinking, upgrading to a DG-300???

;-)

--Noel

A few of us flew 17045 at 15m span with the home made wooden tips. A
bit stubby looking, but what a rocket ship!
Karl wrote an article for Soaring on flying his 17 at 15m span.
Landing in 15m mode wasn't as strange as we assumed from the article.
The AS-H31Mi inner panels are 14m. That could make it a 3-class
glider. But the G29 or V2Cx would be great 13.5m ships. Just add water
if the wing loading isn't high enough!
Jim

On Mar 9, 1:28*pm, Greg Arnold wrote:
I recall that KS flew an ASW-17 in 15M class.

Nah, Open is the way to go! Nimbus 3 is still competitive, and you
can pick them up cheap. Several available for around $50K. Can you
get a competitive std, 15, or 18 meter ship for that? Only with a
partner! OK, so you think you need a partner to fly an open class.
Nah, I can rig the old 604 by myself. Same for the Nimbus 3.

And the ASG-29 or V2C will make great machines for the 13.5 meter
class. Think about this. 1.5 meters is 5 feet. So, that is 2.5 feet
less per side than your 15 meter tips which are about 4 to 5 feet
long, right? I am glad that Karl is flying his Duo and taking people
along at Parowan, but am wondering what handicap will be given to his
"clipped" Duo? I am betting he will fly it with the tips off, just
like he did with his ASW-17 at Hobbs back in 1977. :-) And I bet
that he would love to have a 17 without the tips for Parowan if he
wasn't doing such a great job promoting the US Team and Cross Country
Training by taking people in an excellent two place racer. Can you
tell I appreciate what Karl is doing? Thanks, Karl, for sharing your
knowledge.

Now, back to the discussion of Everyone Deserves to be a Nationall
Champion, so lets make 50 more classes!

Suggestion for here in the US. Let's just ignore some of these
classes for National Championships. Either that, or I am going to
host The Zuni Nationals so I can finally be a National Champion, too!

Steve Leonard

On Mar 9, 5:48*pm, Steve Leonard wrote:
Nah, Open is the way to go! *Nimbus 3 is still competitive, and you
can pick them up cheap. *Several available for around $50K. *Can you
get a competitive std, 15, or 18 meter ship for that? *Only with a
partner! *OK, so you think you need a partner to fly an open class.
Nah, I can rig the old 604 by myself. *Same for the Nimbus 3.

And the ASG-29 or V2C will make great machines for the 13.5 meter
class. *Think about this. *1.5 meters is 5 feet. *So, that is 2.5 feet
less per side than your 15 meter tips which are about 4 to 5 feet
long, right? *I am glad that Karl is flying his Duo and taking people
along at Parowan, but am wondering what handicap will be given to his
"clipped" Duo? *I am betting he will fly it with the tips off, just
like he did with his ASW-17 at Hobbs back in 1977. *:-) *And I bet
that he would love to have a 17 without the tips for Parowan if he
wasn't doing such a great job promoting the US Team and Cross Country
Training by taking people in an excellent two place racer. *Can you
tell I appreciate what Karl is doing? *Thanks, Karl, for sharing your
knowledge.

Now, back to the discussion of Everyone Deserves to be a Nationall
Champion, so lets make 50 more classes!

Suggestion for here in the US. *Let's just ignore some of these
classes for National Championships. *Either that, or I am going to
host The Zuni Nationals so I can finally be a National Champion, too!

Steve Leonard

Crap my Salto is 13.6 M!!
Band saw anyone?

On Mar 9, 8:48*pm, Steve Leonard wrote:

Now, back to the discussion of Everyone Deserves to be a Nationall
Champion, so lets make 50 more classes!


The IGC has a long way to go to top the SSA. We have more state
record categories than we do membership. Yes, REALLY.

-Evan Ludeman / T8

On Mar 9, 2:18*pm, John Cochrane
wrote:
I don't understand the purpose of this new class. *I suspect neither
do the people who promoted it, because my sense is these guys were
more interested in lightweight, lower cost gliders, were generally
opposed to water ballast and generally okay with handicapping.

-Evan Ludeman / T8

I don't know, but I can guess. This is the successor to the world
class. They wanted some place to put the PW5s, not out to pasture, and
for some reason they did not want to create something like the US
sports class with a wide handicap range. Given that decision, I second-
guess they did not put in handicaps or a water ballast restriction,
because handicaps would have killed development and a waterballast
restriction would mean that winning gliders would be lead bombs
unsuitable for club use.

But the end result is a *a new class, and the obvious gliders that
will do well in it have not even been designed. The class winner here
will be something like a sparrowhawk with waterballast.

13.5, standard, 15, 18, 20, open, club, junior, feminine is WAY too
many classes. No country can have nationals and field teams in all
separate classes. The task for the IGC is to figure out how to reverse
this insanity and end up with no more than 3 classes, without
devaluing the existing fleet, not how to add more classes. *I'm afraid
"merge classes with handicaps for gliders produced before x date" is
the only way to do it. Flame suit on -- or suggest a better way.

John Cochrane

Can anyone imagine there being enough gliders at most US regionals to
field ANY additional classes, much less these? I'm racking my brain
for what the practical point is. Maybe it's different in Europe...

9B

On Mar 10, 9:14*am, Andy wrote:

Can anyone imagine there being enough gliders at most US regionals to
field ANY additional classes, much less these? I'm racking my brain
for what the practical point is. Maybe it's different in Europe...

9B

Maybe it is so someone WILL make a set of 13.5 meter tips for an
ASG-29 or Ventus 2C and show how much more you could have than a PW-5
with the same span.

T8 wrote:
On Mar 9, 8:48 pm, Steve Leonard wrote:

Now, back to the discussion of Everyone Deserves to be a Nationall
Champion, so lets make 50 more classes!



The IGC has a long way to go to top the SSA. We have more state
record categories than we do membership. Yes, REALLY.
That's a good thing, isn't it? I always thought so.

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (netto to net to email me)

- "Transponders in Sailplanes - Feb/2010" also ADS-B, PCAS, Flarm http://tinyurl.com/yb3xywl

- "A Guide to Self-launching Sailplane Operation Mar/2004" Much of what you need to know tinyurl.com/yfs7tnz