Just a thought...and....don't get your panties in a knot..:-)

[Geraghty]

Recently Tommy Lee and myself were have a phone meeting of the OFC [old farts club]...

We were reminiscing about how much RC boating has changed in the last 35+ years....

Tommy mentioned that he attended the last record trial at Huntsville and witnessed Tyler Gerrards 132+ MPH pass....

The first words out of Tommys mouth were "we are running out of room"......

It is obvious to us that with the progression of FE,gas and nitro... 150+ passes are not far away.....

[They are already making 150 mph passes in Europe....]

Here comes the thought ..........

Is the current 330' SAW length set in stone????......Maybe a 200' or 150' length of trap would be more appropriate.....

PROS.....

1.Adjusting the current 330' to 200' would maintain the current record trial locations viability for years to come...

2.Current records and record holders could and would remain the same simply by applying a multiplier to current times resulting in retaining the current speeds....

3.Bigger water means water more susceptible to weather conditions and other pressures.....I.E. swimmers , boaters , fisherman...etc etc etc....

4.Surveying a new distance is now done by GPS so that is basically a non-player in the equation...

5.Both NAMBA and IMPBA could both consider this....something both organizations could agree on...

Lets hear your comments.....

Rod Geraghty & Tommy Lee [OFC Charter members]

 

[RaceMechaniX]

Rod,

Personally I would not be in favor of changing the 330' distance. It is true that I use all the course length possible, but with my SAW riggers are predictable and I let them coast as long as possible before I give them some rudder to turn around. A big component of SAW racing is keeping the boat at speed for that minimum distance. We have all seen plenty of boats trip the first light and blow over before they reach the second one. Keeping the length consistent keeps the challenge consistent and hence records are consistent.

I believe it would also be costly to resurvey the courses to make shorter lengths. Some of the lakes would not be terribly difficult as the lights are on two shores. However some of the lakes like Legg Lake and Flint have poles in the middle of the lake, making it difficult.

Tyler

 

[Geraghty]

Rod,

Personally I would not be in favor of changing the 330' distance. It is true that I use all the course length possible, but with my SAW riggers are predictable and I let them coast as long as possible before I give them some rudder to turn around. A big component of SAW racing is keeping the boat at speed for that minimum distance. We have all seen plenty of boats trip the first light and blow over before they reach the second one. Keeping the length consistent keeps the challenge consistent and hence records are consistent.

I believe it would also be costly to resurvey the courses to make shorter lengths. Some of the lakes would not be terribly difficult as the lights are on two shores. However some of the lakes like Legg Lake and Flint have poles in the middle of the lake, making it difficult.

Tyler

I personally understand and agree with everything you say..... but the fact still remains .....the trend is we are running out of room......

How do we keep existing sites viable far into the future?????

 

[Charles Perdue]

Sort of on the same subject.....I have a SAW boat (under construction) that has a small flap (air brake on each rear sponson bracket) that raises at part throttle to slow the boat by aerodynamic drag and also by pushing down on the rear of the sponson to put more load on the sponson running surface. It then lowers out of the air stream at full throttle getting ready for the next pass.

I played with this idea before building it into this boat by mounting this temporally on a heat racing boat and it worked very good, much, much better than expected, very predictable.

Just a thought for some of the fast guys.

Charles

 

[bzubee]

Rod, Don't forget about the nitro boats some of which will still be accelerating through the traps due to the longer times it takes them to spool up. Gas and FE speedsters have unbelievably quick acceleration.

 

[RaceMechaniX]

From my perspective it is the larger nitro boats that have the greatest problems as they swing props with huge pitches and mill at 40mph. I watched Mark Grim run his 80 hydro at 130MPH and he had to use all of the turning space at Legg Lake. The same goes for his gas SAW riggers.

In my opinion, the responsibility lies in the boater to ensure they can slow down and turn safely. Whether this be via air brakes, adding a small turnfin or other mechanism. It's part of the challenge.

 

[DON MAHER]

Hi Rod,

I have been trying to get people to look at this idea for 5 or more years! Look at Drag Racing, the top fuel and funny cars run over

300mph and there timing lights are 60ft. apart! "SAW" is about top speed, not acceleration! With shorter traps smaller ponds could be used also. This would be a benefit in travel time and expense

Don

 

[KenOlvis]

From my perspective it is the larger nitro boats that have the greatest problems as they swing props with huge pitches and mill at 40mph. I watched Mark Grim run his 80 hydro at 130MPH and he had to use all of the turning space at Legg Lake. The same goes for his gas SAW riggers.

In my opinion, the responsibility lies in the boater to ensure they can slow down and turn safely. Whether this be via air brakes, adding a small turnfin or other mechanism. It's part of the challenge.

Great point sir!

 

[sbowden21]

Rod, Don't forget about the nitro boats some of which will still be accelerating through the traps due to the longer times it takes them to spool up. Gas and FE speedsters have unbelievably quick acceleration.

From what I've seen over the years.... Nitro boats accelerate way harder/faster than Gas boats... ive never been to a record trial and i doubt i will ever attend one as it does nothing for me... But with the nitro records being where they are at today i highly doubt anyone accelerating through the traps will have a chance at setting a straightaway record.

 

[Don Ferrette]

Rod,

Personally I would not be in favor of changing the 330' distance. It is true that I use all the course length possible, but with my SAW riggers are predictable and I let them coast as long as possible before I give them some rudder to turn around. A big component of SAW racing is keeping the boat at speed for that minimum distance. We have all seen plenty of boats trip the first light and blow over before they reach the second one. Keeping the length consistent keeps the challenge consistent and hence records are consistent.

I believe it would also be costly to resurvey the courses to make shorter lengths. Some of the lakes would not be terribly difficult as the lights are on two shores. However some of the lakes like Legg Lake and Flint have poles in the middle of the lake, making it difficult.

Tyler

Well said and agree with.

 

[David Murany]

Also what about the guys trying to set a 2 lap record? Do they have to come on a different day? Adding a 3rd timing light would be a hassle as well due to having to alter the timing controllers.

 

[Mark Bullard]

No equipment would have to be altered. Years ago we ran the timing lights in two different spots. We had the straight away setup and then the oval setup. The equipment was the same because we use time only. We then use the time with a set number for the MPH. It is just a math problem. Now instead of setting up a spot for oval we just use the left timing light. This way we can do both straight away and oval with just a flip of the switch.

I myself could go either way. We have talk about lakes that want to hold the Internats that do not have the length to set the equipment at a shorter distance but it has never been done. I do enjoy watching the 330' run for straight away and I have seen a lot of 100 mph plus runs.

 

[David Murany]

No equipment would have to be altered. Years ago we ran the timing lights in two different spots. We had the straight away setup and then the oval setup. The equipment was the same because we use time only. We then use the time with a set number for the MPH. It is just a math problem. Now instead of setting up a spot for oval we just use the left timing light. This way we can do both straight away and oval with just a flip of the switch.

I myself could go either way. We have talk about lakes that want to hold the Internats that do not have the length to set the equipment at a shorter distance but it has never been done. I do enjoy watching the 330' run for straight away and I have seen a lot of 100 mph plus runs.

Ok Mark. Would you then use 2 controllers since the straight away lights would most likely be centered in between the bouys? Just trying to understand how it would be setup. Thanks for the info.

Dave

 

[raptor347]

I'm with Charles on this one. If you're going to play at the top end, engineer the boat to operate safely within the limits of the race site.

Shortening the course to 200' only buys you an extra 65' at each end. With the speed gains we're seeing, it won't be long before the sites are too short again.

 

[Mark Bullard]

The lights are setup to one side of the bouy line of 1 & 3 and 4 & 6. We have our setup up on the right side of those lines. Everything is setup with survey markers on the shore. Our timing light mount are inline with the markers and the bouys are offset to the left. Our markers are very close. I think one of them is off by 1/4". When we do oval all we do is flip the switch on the console to oval and this puts the timing system to the left lights.

 

[David Murany]

I understand that part Mark. I was curious as too how and accommodate the new shortened straight away idea?

 

[Mark Bullard]

In the IMPBA rule book "Section L" "page 3" there it talks about the magic numbers. What theses numbers are where the distance with the time is work out into a number that you use for the speed. There is a little math to get the magic numbers but they have been worked out for our distance. You will see them for all of the events. I have been working on another console that will do speed also but I do not remember the math to get there. And it has to do things a little different. But you take the magic number for the timed event and divide it by the time. This gives you MPH.

 

[Terry Keeley]

Rod,

Personally I would not be in favor of changing the 330' distance. It is true that I use all the course length possible, but with my SAW riggers are predictable and I let them coast as long as possible before I give them some rudder to turn around. A big component of SAW racing is keeping the boat at speed for that minimum distance. We have all seen plenty of boats trip the first light and blow over before they reach the second one. Keeping the length consistent keeps the challenge consistent and hence records are consistent.

I believe it would also be costly to resurvey the courses to make shorter lengths. Some of the lakes would not be terribly difficult as the lights are on two shores. However some of the lakes like Legg Lake and Flint have poles in the middle of the lake, making it difficult.

Tyler

Big +1!

 

[Terry Keeley]

No equipment would have to be altered. Years ago we ran the timing lights in two different spots. We had the straight away setup and then the oval setup. The equipment was the same because we use time only. We then use the time with a set number for the MPH. It is just a math problem. Now instead of setting up a spot for oval we just use the left timing light. This way we can do both straight away and oval with just a flip of the switch.

I myself could go either way. We have talk about lakes that want to hold the Internats that do not have the length to set the equipment at a shorter distance but it has never been done. I do enjoy watching the 330' run for straight away and I have seen a lot of 100 mph plus runs.

There's nothing to stop a club that wants to run an "old school" Internats to have a short, unsurveyed speed trap for SAW trials (even like 50') and to put the oval beam at the start/finish for heat racing. Of course records couldn't be set but they could sure establish places for US1.

 

[Terry Keeley]

In the IMPBA rule book "Section L" "page 3" there it talks about the magic numbers. What theses numbers are where the distance with the time is work out into a number that you use for the speed. There is a little math to get the magic numbers but they have been worked out for our distance. You will see them for all of the events. I have been working on another console that will do speed also but I do not remember the math to get there. And it has to do things a little different. But you take the magic number for the timed event and divide it by the time. This gives you MPH.

It's really the time through the traps or around the two laps that's relevant for setting records. In either case we take the time and divide by 225 for SAW and 1200 to get an AVERAGE speed in MPH for each.

A boat could go crooked through the traps and be accelerating (and even slow down) but it's the time recorded when the beams are broken that counts.