Interest in a build-off?
- Thread starter willsonman
- Start date
Well, in the words of Willy Wonka... "you get nothing!" No physical awards per FT recommendations. I will work to coordinate the adjudication and a rubric that can be measured so any entrant can know what will be judged.
Anybody know where I can get blue foam?
Raptortech
Foam Addict
I'm in. I'll probably enter that 10ft cargo plane I have planned. Any details on registration yet? Also, how does the community aspect of this come into play?
"Adjudication of a rubric?" You sound like one of those horrid education academics who sit in offices and write theories on education. LOL!
From the past.
Sad to say, they stopped making it about 2 years ago and a cry rose up from the model airplane builders. Pink is very similar, but, well, pink. From reports, the Green is a bit more crumbly (in fairness I've never used it) but there are several builders who've used it with fair success.
Most of the better builders will turn their nose up at DTFB -- with good reasons quoted -- but when you get to know the material's strengths and weaknesses, how to work with it, and what it's limits are, it becomes more versatile than previously imagined. I've seen that to be true of many materials, and I expect that it's true for green and pink too -- buy some of one, build something, playing with scraps as you go and you'll better learn a new material.
Never used the blue foam but I've seen builds with it. I've always been a pink foam guy because I have a Home Depot about 1/2 mile from my house. Honestly though, I've built more planes with Adams than any other foam. You have to sand it anyways after you use it to get the curves right so I've never seen any sense in the gripe about how smooth it is. The paper provides a mild protective surface for storage. Not to mention it is stupid cheap compared to most any other foam out there. Its not as moldable (pinch, squeeze etc.) as depron but it has served me very well.
Pat, I've been through enough schooling and technically I'm in the area of validation in my scientific field that if you want to measure something you have to have a standard. Hopefully its been calibrated as well
The rubric is your standard. What makes it tricky here is that you have, conceptually, airplanes that were in production and are well-documented, and planes that were not (on both counts). How do you compare selection of a scale airfoil if one is documented and one is not? What is more likely is to list scale features that are included and provide references as you build to demonstrate why you decided to do what you did. More scale features = higher grade.
Pat, I've been through enough schooling and technically I'm in the area of validation in my scientific field that if you want to measure something you have to have a standard. Hopefully its been calibrated as well
The rubric is your standard. What makes it tricky here is that you have, conceptually, airplanes that were in production and are well-documented, and planes that were not (on both counts). How do you compare selection of a scale airfoil if one is documented and one is not? What is more likely is to list scale features that are included and provide references as you build to demonstrate why you decided to do what you did. More scale features = higher grade.
See the attached rubric. Feedback is welcomed. If you have a question why I placed something on the list and its value please ask. There is a reason for each one.
Thanks for the info. I don't need much of it, just some stuff for rounded side panels. I'll be doing an Acro Sport 1 from EAA.
Rubric . . . always an interesting word.
right word used in the right place, but I get where teach is comming from -- too often abused in teaching circles as a buzz-word, often for someone to slap the teacher over the head about them doing it wrong . . . or so my teaching family members tell me (as an engineer, I'm the black sheep in the family)
. . . then again I hear it and my mind immediatly goes to "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels" . . . "Not Mother?" "No Ruprecht, not Mother."
Back OT!
Looked at the listing, and overall a decent decompision, favoing the scale side heavily -- I've got no issue with that -- but I have noticed you've got a slight bias toward fighters/bombers. While items D & E on scale features do increase the detail and complexity of the build, there are many airframes which don't exibit one and/or the other, which would immediatly put them at a disadvantage, before the builder even begins.
If somebody were to build a clean, scale electric Wright Flyer, complete with wing warping, regardless of their detail they're already docked 9 points.
Perhaps scale details should be "Additive points for any of the following: (insert list with max points for each type of detail, all in excess of 30 points)" with a maximum category score of 30 points.
Also on the finishing . . . how do you plan to gage your color/specular/smoothness accuracy? IRL, it's nearly trivial, but here it almost becomes more of an art of photography than a skill in finish.
right word used in the right place, but I get where teach is comming from -- too often abused in teaching circles as a buzz-word, often for someone to slap the teacher over the head about them doing it wrong . . . or so my teaching family members tell me (as an engineer, I'm the black sheep in the family)
. . . then again I hear it and my mind immediatly goes to "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels" . . . "Not Mother?" "No Ruprecht, not Mother."
Back OT!
Looked at the listing, and overall a decent decompision, favoing the scale side heavily -- I've got no issue with that -- but I have noticed you've got a slight bias toward fighters/bombers. While items D & E on scale features do increase the detail and complexity of the build, there are many airframes which don't exibit one and/or the other, which would immediatly put them at a disadvantage, before the builder even begins.
If somebody were to build a clean, scale electric Wright Flyer, complete with wing warping, regardless of their detail they're already docked 9 points.
Perhaps scale details should be "Additive points for any of the following: (insert list with max points for each type of detail, all in excess of 30 points)" with a maximum category score of 30 points.
Also on the finishing . . . how do you plan to gage your color/specular/smoothness accuracy? IRL, it's nearly trivial, but here it almost becomes more of an art of photography than a skill in finish.
HA!!!! you completley overestimate my patience and attention to detail
Build to fly and compete to push yourself, but win or not, have fun. Go ahead and join in. The difference in skill isn't as steep as you think it is, and you're BOUND to learn something you'll find useful.
I've also seen competitions around here to be more cooperative . . . you're doing the building and you'll get compared on your work, but if you post a build log and something isn't quite right, in past it's been totally fair game for others to offer sugguestions on how to do it cheaper/faster/better. You end up a better builder, we end up with a better show
Wilsonman,
I thought I heard wispers for skill levels . . . although that further dilutes the contestant pool. Perhaps something like a Golf handicap? No idea how you'd gage that . . .
So the idea behond that is that if you DO have retracts or something WWII era then it gets counted there. If you do NOT have them, like wing warping, you dont get them counted there but you do get the points in another section. I neglected to adjust the point scale on "other" to account for that (fixed). The other idea behind that is that it does take more time and effort to do those things so if you do them you do get (theoretically) more points if you do them and other details as well. But the retracts etc. do NOT get counted in the other section. This is to help level the playing field between subjects given the amount of time indicated for the build.
The idea with gauging the other finishing is reflective of the adjudicator. Their "calibrated" sense of color etc. (with reference to documentation) will be relatively the same from one plane to the next. Another adjudicator may be different in their scoring but the same relative evaluation applies.
If you are to evaluate "sport scale" its all relative. True scale is about including every detail and docking points for things you exclude. Sport scale is about starting with a relatively scale subject and adding more details, and accruing points for adding them.
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Blue, Pink Green...can't find any of them at my local hardware stores All they've got is the heavy yellow crumbly stuff with aluminum on the outside and the white Styrofoam. I've seen a very thin flexible blue foam but it comes in rolls not sheets and isn't really suitable for building. I guess the stuff people use for building planes just isn't used for insulating houses here in the desert.
I love this idea and am tempted to toss my hat in...but I just don't know if I can actually have something worth entering completed in that time frame. I know I could have something built - but not sure I could afford to gear it up and actually have it flying. I may start building anyway just in case I've been looking for an excuse to tackle something with the pile of balsa I've got laying around and I've been thinking about doing a Van's (Found plans for a RV-4, but would rather do a 3 or a 7 if I could find plans for them instead.)
All they've got is the heavy yellow crumbly stuff with aluminum on the outside and the white Styrofoam. I've seen a very thin flexible blue foam but it comes in rolls not sheets and isn't really suitable for building. I guess the stuff people use for building planes just isn't used for insulating houses here in the desert. I love this idea and am tempted to toss my hat in...but I just don't know if I can actually have something worth entering completed in that time frame. I know I could have something built - but not sure I could afford to gear it up and actually have it flying. I may start building anyway just in case
I've been looking for an excuse to tackle something with the pile of balsa I've got laying around and I've been thinking about doing a Van's (Found plans for a RV-4, but would rather do a 3 or a 7 if I could find plans for them instead.)
Oh...and how do you like that...one quick search later and I see some RV-3 plans....http://outerzone.co.uk/plan_details.asp?ID=5911
Hmmm......
Hmmm......
What? Rivets? Who DOES that?!?
After reviewing the rubric I feel totally unqualified. But, that's not going to stop me!
After reviewing the rubric I feel totally unqualified. But, that's not going to stop me!
I'll be doing rivets as well as aluminum front turtle decks.
Jhitsma, Outerzone has a plans set for a 6/6a under the seaplanes category. There are floats on the plans, but it could be easily converted. I know the 6 isn't quite a 7, but they do look pretty similar, so if one was ambitious enough they might be able to get creative and end up with an RV-7/7A
Wilsonman, great job on the rubric, but what if the aircraft we are building does not normally have an airfoiled tail? Will that apply the same way that aircraft without retracts/weapons will?
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