F1?
03-26-2002, 04:19 PM
#1
F1?
I've been inactive in the hobby for several years and cannot find anything about F1 these days. The last I saw, there was an anoucement that pylon had been suspended under better cages for pylon judges could be constructed. I see Q500 and QM40 is alive, but what about F1?
John
John
03-26-2002, 06:14 PM
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F1?
Well we have off-course judging now. All of the pylon and turn judges are at least 300 feet off course.
F1 is gone, but there is a coming resurgence of F1 like planes in QM-40.
Duane Gall wrote something in Model Aviation a few months back about some F1 related possibilities.
If you like F1, you will like QM-40 at its current level of development.
Check out PylonWorld.com to see what's out there now.
If you want to buy F1 kits, some are still available. In fact, this fall, I'm going to start making Stegall Minnows again.
F1 is gone, but there is a coming resurgence of F1 like planes in QM-40.
Duane Gall wrote something in Model Aviation a few months back about some F1 related possibilities.
If you like F1, you will like QM-40 at its current level of development.
Check out PylonWorld.com to see what's out there now.
If you want to buy F1 kits, some are still available. In fact, this fall, I'm going to start making Stegall Minnows again.
03-26-2002, 07:16 PM
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F1?
It had a number of problems.
The price of Nitro went way up. A lot of the power development in F1 was based on Nitro usage. Dub Jett was a leader in trying to get people to go to 15%, but the effort was not successful. Home brew fuel was the standard for F1.
The straight wide-open pipe on the exhaust meant that the planes were deafeningly loud. More and more fields had noise issues. Dub tried to get people to agree on a muffler, but that effort failed.
The scale judging was always an issue. Penalizing people because of the looks of their plane didn't make anyone happy except those that were in the first row. My dad had a wing to get bumped and a hole poked in it on the way to the Nats one year. He spent many hours and dollars to get that fixed before judging. I'll give you the details if you want them. These days, if some cracks up something on landing, etc, they superglue or epoxy it, maybe sand it, and get back to racing. And they don't even have to repaint the plane for the next race. IMO the SWRA made a big mistake in adding scale judging to their event.
The limited range of full scale subjects was another issue. When QM-15 started, most of the planes were F1 replicas. Greg Doe, Jimmy Katz, and others started using other types of planes and people realized that they had a whole new palette of subjects. This carried over to QM-40. To my knowledge, even though the TRC-1 was designed and partially constructed. But I don't believe one has flown yet. Jerry Small's Sidewinder is a replica of the TRC-1 and is a very popular plane. That's kind of the extreme, but look at the QM-40 Approved Plane List and you will see a lot of variety. Mostly F1's and unlimiteds, but a Bugatti? I thought that one was interesting because I saw a construction article in one of the mags for an electric Bugatti and I started thinking about how one could be done for QM-40. I would still like to see photos of the Q40 version.
Dub wasn't the only person that tried to save F1, but he was vocal and a leader, and accurately predicted its demise. Dub is a smart guy. One thing that he had a problem with on QM-40 was allowing long wings. It kind of kills the scale factor of the planes. And the 56" wings are harder to transport than the typical 48" wings on the F1's.
The price of Nitro went way up. A lot of the power development in F1 was based on Nitro usage. Dub Jett was a leader in trying to get people to go to 15%, but the effort was not successful. Home brew fuel was the standard for F1.
The straight wide-open pipe on the exhaust meant that the planes were deafeningly loud. More and more fields had noise issues. Dub tried to get people to agree on a muffler, but that effort failed.
The scale judging was always an issue. Penalizing people because of the looks of their plane didn't make anyone happy except those that were in the first row. My dad had a wing to get bumped and a hole poked in it on the way to the Nats one year. He spent many hours and dollars to get that fixed before judging. I'll give you the details if you want them. These days, if some cracks up something on landing, etc, they superglue or epoxy it, maybe sand it, and get back to racing. And they don't even have to repaint the plane for the next race. IMO the SWRA made a big mistake in adding scale judging to their event.
The limited range of full scale subjects was another issue. When QM-15 started, most of the planes were F1 replicas. Greg Doe, Jimmy Katz, and others started using other types of planes and people realized that they had a whole new palette of subjects. This carried over to QM-40. To my knowledge, even though the TRC-1 was designed and partially constructed. But I don't believe one has flown yet. Jerry Small's Sidewinder is a replica of the TRC-1 and is a very popular plane. That's kind of the extreme, but look at the QM-40 Approved Plane List and you will see a lot of variety. Mostly F1's and unlimiteds, but a Bugatti? I thought that one was interesting because I saw a construction article in one of the mags for an electric Bugatti and I started thinking about how one could be done for QM-40. I would still like to see photos of the Q40 version.
Dub wasn't the only person that tried to save F1, but he was vocal and a leader, and accurately predicted its demise. Dub is a smart guy. One thing that he had a problem with on QM-40 was allowing long wings. It kind of kills the scale factor of the planes. And the 56" wings are harder to transport than the typical 48" wings on the F1's.
03-26-2002, 07:26 PM
#5
F1?
Don,
Thank you very much for clarifying that. I remember the noise and scale judging issues though I'm pretty sure I went inactive before the nitro price went up. I remember one year when all of the fuel manufs said it was difficult to come by, unless you went to a hot rod shop and they seemed to have all you could want. At that time, long wings were the new experiment. From the events I've looked at in the last day, it appears that QM40 is pretty well established. I'm glad there was a replacement for F1 instead of the total loss of the genre.
I'm still not active, but I very much miss it. One of these days, I'll find the time to get back at the bench.
John
Thank you very much for clarifying that. I remember the noise and scale judging issues though I'm pretty sure I went inactive before the nitro price went up. I remember one year when all of the fuel manufs said it was difficult to come by, unless you went to a hot rod shop and they seemed to have all you could want. At that time, long wings were the new experiment. From the events I've looked at in the last day, it appears that QM40 is pretty well established. I'm glad there was a replacement for F1 instead of the total loss of the genre.
I'm still not active, but I very much miss it. One of these days, I'll find the time to get back at the bench.
John
03-26-2002, 07:53 PM
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F1?
The QM-40 planes are good flying planes, and land hot like the F1's. Even though all molded composites are most often in the winner's circle, there are quite a few fiberglass and foam wing core kits out there. If you have an asphalt runway, they are fun even as sport planes.
There has been some talk of a QM-40 Sport class similar to Q-500 Sport.
There has been some talk of a QM-40 Sport class similar to Q-500 Sport.
