ORIGINAL: bwick

I manned the courtesy scales the day before the nats started and can say with certainty that there were several people in intermediate and advanced that took advantage of the 115g allowance. I think that rule is great for the lower classes. It promotes lower entry costs to the sport because a lot of those guys get their airplanes from masters and FAI pilots that have some worn out airframes. They can also use some of the cheaper/heavier alternatives for airframes and power plants.

That being said, eliminating the weight rule would be unwise in my opinion. The best and the brightest will always figure out how to take advantage of any relaxation of restrictions. Whatever they come up with will soon become ''must have'' for everybody and it won't be cheap, I promise. General size of the airplanes will grow. Right now were flying models at 4.7-5.05 kilos and with 74-76'' wingspans. Get rid of the weight rule and we can increase the wing span, slap on a YS 200 CDI or use 50c 6000mAh batteries, and increase wing span/area to achieve the same wing loading with a bigger airframe (I'm sure we've all heard the term ''bigger flies better''). Oh, and since the airplane is a bit heavier we better increase that side area on the fuse, or slap another wing on and really go to town. Before you know it, everyone at the top is flying 6kg biplanes with bigger, more powerful, more expensive power plants and we've all figured out that a moveable canard on the front and back of the fuse helps land our snaps better and gives us better control in crosswind conditions. Do you want to guess what that airplane would cost from Oxai? Christophe doesn't care, he got his for free! (nothing against that of course, just making a point) You think $5,000 is a lot of money for an airframe? Chump change.

Im not against taking a second look at the rule and maybe implementing it in a slightly different way to take electric power plants into consideration, but those of you who just want to throw it out the window because you can't make weight are barking up the wrong tree. It seems like this gets discussed once a week on this forum. Somebody needs to sticky one of these threads.