ORIGINAL: budgetdude
Has anyone thought about spectator apeal. I get tons of comments on my pilot (the foam goat-tee guy) from my non rc friends and local club spectators. Its usually one of the first things they notice. They could give a crap about the 3:1 thrust to weight, or that I have 3000+ ounces of servo tourque. It looks like a full scale plane to them and I think they dig it.
Then if you like pilots and want one, do it. But it should have NOTHING to do with the outcome of a contest. The original intent of the rule was in the early days of IMAC when having a pilot and panel actually hurt performance due to weight. So the idea was to ding a pilot for not having one due to the performance gain he got from not having the weight. That reasoning is long gone. Now we try to use silliness about how it makes the planes scale, etc.
Like I keep saying, pilots are fine, if you want them. But they should have ZERO to do with scoring the contest. And if you ARE going to require them, then it needs to be defined and made an absolute requirement. No pilot, no fly. Period.