RE: Airplane on a Treadmill
"And if you look at the landing gear on their airplane, you'll instantly recognize that their test vehicle destroys the validity of the test. No way that crappy gear comes close to not biasing the results."
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I mentioned the obvious lack of suitability of that PoC for the test, and the more obvious lack of ability of the 'busters themselves to fly r/c planes on the Mythbusters forum, and got my head chewed off.
With all the people in the SF area that -can- fly r/c, and all the much more suitable planes to use... I guess the "how hard can it be?" syndrome pokes its ugly head up way too frequently.
Proper testing demands all the variables be controlled, so that -only- the one being tested for can change. With unsuitable test gear and novice users, there's nothing but chaos to expect for results.
I'd also mentioned their poor procedures with their r/c full-scale cars, without any means of fail-safe.. the cars would frequently take off by themselves without being controllable. Now, they point out they have fail-safes incorporated in their cars.