Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

I've read a few posts that wished Senior Pattern would come to the Midwest. The good news is Johnson County RC Flyers Inc. of Edinburgh. Indiana has been awarded a SPA Contest July 26-27, 2008 which is a Saturday and Sunday. I am reaching out to guys and gals from surrounding states to Indiana to come and compete. I have talked to the southern boys and they are coming up to central Indiana to help kick off the Indiana contest. Now you have no excuse. Get your planes ready to rumble.................Go to www.seniorpattern.com for rules and regs..............

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

See you there.

Vince
Hobe Sound, FL
AMA 52779
SPA 377

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

That is great news. I'm new to this vintage stuff, but do have one idea. Is there any chance you can run the contest under the BPA rules? I've talked to a lot of new guys interested in doing the vintage pattern stuff, but without exception all of them want to be able to use retracts and pipes.
Personally, I do as well. I want to recreate the pattern models of the 70's.

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

Plane looks great Vince . . Ummmmmm . . so does the pool ! !

We have had a run of weather between 100 F and 108 F here [:@]

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

The contest up at Apopka, (Orlando), a couple months back, was BPA/SPA combined. This right after the Florida SPA chapter was formed. Orlando Frets was the CD. Separate classes and awards. Jason Shulman was there, flying BPA, and some other guys.
Retracts, pipes, etc. Good mix, lot of fun.

Vince

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

I like the Deception in the second pic from the right.

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

I second that! I would clearly be interested if BPA rules were allowed.

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

The pipes and retracts are more the 80's than the 70's Mike. I will stick with SPA since they brought me to the dance............

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

Not true. Retracts were very common by '72. Way, way before I started pattern in'78. By the '77 Springfield worlds, almost everyone used pipes as well.

Perhaps using both SPA and BPA rules like Crankpin suggested would be possible. I honestly believe it would help the attendance at the event a lot.

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

Mike is right. When Dave Brown came to World Engines in 1968, he started with the Phoenix V and Goldberg retracts. He used Goldberg mechanical retracts for many years. I don't know the dates after that, he started with Southern RC retracts when he acquired the company, or whatever happened there. I used Rhom-Aire's in 1968.

As far as SPA/BPA, my opinion is that it will be combined. Not only to make it more interesting, but to keep the membership up. You gotta figure, we have to keep getting new blood into SPA. Us older guy's are probably in the last decade of our life on this planet.
How many flyer's show up for a contest? Is the expense going to hold some guy's back? Someone made a comment on the classic pattern forum, that the expense of getting there is going to far out weigh the cost of putting a plane together. It takes me 5 hours just to drive out of south Florida. Go a thousand miles one way to a contest at 20 mpg, round trip, hotel, food, etc., go figure.

If I am a CD, and can have 8 flyers that want to fly BPA, and 15 to fly SPA, what am I going to do? Say no? I wouldn't, I would combine it like Orlando Frets did at the first SPA/BPA contest up in Apopka 3 months ago.

I am from those days also, but I want to compete, not to be on a Wheaties box, but put fast pattern planes together. It is very exciting today, to have the old planes, and modern up to date radio gear for them.

Vince

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

OK Mike --Early 70's pipes and retracts not standard and toward the late 70's they were the norm.
Mike here is your perfect plane. Build a SPA legal plane with retracts and you can still fly SPA contest you just can't use your retracts (locked down). Now use a 61 2 stroke side exhaust with standard muffler for SPA and put a swan neck and pipe on for BPA. And if BPA alows 4 stroke there is no pipe issue.........

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

I started flying pattern in the late 60's and almost all the ships at most
of the contests I went to had retracts, maybe 50/50 had pipes.
My first contest ship had Goldberg mechanical retracts. I don't understand
why the SPA is so sticky on the subject of pipes and retracts when they are
so loose on other rules. Most of the ships I've seen resemble the original
designs by name only. Seems the builder has the option to change anything
on the airplane as long as it only slightly resembles the original.

tommy s

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

For me..I hope all this stays "Fun"...That is the main goal IMHO...Having a great time in a Competative but Laid Back environment would be the ultimate in my opinion...

I have only attended an SPA event years ago as a spectator...Never a BPA event...But from what I've read the folks are having a great time!! And that is what it's all about...

Building some Kewl Airplanes from the past seems to a neat idea to allot of people around here...Whatever your personal motivation is...I'm sure it's based..in part..on some fond memories..which deep down inside make you smile...

I'd like to see it stay that way...

Have Fun...

Chuck

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

Absolutely. If it isnt fun it isnt worth doing at all. For myself, the attraction to the vintage pattern models stems from the airplanes and heros that flew them when I was a little kid seeing them in my dads RC mags and at the flying field. I remember back in '71 or '72 when I was 7 or 8 years old, Dave Brown along with my dad and some other guys cut a bunch of Phoenix 5 cores in our basement and a bunch of P5 were at the field the next year. I believe crankpin was one of those guys too. Thats what really got me hooked on models. Those were the coolest airplanes and best pilots I had ever seen and these and the models from the next few years are the airplanes and equipment (engines, exhausts, retracts etc) that I want to recreate with this stuff.
I thought I was unique in this till I saw the BPA pop up and recently started talking about it with other guys and found a lot of interest in true 70's ships.

FWIW, I found these in an earlier post. Its the equipment list of all contestants from the '72 Team Trials. 100% of the pilots used retracts.
I'm certainly not posting this to prove you wrong. I'm hopeful that you can incorporate BPA (allow retracts and pipes) into your contest this year. OK, partially for selfish reasons, I'd do my best to come play if you did, but I also know other guys that would be excited about it and try to come if they could fly true 70's ships and not have to leave gear down or unpipe the engine. In fact one of my best friends had a really cool EU-1A, and being that it had a RE engine w/ a pipe through the canopy, it cant be changed to a muffler w/o a lot of effort.

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

Ok Mike I'll grant you the 72 US teams all had retracts. But what about the TOC and WORLD PATTERN and all the other countries participating. I think you guys are missing one big point about the SPA. The grand sceam is to keep planes affordable ,so more can participate than who has the biggest pockets. I've seen any sport get out of hand for the average Joe Blow can't afford the latest muffler or gazillion dollar racing bike. I myself was looking for a legal SPA plane and forgot my list to take to a swap meet. I found a perfect Wolfgang Matt Arrow with retracts and a ST Blue head rear exhaust and pipe. I knew I had seen an Arrow on the list and I could leave retracts down and swap engines easily. But the Arrow turned out to be a 1978 design and a WORLD PATTERN winner in 1979. Turns out it was the AERO MASTER I remembered on the list. The only reason up to 91 four strokes are approved engines is because of noise limits at more and more fields. The 1975 cut off year for SPA planes was explained that after that special engines and planes became became the norm to be competative.

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

I think that Mike has the right idea. I do not think that the BPA style plane will have any advantage over the SPA type ships. It seems that the majority of the BPA guys want to run the planes as designed but the majority of SPA guys want to stretch em out for the 91s and add rudder area and so on. Either way the planes seem to be fairly well matched. It is too bad that some more SPA Expert types did not attend the Florida Vintage pattern Contest as it would have been a good "real world test" of the styles together in the same competition. The amount of people who would participate in a combined contest should increase over each group flying separately. If the points were a thing then SPA could have 1 set and BPA another. It is basically about the same thing "Flying old pattern planes".

My new Tiger Tail under construction now will be to Ron Chidgey's plans (3-72 MAN) with webra 61BH with stock muffler and Supra Retracts. They will stay down for SPA and go upstairs when I fly anywhere else. My first TT (1975) was fixed gear but my Mach 1 (1976) had Goldbergs (nightmare to set up but they looked SOOOOOOO sweet when up and going). When I do the Mach 1 it will be the same. Being kind of far from the mainstream SPA circuit I could not see building a plane with fixed gear when you can just leave them down for a few contests. I for one would rather see a design built to the original plans with retracts than see a long taildrager with a billboard for a rudder and wheels sticking out in the breeze that is called a Daddy Rabbit, Tiger Tail, Dirty Birdy, Etc.

Just a child of the sixties voicing his own opinion.

Let's keep them all flying.

Peace

Mark O
:):):)

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

I'm planning on being there.

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

Interested in selling the Arrow /w the ST RE 60 and retracts? I always liked that airplane.

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

Mike--

I am an SPA member, and while I understand what you are saying and why, it isn't really a good idea to ask a new SPA chapter sponsoring its first SPA contest to abandon SPA rules. As a new SPA chapter, they need to adhere to SPA rules, or figure a way to allow BOTH BPA and SPA planes to fly back-to-back in one event but stay WITHIN THE SPA RULES as the Florida chapter has managed to do. That is the only way that points generated at the events will count in the national standings.

I understand many former pattern pilots would like SPA to change its rules as a condition of joining, or attending a contest, but that is not going to happen. SPA as an organization was formed in 1991, and the rules are largely unchanged since then. We like the current rules. It really isn't a question of exactly when retracts and tuned pipes were introduced. SPA was formed under the gereral concept of "simple and inexpensive", with the emphasis on simple. Since the SPA cut-off is Dec 1975, I think it is fair to say that although retracts were relatively common at the highest levels of competition, they were not as commonly used by the majority of pilots as they would be within a few years of the 1975 cut-off date. Tuned pipes came after the SPA cut-off for all practical purposes.

The primary reason for the introduction of the 4-stroke into the picture was noise concerns at one of our main chapters. People may argue with that answer, or not believe it, but that is the truth. Many resisted, but in the end converted over because of the better vertical performance the 4-stroke brings. As an aside, for the past two years, more and more 2-strokes are being flown, (I think things go in cycles), yet at that one site, 4-strokes are the rule.

The airplanes are allowed to be modified in minor ways, (not as much as is stated by some on this forum), because the emphasis is placed on competition--not an exact duplication of the vintage model itself. Remember that SPA uses rules in effect all the way through 1975--certain design mods are allowed to help some of the earlier planes to be more competitive. We operate on something commonly referred to as the Duck Rule, (if it looks like a duck, it's a duck).

Today at the SPA Board meeting, national rules were changed so that points generated anywhere in the country can count equally toward the national championship--but in all cases, the same set of SPA rules must be in force for competition to be equal. We can't have different rules in different parts of the country. If pilots wish to compete with BPA aircraft, those competitors can fly and are judged, but they can't place in the final SPA standings. The Florida organizers have done a great job of trying to bring in non-SPA-legal planes. As time goes by, I'm sure things will evolve; right now the Florida system is the best compromise we can come up with.

After all the threads that have appeared in the Classic Pattern forum since it was formed, (debating these points), it is unrealistic to expect everyone to agree with our rules or my attempt at trying to explain the reasons for what we do. I can only hope that this post may help explain things for some pilots.

I'm planning on being one of the SPA "regulars" to attend and support that first Indiana contest. We are all excited about brand new chapters not only in Indiana, but also Oklahoma.

Thanks
Duane Wilson

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

Duane - good post- boys it's like this. I'm sure some don't like the the BPA regulations too. And someone will probably start a different ?BA, because they won't bend any farther. Where will it stop? Now I have not been to a SPA contest yet and I will before Indiana one. But through the news letters I have read the average numbers of pilots have been 20-26 and I don't know how much larger you would want to grow..........Mike someone else was interested in the ARROW in IL. I hadn't replaced my camera to send pictures. It has air retracts and the more I look at it the more I like it. I have an ATLAS kit on order, if it ever gets made.
Randy

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

Gentlemen:
I have with great interest observing this thread. Indeed it is very intersting, some good points, others not so good. Be that as it may, when the Florida Vintage Pattern Association was formed, the first thing we said "WE WOULD NOT VIOLATE SPA RULES" OR INTENTIONALLY DILUTE THE SPA. To date I believe we have adhered to this.

Before the Apopka Florida contest, I spoke to several of the pattern pilots (from NSRCA District 3) who showed interest in the pre 1996, 1975 type airplanes. We all agreed there was no advantage on one type of airplane over the other. That is SPA Legal or so called BPA type. The difference is the pilot. This was proven at Gary Courtneys Huntsville contest and at the Apopka Florida contest.
At the Apopka contest we allowed all planes (both SPA lega and BPA types) to fly together with pilots flying Novice, Sportsman and Expert. In essence, all competed head to head. Points for the SPA Championship were to be awarded being that this was the FIRST CONTEST for 2008 in the SPA Calendar. To keep scoring simple, all scores registerd and posted and awards given as the individual pilots placed (same style as an ordinary contest), remeber no points towards SPA.
Now the difference, since this was also an SPA contest, ONLY THE SPA MEMBERS were elible to fly in this part They were awarded their awards as they placed by removing the non SPA pilots scores.
This then satisfies the SPA RULES and has all the pilots competing with SPA/BPA airplanes. I only wished I would have had more time to put the contest on, one month to get approval from SPA, get the information out to the public, modify a pattern scoring program and CD the contest was agreat chore. But I enjoyed it.

In all the years I have been associated with and flying pattern, I have flown Dirty birdy with fixed gear, Kaos with fixed gear, Miss Norway with Retracts, and a full blown MK Arrow. I'll soon be test flying an original MK Arrow kit I have just finished (getting ready for this year), this contest has been the most relaxing and the most fun I have been assocoated with. Sharing airplanes seemed to be the norm. In fact, I may even say at next years contest that no pilot can fly the same airplane more than twice.

Summarizing, SPA can fly alongside BPA and if scored correctly, we will not violate nor DILUT SPA effprts. spa HAS DONE AN OUTSTANDINF JOB SO FAR, LETS NOT RUIN THIS.

My $.02 worth.

Orlando Frets

AKA Crashlander

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

Very well spoken Crashlander. I do not really care about "points". I think you will find that most people just want a chance to fly these birds with a group of people that have the same interest. Retracts, pipes..... yeah I love them!!!! BUT....To be able to compete against other people for the fun of it and walk away with some fond memories is good enough for me.

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

I understand where you guys are coming from and what you are saying. I certainly didnt mean to ruffle any feathers or in anyway start a SPA vs. BPA vs whatever disucssion. My only point really was that I know a group of guys that would get airplanes going and come fly in this new event if they could fly a true 70's model with retracts and pipes, but likely wouldnt come if the event didnt allow those airplanes.
For myself, like the others I mentioned, its about a trip down memory lane, not about points or winning or loosing a contest. God knows I've been down that road for a long time and am not looking for a new place to be serious about competitive aerobatics.
I apologize if my comments were taken differently than I meant them.

speedster, if you do find a way to satisfy the SPA rules and incorporate BPA type models into your event like suggested by a few guys above, please publicize the fact. It will make a difference to some folks in deciding to attend, and I'd love to see your event do well.

Also, if you decide to sell the Arrow and the other deal doesnt do through, let me know and send a few pics when you can too.

m

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

Mike:

That's one of my points.
As an example:
A pilot shows up with a chaos (Kaos, spelll??) with a tuned pipe and retracts. If SPA and BPA flew together, then that pilot would not qualify for SPA, but he certainly qualifies for BPA, Historic, Oen (call it whatever) but let him fly.

Now that's fun and opens upa a route to new friendships.

That is my take on the matter and that is what I did at my contest.

RE: Good News for Senior Pattern in Midwest
 

Mike, I watched this conversation and stayed out of it (until now ;) )

The only "answer" to this "problem" is for the contest to be held like Orlando did the one in Apopka....or, they can just say "too bad"...in which case, you can always CD a BPA event yourself. Mike McConville CDs a BPA event in the midwest.....yeah, somehow I think you'd get some attendance! (I'd make the drive for that one myself).

BPA rules have been, are and always should be extremely relaxed, because it works well. It's FUN. I like SPA and the guys that fly it, but frankly I just don't relate with the planes....and I'm all about the planes. if you search this forum a little, this discussion goes back years and years and years, and always ends up the same way for some reason. We (BPA style guys) don't seem to see a problem with flying both and see it all as compatible, while core SPA members do not. It has become obvious that we can't change thier minds about that, but it is certainly swinging that way. The ballistic style of flying and people our age are growing in numbers so it's only a matter of time until something, somewhere, somehow has to change. This is why Gary held the first BPA meet in Huntsville, to break it loose and test the arguements so to speak. I think he started something that is gathering some momentum if we don't let it die on the vine.

We as a group do not care much for becoming organized and official, we like it loose just like it is. If SPA would accomidate us we'd be more than happy to "merge" so to speak, but we are not asking and do not expect them to, as they have made it pretty clear that it's just not going to happen right now. And that's fine, we do understand. Most of us hold the opinion that SPA is missing a great opportunity, that's all.

I hope you have more success than we did :D I know you're not trying to push, but some people won't see it that way. Again, just read back a little in other threads. But don't stop trying! LOL

And I hope to see you in Huntsville this year!

-Mike