This thread came back on topic....

I went to Brian Howard's regular judging school in 2004 at Desert Aircraft. I went to the Advanced Judging School in 2005 held in Chandler. I was also at the judging refresher at the Tucson Shootout. Here is what I was taught and what I recall.

1. The standard is perfection. Deductions are taken from there.
2. There is no "allowed" displacement on snaps that isn't deducted. As a judge, you have to find a consistent way to downgrade for ANY displacement after the snap.
3. Whether or not it's possible to snap without displacment is irrelevant. The standard is perfection. The pilot that meets the criteria with less displacement would get less of a deduction than the pilot with more displacement.
4. Much to the dismay of the judging "perfection standard" purists, a "judging reference card" was published by IMAC that now stated that "Lateral/Vertical displacement of line due to the snap NOT downgraded". This guideline doesn't appear to have any basis on the published judging criteria in the manual, but the statement was put on the IMAC "judging reference card" anyway.
5. Because it was on the "reference card" (but not in the judging criteria in the manual), Brian allowed the "reference card" "guideline" to be used at the Shootout.

This move away from the "perfection" standard which wasn't based on the criteria in the published judging guide is what Brian mentioned being addressed. I don't think he had any plans to change ANY rules. As Aresti2004 states, that takes many years. He just wants to make sure we go back to following the existing rules instead of the "reference card" someone created, which I'm guessing has no actual authority as a set of rules. It was just created for convenience.

I judged all year based on the manual and didn't read the "reference card". All the pilots WERE deducted for displacement in snaps, except for my judging at the Shootout.

My best wishes to all the pilots next year, whether it's the same class or a higher class. I know I'm going to have my hands full with the Advanced class in the Southwest Region!!!

Take care,

Dean Bird
2005 Tucson Shootout Intermediate Class Champion
2005 IMAC Southwest Intermediate Class Champion

What you were taught at the judging refresher seems questionable. If an actual snap is executed, some displacement must occur, however slight. So based on the idea that the standard is perfection, a perfect snap must include a pitching movement prior to any roll inducement through autorotation. And since you will not get an instantaneous transition from an unstalled condition to a stalled condition, the wing will experience an increase in lift in the direction of the pitching movement and there will be some departure from the original line of flight before any true autorotation is possible. If rolling occurs before this, than at a minimum, there has to be a downgrade for the number of degrees of roll that ocurred before actual autorotation started. Another can of worms.

So, to faithfully follow what they told you about the standard of perfection, it seems to require that we apply what we know to be true about actual snaps vs. everything else. It follows that an actual snap must have some displacement in the pitch axis to start with, however slight. Then it might become a question of how much departure is acceptable without a downgrade. Other stuff could happen during the snap, whether through luck, turbulence, pilot technique etc, that might just get the model back on to the original line. So if the expectation they are setting is that you have to fly it back to the original line during the snap to counter the displacement from the snap onset, that's a different story. Is that what they meant or was it supposed to be that no departure at all could occur, i.e., are they saying that the CG of the model is supposed to stay pinned to the original line?

I think you missed something Dean.

Brian feels that there should be no displacement, however he recognized at both the Chandler class and at the Shootout that the IMAC rules DO NOT define a downgrade. As long as the track of the plane prior to and after the snaps roll is parallel then it is OK. A snap is a stalled maneuver and we cannot downgrade for a displacement that may occur during the stalled portion and autorotation.

Bill Malvey
Chairman IMAC Rules Committee

So where can the Unlimited pilots petition for more figures and less snaps ?

Why can't we have something like 6 of 8 opposite 3 of 4 ?

Flying the 2006 Unlimited proposals, I feel like I'm learning to fly all over again.

I even bought a pattern plane, just in case I decide to jump the IMAC ship.

Paul

You're not the only one! Hey Paul, we should talk about how we practice next year. I've got some news for you that I think might be interesting. Start planning for the Pattern Nats man!

Post your comments on the IMAC website. There is a "comment" provision on the 2006 sequence page. Not sure it will result in much, but that is probably the best way to get the feedback submitted.

I'll agree with you up until you start adding your comments..

"As long as the track of the plane prior to and after the snaps roll is parallel then it is OK. A snap is a stalled maneuver and we cannot downgrade for a displacement that may occur during the stalled portion and autorotation."

I don't remember that being stated in either of the judging classes. What was said is that it didn't matter whether not is was possible to do a snap without displacing. If/when it happens, find a consistent was to apply a deduction. The whole deal about stalled conditions is discussed in stall turn and spin judging, I would agree. But those are trying to address the flight path moving because of wind during a stalled condition. It's real stretch (and wrong) to apply stall turn and spin "wind drift" allowable deviations to a snap.

The displacement after a snap doesn't have a defined deduction criteria. Very true. Neither does the deduction for the shape of a loop. But as a judge we find a consistent way to apply the deductions based on how bad it is.

Obviously, we're all speaking for Brian. It sounds like he's on the right committee to address the question. I was just giving you all warning that it doesn't take a rule change to start deducting for snap displacment. The rules already state that the "competitor is required to make the shape of all maneuvers perfect". Whether or not that's possible is irrelevant. I do remember Brian's comments that even though it may not be possible to snap without some displacement of the line doesn't mean we can ignore it. We just have to find a consistent way to apply a deduction. The less there is, the less of a deduction.

There are a few deviations from "perfect" allowed by rule (you mention a couple above), but having a different exit line when adding a snap element on a line isn't one of the allowed deviations from "perfect" geometry.

Again, the problem at the Shootout was that someone added a new allowed deviation from "perfect" on the "judging reference" card. It was only created for convenience, it isn't the rules. The only point I'm trying to make is that removing the statement that doesn't have a basis in the rules is an easy correction that doesn't require any rules changes. It was just a tool created for convenience and isn't the official rules.

We'll let Brian deal with it!!

Take care,

Dean

NJRCFLYER2,

All of would you said may be true. Again, whether or not it's possible doesn't matter. We weren't taught that the "perfect" snap doesn't displace. We were taught that the judging criteria of "perfect" geometry requires a deduction for the line being displaced on the exit. The person that displaces less is deducted less than the person that displaces more.

Good luck to everyone at next year's contests!!

Take care,

Dean Bird
Sun Valley Fliers
Phoenix, AZ

dean, this is very troubling thread. brian does not speak for imac, we all know he has an iac, not an imac background. And a lot of us feel that the hazy relationship with IAC often produces strange results. Regradless of anyone's credentials, no one has specific rules authority, nor can anyone change or modify published rules. All anyone can do is offer an opinion of interpretation, but anyone is free to challenge that opinion. Another "qualified judge" could easily teach a class that takes the position that because the IMAC rules are silent on a downgrade, no downgrade should be given. Downgrades should be based on defined criteria, and with little or no opportunity for personal bias - yet that is exactly what is being said - that individual judges should create their own criteria in determining placement downgrade. That defeats the whole purpose of having rules. The source of the judging card is the rules...it is clear and unambiguous: the cornerstone of judging.

I appreciate the effort that is going into these judging schools, but unless the schools are taught with a consistent and uniform criteria, and unless the persons teaching the school have a firm grasp on the IMAC rules, they are of questionable benefit. IMAC is committee happy, maybe sometime can spent addressing issues such as this one, or at least the RDs recognize the inconsistency and take some steps to address it. Personally, if I were to CD a contest - and bring your jackets, because hell would be frozen over - this issue would be disussed in the pilot's letter, as well as at the pilot's meeting. and it goes without saying that aresttedin2004 would be chief judge.

P

I don't disagree. The "published rules" state that "The competitor is required to make the shape of all maneuvers perfect". Nowhere in the snap judging criteria does it say that there is an allowed deviation from "perfect" geometry. There is an allowed deviation for "wind drift" in a stalled condition during stall turns and spins. No such deviation from "perfect" is described in the judging criteria for snaps.

So by the book, the deviation from "perfect" would be a downgrade. As with loop shape, there is no hard criteria that can be measured. As a judge, you have to be consistent in applying the appropriate deduction for how much displacement, if any, occurred during the snap.

Just going by the manual. Don't shoot the messenger (Brian).


Later,

Dean

Sorry Dean, but you have yourself all twisted up here. First, I did the reference card and I know the how and why of what is in it. The "added" line you talk about is there to make this very topic clear. THERE ARE NO DOWNGRADES IN THE RULES FOR DISPLACEMENT DURING THE SNAP. I simply cannot make it any clearer. Email Fred Johnson and Wally Pitts if you think I am off base here. It was their decision to "add" the clarification to the judging summary card. I agreed with it as well.

It is your statement that has no basis in the rules. PLEASE find me where it defines a downgrade for being displaced during a snap roll. It does not exist. You are using this theoretical "perfection" ideal that Brian talks about. That's fine, but you have to go back to the rules and actually find the defined downgrade, and it is not there.

To do what you (and Brian) are talking about WILL require a rules change since it will require adding verbiage to define the downgrade that you so dearly want to use. I know that Brian does not agree with the rules as they stand now, but there it is. I am sure that this topic will come up as we move forward with the next rules cycle, but for now you simply cannot apply a downgrade that you think exists without being able to show the defined downgrade in the rules.

Once again, the reason for this is that a snap is a stalled figure, the plane is not fully under the pilot's control during the snap (stall and autorotation) and therefore IMAC allows the track to displace during the snap. However, the track prior to and immediately after the snap must be parallel. In other words if the plane finishes the snap and is climbing at 10 degrees, and is 20 degrees off the yaw axis, THEN those ARE downgrades. But if the two lines are perfectly parallel, then there are NO downgrades.

Again, if you are having trouble with what I am saying here, please email Fred Johnson or Wally Pitts about it. They will refer it to the IMAC Rules Committee for review and comment.

Bill Malvey
Chairman - IMAC Rules Committee

Dean,

Bill is right on this one. There is no defined downgrade for displacement of the line on snaps. So we grade to the criteria that a displacement is allowed. Whether we agree with the rules or not. This has been decided on as the current standard for IMAC by Fred, and supported by Wally.

That ruling was made several years ago by Fred, et all; when this very question started coming up at the IMAC judges schools throughout the nation. Unfortunately, in the 2007-2008 RCP process we missed making sure we clarified what the IMAC standard is with the rules that have gone forward to the AMA. So we will be having these discussions for a few more years until we can get clearer criteria in the IMAC rules.

FWIW,

Anna Wood
Queen Creek, AZ

Got several pilots to fly all the proposed knowns for 2006 and have some great feedback for the BOD and membership.
Ken McQuire and Kurt Koelling have the notes, hope they can share them with us.
For the most part, the sequences went pretty well but there were some maneuvers that just ate up airspace and will either need to be changed or a different sequence selected. The only one I personally remember nobody liking was the Unlimited proposal with the crossbox figure N. I think there was an Advanced sequence nobody liked also but don't remember which one or why.

Also got to do that inverted 360 aerobatic turn I mentioned last week. Went easier than I expected. Hum, never the case when it matters!
Will B.

LOL.

I said that the day the proposals came out on the NC list and had several people tell me that it would be fine, etc.
Glad to see people arent liking it.

Seems hard to judge/fly a 45 line going out or in.

A cross box figure N? For real? That clearly presents a major problem with being able to fly it or judge it with any kind of accuracy. Must be just a test to make sure people are paying attention.

Nobody thinks there is a "defined downgrade" for the displacement. But the "perfection" standard isn't "theoretical". It says right in the book that "The competitor is required to make the shape of all maneuvers perfect". Seems pretty clear, not "theoretical".

Other manevuers such as stall turns and spins specifically mention when less than perfect doesn't cause a deduction. I see no allowable deviation from perfect without a deduction mentioned in the snap judging criteria. Hmm......

The fact there is no "defined downgrade" for loops that aren't perfectly round doesn't stop us from taking a deduction when they aren't "perfect". As the book states, we just "develop a reproducible method to judge" the maneuver.

I have no problem following the reference card!! Anything with a snap is my lowest scoring maneuver, so I'll take any gifts I can get!!

See you next year. Hope to see you at the Cactus Classic!!

Dean Bird
Sun Valley Fliers
Phoenix, AZ

Great thread guys.

As S Hannah stated, the best place to comment is on the IMAC site. These comments will all be taken into account before the BOD discussion and selection beginning next week.

Dean, I understand where you are coming from, but please point me to where it says a perfect geometrical snap contains no displacement. I have discussed this with several people and arrived at one way to look at it.

Consider the aircraft in autorotation as rotating around the outside of a cylinder. With one wing in a stalled condition, the aircraft's rotation is about an axis located somewhere out on the stalled wing. If you are performing one full snap, theoretically the airplane will make one rotation about that axis and end up in the same spot. It is when you do fractional snaps, especially the half snap, that the airplane will rotate partially around this "cylinder" and exit at a different spot. This is how displacement in a perfect snap can be justified.

Please, don't read this as a definition I've found somewhere, just one theory derived from a bunch of dumb pilots talking aerodynamics. ;-)

Daniel Rathbun
South Central RD

Dan,

Thanks for the awareness of how the rules are written!!

I think most will agree that a perfectly flown snap may displace, and likely should in partial snaps. But flying the element perfect, and maintaining perfect geometry is two totally different things. That's why it's been said that it may not be possible to fly snaps without displacment. But the displacement would still be deducted because it isn't perfect geometry, which is required by rule. The guy with less displacement would get less of a deduction than the pilot with more displacement.

For Aresti2004, Fred, and Wally to rationalize that it can't be deducted because the deduction isn't specifically mentioned nullifies the requirement that the "competitor is required to make the shape of all maneuvers perfect". Instead, they've turned the judging concept 180 degrees to say "Fly it however you want. We can only deduct what is specifically mentioned in the judging guide." We've all been told many times that the standard is perfection, and we deduct from there.

It's been pointed that the "justification" for the new guideline on the reference card is because the snap is a stalled condition. When less than perfect geometry ISN'T a deduction, that IS specifically mentioned in the judging guide. The Spins and Stall Turns are examples. The snap judging criteria doesn't have any allowance for less than perfect geometry.

I'm not against getting gifts on snaps!! I hate them, and everyone I fly with knows it. It just seems clear that the rules don't give me the gift. My "Thanks" to Fred and Wally.

Best of luck to the South Central Region in 2006!! The pilots from your region are always a blast to hang out with at the Shootout!!

Take care,

Dean Bird
Sun Valley Fliers
Phoenix, AZ

Yes I remember Wayne. To be honest, it can be done but it seems that you need to be as close to the dead line as you can, and as deep in the box as you can. Sort of not the point of trying to keep the foot print down.
Will

Dean,

instead of trying to change the rules, you should use them at your own advantage.

For example. The less you displace in a snap, the easier it is to keep track and stop the snap at the desired angle (level, inverted or whatever angle) as the snaps that are less "deep" are easier to control that those made by some on 3D rates.

What I try to say is that if the rules don't specify any displacement amount, then use the displacement amount that is best for YOU and judges will have no choice of giving you better scores.

That said, no intention here to flame or anything like that. I truly feel the rules are out of my reach and the best way to deal with them is to actually USE them.

You really are beating a dead horse here Dean. The rule is what it is and you know what the official interpretation is. You are over interpreting what Brian Howard said. Plus he feels that way due to his IAC background. We ARE NOT saying "fly it as you want to". Rather you are saying "judges deduct what you want to without regard to the actual rules". I like our method better. It says that there are no downgrades for displacing the line during the snap as long as the two lines are exactly parallel before and after the actual snap. How much more clear does it need to be??

You actually prefer a system where Judge "A" can take two points off for any displacement, Judge "B" might take 1 point, Judge "C" might take whatever hits him as right and so on?? This is the pitfall of the "judges should develop a consistent system...." Which by the way is NOT mentioned anywhere in the snap section when talking about this issue. It is in the loops and that is being changed for exactly the reason stated above.

Here are the pertinent phrases from the F&JG

From Section 8.9.3 (bottom of page)

Throughout the snap roll, the main axis of the snap roll’s rotational
must be in the correct plane and direction of flight.

A changing rate of rotation or the nose moving more
onto the flight path (like a roll) is the most often observed change in
character.
END QUOTE


OK. So it clearly says that the snap roll must be in the "correct plane and direction of flight". Notice it does NOT say that it must be on the same line!! In fact the next line infers that if it IS on the same line it is likely more of an aileron roll as opposed to a snap roll.

The one and ONLY possible nit to pick here is that this does not specifically allow for a change in altitude on horizontal snaps, where if it happened, it would be most noticeable. This is in fact what bothers Brian the most. I know this from having discussed it with him several times. The interpretation made by Fred, Wally, and myself when we did the Summary Card was that it is reasonable to expect that if lateral displacement (on the same plane of flight, not line) is allowed then it is NOT unreasonable to also allow a displacement in altitude. Allowing a displacement along the two primary axis of control in a snap (pitch and yaw) seemed consistent.

So again, the rules AS IS are VERY clear that there is NO requirement to be on the same line, only the same plane. Further, the rules infer that being on the same line MAY be cause for a downgrade and indicate the snap was not done properly. So, the interpretation was made that allowing a vertical displacement (altitude when horizontal) was consistent. the requirement is to maintain the exact same track prior and after the snap roll. This maintains the base geometry of the figure.

I hope this puts to issue to bed for you and any others that may be having difficulty with this issue.

Bill Malvey
Chairman - IMAC Rules Committee