Guys,
There is another thread regarding the latest issue of Model Aviation.
Some of you commented about the articles, expressing your approval. I checked out the author.
He might be a very nice person, and I will state at the outset, I have no ill feelings for him. Keep on reading.

I looked at AMA PDF document 510M, as I had never heard of the author, Pete Oochroma, and was amazed when I did not find his name on the list of turbine waiver holders.
After checking and re-checking, I called Illona Maine at AMA headquarters, who verified that Pete Oochroma is NOT an AMA menber, and of course, does NOT hold a turbine waiver.

She suggested that I send an e-mail to two people...one of them, Michael Ramsey, the Editor, and to Rob Kurek, the Director of Publications.

Here' a copy of my letter to them:

Gentlemen,
I am writing this e-mail after reading a pair of articles appearing in the August 2008 issue of Model Aviation.
I was initially quite happy to see the turbine related articles authored by Mr. Pete Oochroma.
After reading both articles, I was amazed to find out that your contributing author is not an AMA member and turbine waiver holder. If he is a member of a similar group in England, Canada or elsewhere, and is turbine qualified, that fact should have been mentioned in the magazine.
Today, these facts were confirmed to me by an AMA headquarters staff member. I was curious about his qulifications because of some of the innacuracies in one of his articles. After searching AMA PDF document 510M, I did not find his name. I then called AMA headquarters for confirmation.
From this months editirial page: "The builder had the model framed up in no time, and has since logged many flight hours on it".
My question: With, or without a waiver? AMA legal...or does he fly on private property without AMA coverage?
Am I on target, or do I have some bad info?

Every AMA turbine waiver holder feels that he or she has jumped through some hoops in order to initially obtain and then maintain the waiver, so we are rather protective of it. The turbine waiver represents much personal desire and devotion to the sport. It is very meaningful to most of us. As the AMA rules require turbine flyers top pass certain qualification tests in order to possess a turbine waiver, I would expect the AMA magazine to make sure contributing authors of turbine related articles to do no less.

I have been an active RC jet pilot since 1999, and participate in the hobby industry as a BVM Jets field representative, a JetCat USA field representative and own seven BVM Jets, with several hundred turbine flights in my logbook.

I will anxiously awate your reply,

Sincerely,


Harley Condra.


Here's the reply from Rob Kurek, Director of Publications.
Harley,
Thank you very much for bringing your concerns to my attention. I have asked the editorial staff to look into this matter and respond.

Certainly we want to make certain MA reflects accurate information. If need be, we will run a correction in the next available issue. Your points are well taken, and will strive to be more careful and clear in presenting this type of information in the future.

Thank you,

Rob Kurek
Director of Publications

Well, his reply seemed okay, but I wasn't convinced.

Here's the reply from Michael Ramsey, the Editor.

"Mr. Condra
Our contributor is a private individual who happens to fly his turbine powered models at a personal airfield. Your concern is interesting (and initial part of the evaluation process), however, the editorial staff found the contributing author in question to be the most relevant and well written article that best adhered to the purpose of the article-to introduce and explain the modern turbine powerplant. If his article is correct and serves the purpose of helping the membership understand the Jet special interest and get more involved and well as supportive, then I fail to see a serious greivance.

I'm curious as to what errors you've found as we'd like to mend any issue of that kind as soon as posssible.

We applaud the efforts of the Turbine Waver holder community and of course we recommended sand outlined the waver process in the article as you will note..

Sincerely,
Michael Ramsey
Editor MA", blah blah, blah

I think he should learn to spell Waiver! He said it twice, and misspelled it twice!

I think that his reply was arrogant.
I wrote a reply, but haven't sent it, as my e-mail program started acting up. I will send it as soon as I can. Here it is:

Michael,
Thank you for your explanation, however it is very weak, and does not speak well for the AMA headquarters staff.
Within our turbine community is a constellation of more experienced jet flyers than your contributor, including AMA Hall of Fame members that are active participants in the hobby industry.
Many of these individuals have forgotton more than your contibutor has learned with his short excursion into jets, and many of these industry members are capable of far better explanations of the fine points of turbine modeling. Sorry you elected to publish an article written by a friend that does not represent our special interest group.
If your editorial staff found your non-member contributor's offering to be more relevant, then it is obvious that you and the editorial staff do not in any way represent the special interest group. If you would rather rely on "non AMA member private airfield lone wolves" to help the dues paying membership understand the Jet special interest, then you must be more interested in selling magazines than in serving the AMA membership.
It is obvious that your mind is made up. I will not correct his errors, except to say that your "more relevant" contributor's knowledge about the waiver process was not learned from personal experience, since he doesn't qualify for one.

Sorry if I seem critical, but as I stated, we guys that have been around since the beginning of turbines worked hard for, and are protective of our waivers.
I'm sorry that you are not.
Your reply has raised my blood pressure slightly. I have decided to forward these communications to the JPO and others. I think our SIG should know who is representing us in print.

Sincerely,

Harley Condra
AMA 2045
Waiver 2290
JPO 1033
BVM REP
JetCat REP

What do you guys think?

MY EDIT SINCE YOU ASKED.

Michael,
Thank you for your explanation, however it appears weak to me and does not speak well for the AMA headquarters staff (in the sense that………….).
Within the waivered turbine community is a constellation of more experienced jet flyers than your contributor, including AMA Hall of Fame members that are active participants in the hobby industry.
Many of these individuals have forgotten more than your contributor has learned with his short excursion into jets, and many of these industry members are capable of far better explanations of the fine points of turbine modeling. Sorry you elected to publish an article written by a friend (ARE YOU SURE) that does not represent WAIVERED PILOTS our special interest group, THE JPO.
If your editorial staff found your non-member contributor's offering to be more relevant, then it is obvious that you and the editorial staff do not in any way represent the special interest group. If you would rather rely on "non AMA member private airfield lone wolves" to help the dues paying membership understand the Jet special interest, then you must be more interested in selling magazines than in serving the AMA membership.
It is obvious that your mind is made up (NOT SURE I AGREE WITH THAT). I will not correct his errors, except to say that your "more relevant" contributor's knowledge about the waiver process was not learned from personal experience, since he doesn't qualify for one.

Sorry if I seem critical, but as I stated, we WAIVERED AMA PILOTS that have been around since the beginning of turbines worked hard for, and are protective of our waivers.
I'm sorry that you are not (TAKE THIS LAST SENT. OUT OR EDIT IT BETTER).
Your reply has raised my blood pressure slightly. I have decided to forward these communications to the JPO and others. I think our SIG should know who is representing us in print.

Sincerely,

Harley Condra
AMA 2045
Waiver 2290
JPO 1033
BVM REP
JetCat REP

Excellent response Harley. Can you please provide us with the Editor's and the Director of Publications' e-mail addresses? I too would like to comment on their choice of authors (in a civilized manner).

Thanks.

Here's the e-mail addresses:
Michael Ramsey (Editor of MA) [email protected]
Rob Kurek ( Director of Publications) [email protected].

Sorry Sean, I got my e-mail problem cleared up and have sent the reply as I wrote it. Your edits are good ones, and I would have used them irf ZI had not sent it yet.
I wrote to Frank Tiano (HMFIC of the JPO) and he is concerned as well. I forwarded a copy to BV too, as I want him to know what I am up to, since I represent BVM as a field rep.

Treat these guys civily....you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. No flames, no threats......

Well I'm sure if any of the "industry members" contributed a better article to MA, they wouldn't need to resort to Mr. lone wolf.

True, Mr. Oochroma would be more credible had he held a waiver, but since his article is already circulating the modeling community, why wouldn't you offer to correct any mistakes you saw? You're preaching maintaining the integrity of a special interest group, yet you rather leave potential newcomers misinformed?

I'm sure they just received the article, analyzed it, found it good and published it. If they had received a more accurate/ interesting article from a turbine waiver holder they would have published that one...

no need to get all defensive and think its a plot againsts turbine waiver holders...

some people have too much free time

One thing in his article that made me laugh is the pic of the Composite-ARF guys starting the Lightning by holding a cigarette lighter to the tail pipe.

Anyone else notice that?

Beave

Sure did.... as well as the A-10 on page 23 posing as a full scale.

Yep...noticed that one too!

Beave

Yeah Harley, I wish you would have taken a little different direction with your response, and taken your own advice and not be too confrontational.

I'm a relative newcomer to turbines, but went through the waiver process just like you. I was quite pleased with the attention to turbines in this month's issue, and I'm disappointed to learn that it wasn't written by one of the many outstanding modelers that currently fly turbines with a waiver. On the other hand, I can see the value of getting a newbie to write the article because he/she would approach it the same as somebody else that's just getting started, and that's what this article was about, getting started with turbines.

In my opinion, you have some legitimate gripes, but you come off sounding like one of the old farts that aren't open minded enough to understand turbines and ban them from your local field in a knee-jerk reaction...except you're one of the turbine guys who sounds a bit elitist and looks down his nose at the un-waivered masses...lighten up!

It was fantastic that MA gave us some great exposure, and somebody wrote a decent article that explained turbines to a lay person. After your letter, and the ensuing wave of letters that others will write after you have incited them, do you think they will be encouraged to give us more coverage in the future? Or do you think they'll come to the conculsion that it might not be worth the trouble?..."Jeez, those turbine guys are a touchy bunch, let's leave 'em alone".

I think it would have been better to raise your concerns, and give some reasons why you felt it would have been better to have a waivered pilot write the article, or better yet, ask that a follow up article be written by the same pilot detailing the process of getting his waiver...as he actually gets the waiver! I think it would have been also beneficial for you to better explain why we take the waiver seriously...One good reason is that people flying turbines without a waiver are more likely to make a mistake, cause an incident, and create bad feelings, bad press, and ill will to us waivered pilots. We then often have to deal with the ramifications such as turbine banned club fields, and a bunch of misconceptions that we have to overcome...By publishing this article by a non-waivered pilot, the AMA/MA is basically sanctioning his actions and making life more difficult for us....

Instead you just said that we take our waivers seriously, and we've been around since the beginning, and we paid our dues and he didn't...not very compelling. Then you refused to point out any errors in his article with an attitude of "I'm taking my ball and going home"...It would have been better to take the high road and constructively correct the errors, and maybe volunteer to write an article yourself.

Unfortunately, your response is off to the ether, but hopefully you and others will think twice before speaking once the next time this comes up. Maybe some others can write a response that expresses their concerns and is constructive and appreciative at the same time...

You said it best Harley...You get more flies with honey than vinegar...

KennyMac

Harley, you asked, so here's my two cents:

I think, frankly, that your well founded points would have been better recieved at the other end without the accusation that his reply was "weak". He will most certainly bristle at that comment (wouldn't anyone?) and from that point onward his ears will be closed. If you alienate the man and the "AMA staff" then whatever gains you seek will be harder to attain.

He DID, after all, welcome your input as to whatever errors you found, offering to correct them.

I think that the phrase "you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar" applies here.

IMHO, Don.

Nope, pratorian,
Some do have too much free time..... and I know that there is no plot.

As a Canadian, you are not required to possess an AMA turbine waiver to operate your jets in Canada. After all, the AMA is an American orginization.
There are reciprical rights for foreigners when flying at a venue in the United States. But, they are required to be in possession of all qualifing documentation from the association that is their countries equivalent to our AMA.
Come on down....we would be pleased to meet you. Don't forget your Canadian equivalent of our AMA membership and waiver.

Since we need the membership card, insurance and waiver to fly at a AMA chartered event, and to fly at an AMA charted club field (which the vast majority are) the waiver process is something we must abide by.

We turbine waiver holders pay dues ($$$) each year for the privelage of retaining our insurance coverage, the right to fly at AMA chartered club fields, and participate in AMA sanctioned turbine events. No AMA license, no turbine waiver, you are a spectator. The author of this article is a spectator at these places and events.

Why does the official mouth organ of the AMA choose to print this contribution by a non-member?
I don't think it's right. Seems hipocritical to me.

Guys,
Thanks for all of the constuctive criticism......I know that I am not the most diplomatic person in the area.
But, I'm still not accepting the official AMA position on this.

Harley – I wholeheartedly agree with your basic premise that the AMA mag should really be showcasing cases where people are following the AMA reg's rather than those who are not … though this is far from the first case of them doing so. I've seen rants in the AMA mag about "no touching the aircraft in flight" on one page, while another page glorifies someone doing just the same, etc, etc.

With that said, based on your reply I do think you may be misunderstanding part of what this AMA guy is saying. He is indicating that this seems to be the best written article that they have received on the topic, and you are replying about there being far better qualified people. So, the obvious question (and this is not rhetorical) is : have those far better qualified people submitted articles to the AMA mag ? If so, have they put the effort into an article that this non-AMA guy supposedly has, to have an article that can appeal to the masses rather than just to fellow jet-jocks ? (Note – I have not read the article)

I think the subtext in the AMA's reply is that if we are not marketing ourselves in a way that can appeal to the membership as a whole, then we have ourselves to blame for that oversight, and I think that is a valid observation. However, it would be nice if the mag folks would consider passing such prospective articles past the relevant SIGs for a quick sanity check to make sure they are not advertising activities that violate the AMA safety reg's etc.

Gordon

FYI, [link=http://www.rcuniverse.com/magazine/article_display.cfm?article_id=166]"beginning of turbines"[/link] for R/C models was 25 years ago in the U.K., i.e. 1983, not 1999 when you became an active jet pilot. Turbines really took off in Europe in 1992 when Kurt Schreckling (Germany) published a DIY book for the FD3/64 turbine.

Did any waivered pilot offered to write the article? Or is it something where AMA asks individuals to write articles?

David

Thanks for the correction.....however, I do know something about about the history of model jet engine..They did get started in the UK.....
I had my first RC turbine expereince in 1996...35 LB SWB-3 in a 150" wingspan UAV....sorry you didn't understand. I think some of the readers know what I meant.

Did AMA actively seek articles from this community? I never saw any. Also, I'm sure there were several Americans getting into turbines in the early 90s. He didn't say they were the FIRST he said since the beginning.

Harley, I think your last letter is a little too confrontational. I would tone it down a little bit.

What is this cigarette lighter deal about anyway? Is this a British thing?

Sometime when the propane doesnt light with the glow plug power from the ECU, it can be lit with a lighter at the rear of the engine. I would NEVER do it at the end of the thrust tube as pictured in the AMA mag, tho.............

ok I get your point since I'm Canadian and I dont need a waiver I'm in the same boat as the guy who wrote that article, I have no clue what I'm talking about and I shouldnt post here...

My point was they receive hundread of articles, they pick the better ones, they publish them. I doubt they conduct background checks for each of the authors of every article they publish, do a drug test and see if the author has any criminal records... IMO they just saw a good article and decided to publish it, perhaps it was the only turbine jet related article they received ?

anyways... keep on hitting the editors if you think it'll help protect your waiver afterall I dont need one

Right thats asking for a roman candle. Not very smart. I wouldn't do it anywhere.

Whats the problem here? I dont get it..... Turbine flying got multple pages of praise, and generated excitement amongst the RC community and were going to send in letters of damnation? So what if they got a couple things wrong...how about sending in a letter of correction for the next issue. I just dont get it, anyone care to explain?

Luis

No, Harley is right. As the AMA's flag ship publication, I feel DEFINITELY that MA has the responsibility to have had checked at least that this guy was a waivered pilot if he is going to write an article telling others in the USA how to safely enter turbine flying. That would be a MINIMUM qualification for the dude!

If the guy wrote a knowledgeable article that nurtures interest in turbines without providing disinformation then I don't see a problem here.

He can obviously know what he writes about but choose not to have a waiver because it is not needed in his situation.

Then the AMA should not implicitly condone his activities by publishing an article by him. Had they asked, I am certain many of us (I know I could) would submit such an article.

What is to condone or not?


If I had my own private airstrip and did not attend AMA events, I would not have a waiver either. What would be the point?

He does apparently have an AMA membership, just not the waiver which is fine in his case.