Towing Competition

[iflytailies]

I am considering to organize an aerotow competition on a fun fly level with non-professional contestants. Can anyone provide links to rules, flight maneuvers, etc. that would be performed during an RC aerotow contest? Thanks

[s2000]

You might want to attend the JR Aerotow to get an idea. Not sure why you want to start off excluding people, as far as I know there are no "professional" participants. All us aerotow guys do it for fun, even the extremely experienced pilots, as far as flight maneuvers, thermals are what we look for, aerobatics were pushed several years ago but nobody seemed interested so the idea was dropped.

[iflytailies]

The pilots I fly with are just non-professional tow pilots. I did not mean to be rude. I just want to get some ideas what good aerotow fun flies might look like to challenge my flying buddies around here... I read a lot of German soaring magazines where report from awesome tow competition event. I must have written my first post after I had just read such an article forgetting that aerotow is not really a big competiton thing here... Sorry

[s2000]

No offense taken. The main thing you need is at least 2 towplanes and towpilots, it's a real bummer when Murphys law takes effect, and you got a bunch of guys standing around waiting for a tow.

[thermalbum]

http://www.maac.ca/docs/2006/rules_rcscalesailplane_2005.pdf

[wayneparrish]

JoeDoe, We tried the aerobatic competion event at Fayettville NC one year and there wasn't enough interest to get thru one year hardly. The earopeans are doing this a lot but for the most part we US guys just like thermalling and freestyle aerobatics. It is something that may go though today. Wayne Parrish, Apex NC

[iflytailies]

yeah, I got interested since I saw so much coverage of aerotow competitions in German magazines...

[Bruce DeVisser]

We tried to get interest in California 3 years in a row and results were zero. We aerotow every month, and the most successful activities (besides just aerotowing - fun enough!) have been:

1. sailplane spot landing - judged by the point of touch down which is marked by a streamer on the ground;

2. towplane line drop - uses same marker as #1, try to get front of tow line closest to the marker;

3. towplane spot landing - same as #1;

4. most scale appearance of aerotow action - towplane plus sailplane; judged by how realisitc it appears, including such things as angle of climb, and proper release turn execution by sailplane and towplane, sailplane not stalling at point of release, etc.