What happened? Not good having fast powerboats getting to close to the sailboats. No excues for collisions to occur with under control vessels. I hope I don't read about any more collisions on the lake between power and sail. Such a great place to enjoy our hobby. Ryan

Originally Posted by CPL.FUZZ

Hi all. I may jump to a different happier subject, the sunken and lost battleship was found early Sunday morning. It was in good shape with not much mud inside. Nothing missing. Within a short time after recovery the guns were operating. It needs a real gooood cleaning but most of the electronics should clean up. By the way, NO hole was found, it must have just rolled over and taken on water. HaaRaaa! Happy messin with boats....
Cpl.fuzz

Originally Posted by SD rc boater

Was the Battleship a victim of a run away go-fast?

Originally Posted by Rssailor

What happened? Not good having fast powerboats getting to close to the sailboats. No excues for collisions to occur with under control vessels. I hope I don't read about any more collisions on the lake between power and sail. Such a great place to enjoy our hobby. Ryan

1. It was already determined there WAS NO hole to begin with... I dont get how it was even rumored that there was one. You'd have to go faster than a tug boat to puncture a hole.

2. The battleship was at the night run and I believe lost radio? and it was going in circles. As a result, the owner of the battleship asked another owner of a tugboat (with rescue rig) to attempt to speed up and catch the boat. In the result of that, the boat capsized? and sunk.

For those of you reading this, if you have a rescue boat bigger than the boat youre rescuing, DONT DO IT unless its a last resort (like your boat is sinking), otherwise, just let it drift to the shore, otherwise your boat will just get run over and submerge. I was talking to someone near my car on the night run and didn't see the rescue attempt with the battleship, otherwise I would have asked for the battleship to just drift.

3. Rssailor, you are correct. I really dont want to hear more about collisions either. I just go out there to run, and I hate to consistently bring my boat in just cause someone yells "FAST BOAT" like an emergency siren is going off in the city.

So everyone knows who/what we is talking about. Rob Wood's <Rwood> DKM Lützow* as seen earlier this year at the Boat Handling Challenge - 5 August 2012 with Mr.Lego's 47' MLB in Canadian colors.

* The DKM Lützow was originally the lead ship of her class, the Panzerschiff DKM Deutschland (1933). She was recalled to port, overhauled and re-rated as a heavy cruiser and renamed Lützow in 1940. Scuttled in the shallows in May 1945, she was captured by the Russians, is thought to have been sunk during weapons tests in 1947.

Every time I see a 47' MLB in CCG livery I wonder to myself "what's my boat doing there?"

I may be in the vacinity of Spreckels lake on Friday morning / early afternoon. What are the chances of seeing any boating activity at those times?

Rob

Message from the Commodore of the SFMYC,

While I almost never post to RCG. I need to address the deteriorating situation of collisions between "GoFast" electric or gas boats, and sailboats and slower electric boats. If you read the previous pages, you'll see that slower, classic yachts, tugboats, etc, are leaving the lake because of perceived safety hazards of fast boats and collisions. The safety hazards are REAL. Within the last month, there have been 3 collisions between fast electric boats and sailboats, and too many "close calls" to mention between "GoFasties" and slower electric boats.

Last Sunday, a fast electric boat operated by a 7 or 8 year old kid rocketed across the lake at full speed and holed the hull of a Santa Barbara sailboat that was racing on the North side. The sailboat would have sunk if it was in the middle of the lake, but it was maybe 30 feet from shore. A friend of mine who was on the South shore saw the kid throw the boat in the water. It did one turn at full speed, and then took off across the lake. The father was not supervising the kid at all.The explanation from the father to the S/B owner was that the boat was "out of control". In fact, the whole situation is "out of control".

The Executive Board of the SFMYC has requested that I contact the Rec & Park to set up a meeting between the Department and the various "stakeholders" at Spreckels Lake, i.e, Free-sailers, R/C sailers, scale boat owners, electric GoFastie owners, and I/C + nitro boat owners. This "Community Meeting" would likely be sometime in October, after all lake users have been notified, and would be chaired by the Rec & Park representative. The purpose would be to see if there could be a compromise between all the groups that would provide for the safety of people's boats AND THE SAFETY OF THE PUBLIC because it's not a matter of "if", but "when" something fast jumps out of the lake and injures a spectator or bystander, with inevitable consequences

Everyone knows that the 15 mph speed limit for I/C and nitro has been ignored for years. It's my personal opinion that GoFastie electric boats will be added to the Park Code 3.02, and regulated with a 15 mph speed limit, and there will be some coordination between the Rec & Park and the SFPD and/or Park Rangers to begin writing tickets for violators. I'd urge everyone to keep a level head at this meeting, because, as a worst case scenario, the Rec & Park might just get fed up and ban powerboats completely. Compromise is never easy--everybody's going to have to give up something--but let's do our best not to lose model powerboating on Spreckels Lake completely.

Thank you,
Bob Heacock,
Commodore, SFMYC

Here are some pictures of the hole in the Santa Barbara sailboat, and the GoFastie that collided with it.

On to the happier stuff, DO NOT FORGET WOODEN BOATS ON PARADE on SEPT. 30th. This is a Fun Run type deal and a gathering of Model Boat Guys from all over. A GOOOOOD Time will be had by all. Do not let the name put you off, if it floats it is welcome.

Originally Posted by Kmot

Every time I see a 47' MLB in CCG livery I wonder to myself "what's my boat doing there?"

haha... I wonder if we'll ever get our boats together...

Originally Posted by Trisquire

I looked at your Dumas ace racing sloop thread. Very informative. That could make a fun racing class as well. Call it the Star 17 Class. $33 is a lot less than the Footy kits I've seen advertised. Plus, its a scale model. I half-finished a Dumas ace racing sloop as a teenager. Short attention span in those days. I do remember that the keel was relatively short by today's standards. I don't know if that would present a problem. I noticed that you gave yours a lengthened keel.

Sorry I missed this earlier!

the keel in the original kit is pretty "scaleish" in comparison to it's real world counterpart. The only reason I added a lenghthend keel to the RC conversion is for the sake of experimentation. and well.. not really knowing what the hell I'm doing.. all the replications of the original free sail version, I've kept the keel length and wieght the same as the original , and all, according to reports, have sailed just fine.

on the RC version the keel is longer, and the wieght is heavier and there is no rational reason for ding so other than to mess around with the design and an attempt to make it so the boat fights harder in the tack.

but everything is still able to modified. if it turns out that once it's in the water that none of that is necessary, or, it's counter productive, I'll probably chop it down to be closer to the length of the original model.

it is a grand experiment after all

the little guy is still on the work bench. Ive taken a step back to figure out some rudder issues and to get my RG65 round ranger "go fast" sailboat together.


I hope yall out at spreckels get it figured out. that's a great purpose built pond, and a invaluable resource to the hobby. I dare say that if there were such issues around here, the P@R guys sollution would be to just shut down the pond to EVERYONE

Originally Posted by Bob Heacock

<clip>... operated by a 7 or 8 year old kid rocketed across the lake at full speed and holed the hull of a Santa Barbara sailboat ... <clip>

I guess what nearly frosts me most about this latest incident is which part of "Adult Supervision Required" and "This is not a toy" is so difficult to understand?

Maybe the sign should include an "children 13 (or 15) and under running boats must be under the supervision of a responsible adult." This is not just because of their boats becoming projectiles, but also the possibility of having to fish a tyke out of the Lake.

I know, while it isn't absolutely mandatory, the Club 'strongly encourages' a responsible adult to join with and accompany new junior members - always has, to my memory.

I see this less of a "fast boat issue" and more as far too much boat for that age and far too little parental supervision. (Daddy really had never thought this through....)

What frosts me more is that everybody are going to have to pay for the actions of the very few.

ps - Gotta' Love Thunder Tiger's Web Page....

Thunder Tiger - Outlaw Jr. OBL Deep Vee RTR

Compact, competitive and criminally fast!

*sigh*

Meh... looks like a shoe...

and it's very unfortunate wording..
that's one of the big problem with RTR models of any strip IMHO. people get them and they have a toy mentality about them, and treat them as such. but the "toy" discssion is more of a philosophocal one and sould be broached else where.

as it is.. yes... any place with models like this should have a under 16 requires adult supervision mandate. and the adult should be held responsible for the actions of their precious little snowflakes, criminally if need be. We as hobbiest are in constant danger of losing our venues because of the irresponsible actions of a few

Originally Posted by craig_c

...What frosts me more is that everybody are going to have to pay for the actions of the very few.

Well, let's remain optimistic about this- There are a lot of creative people who care about the lake and enjoy using it for a variety of purposes. I'm sure a good solution will be found.

Originally Posted by Aerominded

Well, let's remain optimistic about this- There are a lot of creative people who care about the lake and enjoy using it for a variety of purposes. I'm sure a good solution will be found.

Don had a good one with the buoy, but i haven't seen it set yet...

A buoy won't stop a runaway $100.00 RTR from going across the lake and slamming into a $1500.00 Santa Barbara or hitting the wall by spectators, etc.

Enforce the 15 mph speed limit.