FPV Racing....Spec Course for Spec Class

[matwelli]

what course layout have you settled on Mat? I've been swamped so this little project has been on the back burner but if the snow ever melts we'll be racing soon thereafter. Will have to watch your video for some inspiration!

Hi Bart , nope no set course, we make it up depending on the location. Held another event yesterday - we had a smaller group (7 pilots) and less camera men so less profesional videos.

we had two tracks, one in a field, wind about 20mph gusting to 40, directly down the course , and the other track in a small forrest.

The new guys prefered the field, the advanced guys prefered the forrest.

Interestingly two of our guys, Ian and Hadley, on the open field Ian was almost twice as fast around the course (hadley had an underpowered setup) , yet in the forest Hadley was snapping at his heels. The closed in space was a great leveler - but as you can see from the footage, it was a tight space

the first vid is in the forest, second in the field, same guy (ian) in both , he finished first in 9 races, his only DNF was when a prop failed mid air

 

[matwelli]

Matt, did you get a chance to use the Cloud Freq Mgmt? You are one of the better acceptance testers.

Thanks Gregg

YES, used it for both the Hamilton event and the Levin Event

Works very well, I use it for the frequency allotment, the use of color for each channel works extremely well to see if there is an issue.

Have not used it for actual points recording, or for the pilots to see their heats, I was too snowed under at Hamilton (getting 22 pilots thru 4 rounds in 4 hrs...) so havent actually used the "cloud" part

With six pilots wasnt too happy with the seeding, so I did a manual write over, which worked well.

8 pilots + is good

What I will do is fill in the results and see how well that part works.

 

[Bartman]

are people flying in the woods with 5.8ghz wireless video? doesn't they lose the video signal when in and around the trees?

 

[matwelli]

are people flying in the woods with 5.8ghz wireless video? doesn't they lose the video signal when in and around the trees?

Nope
All had 500-600 mw transmitters, and the pilots were situated inside the track, nobody seemed to have an issue
I had my doubts at first, but was proven wrong.

 

[Ben Cairns]

I'm just setting up some FPV Racing events in the UK this summer, and the resources on the FPV Tree Racers page, and GoDroneX have been great so far.

Hoping to be able to use the Cloud Management for the first event, have filled out the Registration form, so just a case of waiting now.

 

[chipwich]

Our club ran this past weekend on a field perhaps just slightly smaller than a soccer field. It was rather simple compared to some, but made for some great close racing. Here is a video from one of our guys. Also, check out the DroneNationals.com course. It is awesome, in a soccer field, and there is a RealFlight version for d/l.

 

[Bartman]

just got a like from this thread and was wondering if there's still room in the world of FPV racing for a spec course or have the leagues all settled on a standard course format?

 

[Denny Rowland]

How about a simple triangular circuit that is similar to FAI Pylon racing where speed is everything and flying tight to the pylons. Ten laps against the clock four machines in each race. If you cut the pylon you get a one lap penalty. An international standard length etc. etc.
Maybe add a couple of hoops on the two main straights. Circuit dimensions could be taken from the FAI pylon course.

 

[Bartman]

How about a simple triangular circuit that is similar to FAI Pylon racing where speed is everything and flying tight to the pylons. Ten laps against the clock four machines in each race. If you cut the pylon you get a one lap penalty. An international standard length etc. etc.
Maybe add a couple of hoops on the two main straights. Circuit dimensions could be taken from the FAI pylon course.

Denny

I had thought that the rapid adoption of FPV racing by organized groups would remove the necessity for our "Spec Course" but it doesn't seem to be the case after all.

Maybe we should do a simple circuit like you're talking about as a first run contest idea and then develop it from there?