FAA Waiver question

IMO it's simply a matter of following the rules and having the balls to take these guys on when you know you're right.

There is now restriction on breaking mach. I'm not sure where a G80 falls into the propellant weight limitation but if it's below, then don't sweat it.

Reply to
Phil Stein
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There is know restriction on breaking Mach.

It's a MR motor, you can even fly two of them.

Reply to
Alan Jones

I am not sure what is going on with kankakee. Many time this year when we called them to notify, they wanted to do a waiver. The problem is that is not why we were calling them. IMHO they seem totally confused on the whole deal. And the L1 guy is sort of not in the loop as far as I can tell. He used to work for TRACON... So he was associated with your FAA contact in chicago.

Reply to
Greg Cisko

NOTAMS always attract sight seers. At 12 noon exactly you can see some small piece of crap aircraft flying over the exact center of our launch site. When we had our waiver active, you did not see this. But when it was NOTAM, we saw it pretty much every month. So notification can be a 2 edged sword.

Reply to
Greg Cisko

Ironically you were always able to do this... They have no say so if you properly notify.

Reply to
Greg Cisko

Excuse me? What do you mean people don't bother? If your rocket is between 16 ounces and 3.3 lbs in weight you *MUST* notify. It is the law. There is no interprutation here. If you are not doing so, or know people who are not doing so, you are the problem or part of the problem.

Not sure what "called into question" means.

If you are saying what I think you are saying, you have violated the NAR safety code, if you are even a NAR member. So no insurance. Should be drummed out of the corps as far as I am concerned.

Also there is some urgency to determine why we are now having safety problems with model rockets. If you are really saying what I think you are saying, then the problem is that people are simply ignoring the law and rules/safety code. We really do not have to modify the safety code, we need to somehow police our own. I am really hoping I have not understood what you are saying here. Please elaborate.

Reply to
Greg Cisko

There is? Please explain. I have never heard of any such thing.

Reply to
Greg Cisko

Duh. That doesn't change the fact that there are probably a lot of people who don't do it. Either they don't know they're supposed to, or as Kurt suggested, they simply don't bother. Just as there are a great many people who don't obey speed limits, for instance. And unlike speed limits, notification has no bearing on safety. One could argue that speeding is inherently dangerous -- but a large model rocket flown in clear skies with no aircraft present is safe regardless of whether the flyer has notified the FAA.

Even high power waivers have very little to do with safety. They are merely permits. The only safety issue addressed by the waiver requirement is that the FAA can deny a permit if the applicant is requesting permission to fly in an area (or altitude) where it would conflict with other air traffic. Other than that, having a waiver doesn't make the flight any safer -- the waiver doesn't clear the airspace of other traffic for your launch.

Really? What problem is that?

I think Kurt is speaking hypothetically here. Also, since when does an F10 or even a G80 automatically require notification?

We are? Since when? What "safety problems" are you referring to, and what do they have to do with someone allegedly flying LMR with notification?

You're jumping to conclusions, and you're also confusing two separate issues (what's safe, vs what's legal).

No, but it would be nice if we could get the FAA to eliminate useless requirements that even their own personnel don't understand.

m
Reply to
raydunakin

There is "no" restriction..

Or

I "know" of "no" restriction

Reply to
W. E. Fred Wallace

Thanks for the hellp but if I were clarifying it, I would have said 'no.'

This depends on propellant weight. I just checked. a G80 is 47.9g of propellant.

Reply to
Phil Stein

Typo - no has an extra w on it. Remove dubya. 8-)

Reply to
Phil Stein

True, but ATC can clear the airspace, or confirm that the airspace is clear.

In part, the FAA is like a public park ranger or commissioner. They just want to know how the public facility (airspace) is being used so that they can better manage the facility for public use.

Excellent history question. Exactly when did the FAA start requiring only notification for LMR? It has been many years. Of course flying a G80 in MR requires only following the safety code and common sense.

Yes, do tell!

Some FAA personnel could use some more training, regardless of how you feel about the usefulness of the requirements.

I suspect one day that the FAA will revisit LMR notification and decide if it helps them manage the airspace, or if it is just a useless nuisance. If the FAA were to simply eliminate the LMR notification, would that not put LMR flights back under the HPR waiver requirements? What specific limits on sport rockets and motors would you propose for exemption from all FAA regulations and why? How would you expect the FAA to come up with limits if they do not know how sport rocketeers are using the airspace? LMR notification gives the FAA some indication of sport rocketry use of the airspace, and it can consider the record of notifications and waivers when revising regulations. LMR notification is a minor inconvenience and much better than required waivers.

Reply to
Alan Jones

Your Apogee Aspire on an F10 or G80 is still a model rocket, and doesn't require notification. Once, when NIRA was denied a waiver on the field where we hosted NARAM-33 (by a municipal airport, NOT ORD), I calculated that without needing a waiver a 113g propellant single use H motor could reach about 8000', yet DPA was refusing to allow waivered flights to 1700'! We flew anyway, but ony to the MR limits. BTW, this was a couple years before we finally got FAR 101.22, which would have let us go to 125/1500g instead of 453g.

Reply to
Bob Kaplow

November 1994.

Depends on what they do. If they simply eliminate FAR 101.22, we're right back where we were before the lawsuit. What they SHOULD do is what we asked for in first place: change the MR limts in FAR 101.1 from 113/453g to the

125/1500g limits we requested in 1985. Then the only time we'd have to deal with them at all is for HPR waivers. Less work for them, less hassles for them, less confusion for them.

But they aren't going to do this on their own.

Reply to
Bob Kaplow

Reply to
Jim M

And it's a nice sunny balmy 40 degrees here with the wind coming from the North at 10 mph...perfect flying weather :)

Ted Novak TRA#5512 IEAS#75

Jim M wrote:

Reply to
tdstr

(ducking) ... and it's a nice 85 degrees, with clear, blue skies, here in southern California... (well, there is a LITTLE wind..)

David Erbas-White

tdstr wrote:

Reply to
David Erbas-White

Show off :)

Ted Novak TRA#5512 IEAS#75

David Erbas-White wrote:

Reply to
tdstr

Generally though, this is only done on extreme high altitude flights. For the vast majority of high power flights, the safety of the flight is completely up to the individual(s) handling the launch.

I think it's more a case of making it easy to track down the perpetrator if there's an incident. (Same with park rangers -- if they have a record of who camped at a site, they know who to bust if the site is littered or something.)

What makes you think that? Eliminating the notification requirement can be done without treating LMR as high power.

First off, I'd propose treating LMR the same as low power. The notification requirement his unrelated to safety and serves no significantly useful purpose. It's also unenforceable and is probably violated on a regular basis by people who don't even know it exists. (IMHO, any law that is unenforceable is of questionable value and should probably be thrown out. But that's getting off the subject a bit...)

Secondly, I'd propose eliminating the waiver requirement for high power, up to a certain altitude. Maybe 10,000 feet or so. Most high power flights are within that, and it's easy to spot and avoid aircraft up to that altitude -- something that must be done with or without a waiver. This would make things easier for both the flyer and the FAA.

LMR and HPR have been around long enough that the FAA ought to know everything it needs to know by now.

Except when you want to do some flying on the spur of the moment. Or when the FAA personnel don't know their own regs.

g
Reply to
raydunakin

40 degrees Celsius? That is warm. :)
Reply to
Dave Grayvis

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