I don't disagree with you on this, other than:
1) NAR is a volunteer based organization. Time spent on things that are
(or once were) thought to be 'common sense' require volunteer effort,
detracting from other things that may need to get done.
2) It may well be that the ORIGINAL INTENT was to leave this somewhat
open, and to allow the certification team members to decide. Frankly,
this ultimately becomes a liability issue. If I were to certify someone
as competent with Level 2 based on a saucer certification, and then
later on that individual showed blatant and gross negligence in
deploying a parachute recovery system that resulted in death or injury,
I could (and should) expect that I'm going to be held somewhat
responsible if that ever came to court. NAR doesn't cover this in their
rules, nor should it. But, for me, if I'm going to certify someone to a
certain level I'm going to make very sure that I can defend my actions
should it ever be necessary.
3) Often these 'corner cases' aren't evident when the original rules
are/were written. On a purely speculative basis, for example, what if
it turns out that there is some reason that the new 'sort of' RMS motors
aren't suitable for certification attempts? Should the rules be
re-written every time something new comes out on the market? If it
turns out that a certain manufacturer of an altimeter has a problem,
should the rules be re-written to say not to use that brand of
altimeter? All of these are things that rely on the 'common sense' of
those on the certification team. For example, most state's
constitutions were written back when there was a 'common sense'
definition of marriage, so there was no need to define it as one man
marrying one woman. These days, folks are running around trying to use
that supposed 'oversight' or 'loophole' to completely change the
definition of marriage.
4) One often runs into problems when trying to re-write the rules. I'm
running into that right now (in a different venue). I'm on a high
school site council (as a parent representative), and we are currently
re-writing the bylaws to update some of the 'cases' we've run into. A
sentence (IMHO, a fairly important sentence) was deleted, purely
accidentally, during the update process. When I asked why it was
deleted, it was definitely found to be accidental, but half the people
in the room wanted to just accept the bylaws anyway, to simply get it
done and over with. I've run into this in the past, as well -- there
was a fellow I knew who spent many months fine-tuning the bylaws of an
organization that I was part of, and I couldn't quite understand what a
tedious process it was. Having lived through a lot of infighting in the
organization since that time, and a bunch of folks trying to find these
'corner cases' and 'loopholes', I'm very glad that he DID spend so much
time at it.
5) Using a saucer for level 2 certification does not, IMHO, demonstrate
proper competence for using that level of motors. The argument that
what if one only plans on flying saucers doesn't quite hold water --
first of all, one can't design a certification program that will handle
only corner cases (especially since the numbers who would fall in that
category is probably slim to none), and second of all part of the
certification process (IMHO) is the proper selection of delay, which is
moot with a saucer. Again, this comes back to the common sense and
liability issues. The common sense part is that if someone has
demonstrated competence with deploying a parachute, I will be able to
assume they can properly 'deploy' a saucer recovery system (since there
is nothing to deploy ). However, proving you can 'deploy' a saucer
does NOT, even remotely, demonstrate competence in deploying a parachute
system in a level 2 rocket. Here are some of the things that are
skipped: proper shock cord selection? proper shock cord installation?
proper delay selection? proper delay installation? proper parachute
size? proper wadding/piston use? proper slip fit on nose cone or
payload section?
I've been involved in a lot of different organizations for a long time,
and I've seen all sorts of problems with 'rules'. At this point in
life, I think that these types of rules should be a lot like the
Constitution -- establish the framework, and only modify the framework
when absolutely necessary. Allowing the certification team members to
have the final say seems to be 'reasonable'. If you really want to push
the envelope in a certification flight, and violate the 'spirit' of the
rules, then look for two members willing to be on your certification
team who share the same sentiments. Frankly, if you can't find two
folks willing to be on your certification team because of how/what
you've selected as your certification rocket, then you really OUGHT to
rethink your plans.
David Erbas-White
- posted 17 years ago