RC air combat rules

Let's assume 2 planes with MAC will fight each other. If this would happen, i think few things should be considered.

1. Planes should be expendable.

You should assume that your plane can get critical hit and crash badly. Or air collision very high risk. So you dont want to lose precious $1 billion worth plane you build 5 years.
So planes should be cheap, easy to build, easy to repair or be replaced (totally expendable).
I think deprom or foam planes are good candidates. Anything from balsa will be in scrapped after first crash I think. What else can be used?

2. Plane parameters

Maximum engine(s) power, number of cells should be standarized.

3. Flight and fight.

There should be safe area for air combat specified at some distance from base for safety.
Opening fire is not allowed out of this specified area.
Planes shoud fly only at low altitude (in case of crtitical damage you dont want your plane to crash in 10km radius).


4. Winner.
Winner should be the one who has less holes : )


5. More ideas?

Nice to see all comments or other ideas.

Hello,

We still have no real experience of airsoft air combat so it's difficult to write rules for it.

When playing poursuit with another rc plane, the first thing I notice is the difficulty to see the other plane. IMO one of the first rules should be something like a minimal wingspan or wing aera, and high visibility color. I have tested my view with goggles : 2/10 while I have more than 10/10 with my natural eyes...
I'm not sure other rules are really needed (about plane's design) right now. We just need fighters with working guns in it, this is not the case.

Visibility problem?
Last year I was marking attacks my FPV plane to very small quadcopter and I noticed that LED diodes are excellent target indicators.
LED light is visible very well in camera. I had no problems to see tiny target  - it was 20x20cm in size or less.
So maybe all planes should be equipped in LED light - at the ends of the wings ( left wing green/ right wing red/ some color at the end of tail).
What do you think about ?
Also we can mount white LEDs battery in area near your gun - then other planes can see when you fire.

The plane design is just an idea - I think planes should fly slow and smooth so motor power limit should be a rule.
I  played few years in WW2 air combat simulation online games, and I know that it is almost impossible to hit UFO RC planes, because are very owerpowered and turn and climbs like UFO.
The smaller the plane the problem is bigger.

Depron planes are very easy to glue and repair, even after being smashed to pieces.
Sure you can fly other plane, but after first crash or accident you will fix repair it for years.
Also such planes are expensive and depron is cheap.

Also, all planes should have landing gear and should start and land from ground.
This way you can mount weak motor and still make to start and mantain flight.

PS. I think I can find a movie when I strafed this tiny quad. Will search for it.

All what you say makes sense, and surely using LEDs is a good idea.

I already have built a fighter and shoot some balls on a ground target, the plane is what it is not very powerful and a bit heavy. I can't be sure of a specific design for a mission such as air combat. We just have no experience about this. Maybe one day 2 guys will do the first true air combat and then, we'll have some experience to talk about.

For example, I'm not sure the pilots will push their planes to the limits (rate of climb, speed, turn radius, etc.), so maybe the biggest advantages will come from stability, inertia, etc. I think the pilots will do the difference, not the planes.

For the moment I built my plane so that it's big enough to carry a gun, small enough so I can put it in my car, with landing gears because it's too heavy to be hand launch safely

Maybe I was bit too optimistic with LED's.
Sure LEDs can help in evening or in cloudy day, but I doubt if it will make difference in sunny day.
I think plane colors and size you mentioned before is very important.

As for planes engines - i think it's bit like in car racing, what's the point to race if one car has engine 1.5L and the other has 8L ?
Sure it is only for fun but IMHO more fun if planes will be more-less similar in "class"

I'm planning to build FPV-gun plane from foam and a total mass of 1500g.
In fact I will use old Easy Glider 180cm wingspan plane and I will convert it.
I'm not sure if I will succeded, but this is my goal.

PS. I saw your movie ground attack and tank hit, very cool D.

Hi,

I always said that the rules should be quite simple.
In my opinion, the motor's power should be limited to a maximum limit (I'd say about 350W)  and the wingspan should not measure under something like 2m. Everything else free. Like this, the plane will not be too nervous. Yomguy is right, it's not easy to find others planes in flight. But almost impossible to keep his 6 O'clock if he decides to escape. Rc models have much less inertia than real planes, so, much more difficult to follow them. That's why I think We have to make planes that have a glider behaviour. It's the condition to make a fight possible and interesting, I think.

1 or 2 motors, this choice has its advantages and disadvantages.
How much cells and how much mAh, if the power is limited, has no real importance. A bigger battery will give a better range but an heavyer plane... A choice that belongs to the pilot, I thing. With this two simple limitations, power and wingspan, natural selection should quickly give the best answers  

3 A limited ceiling, distance, firing floor, safe, all right. You know, the dangerous range of BB's is not very large, so it should not be a big problem.

4 : the winner is the less "pierced", yes , but it has to stay in flight at least as long as the looser, or all a précise duration.

Fred

Fred Van.H. a écrit:
I always said that the rules should be quite simple.
In my opinion, the motor's power should be limited to a maximum limit (I'd say about 350W)  and the wingspan should not measure under something like 2m. Everything else free. Like this, the plane will not be too nervous. Yomguy is right, it's not easy to find others planes in flight. But almost impossible to keep his 6 O'clock if he decides to escape. Rc models have much less inertia than real planes, so, much more difficult to follow them. That's why I think We have to make planes that have a glider behaviour. It's the condition to make a fight possible and interesting, I think.

100% agree, planes should be big in size and slow.

Fred Van.H. a écrit:
1 or 2 motors, this choice has its advantages and disadvantages.
How much cells and how much mAh, if the power is limited, has no real importance. A bigger battery will give a better range but an heavyer plane... A choice that belongs to the pilot, I thing. With this two simple limitations, power and wingspan, natural selection should quickly give the best answers  

100% agree.

Fred Van.H. a écrit:
3 A limited ceiling, distance, firing floor, safe, all right. You know, the dangerous range of BB's is not very large, so it should not be a big problem.

I'm not afraid BB's. You can wear goggles or mask for proctection. What I do afraid is 3kg plane crashes on your head with 100km/h. Goggles will not help
We have to consider high risk or shoot down or collision and need safe area where plane can crash ( no people there, anmials, structures, cars etc ).

Fred Van.H. a écrit:
4 : the winner is the less "pierced", yes , but it has to stay in flight at least as long as the looser, or all a précise duration.

Yes good point.


I think maximum power of the guns should also be specified. How many it would be ?
I'm not sure about ASG but in paintball fps must be set below 300 fps level - this is a rule.

cugi a écrit:

I'm not afraid BB's. You can wear goggles or mask for proctection. What I do afraid is 3kg plane crashes on your head with 100km/h. Goggles will not help
We have to consider high risk or shoot down or collision and need safe area where plane can crash ( no people there, anmials, structures, cars etc ).

Oh yes, you're right. The risk of collision is probably the most important for fighting aircrafts... and also for peoples on the ground, of course.
If we are two or three friends playing in the nature, no real problem, but if one day people come to watch that, if figthers become numerous, this danger will be important to consider.

cugi a écrit: I think maximum power of the guns should also be specified. How many it would be ?
I'm not sure about ASG but in paintball fps must be set below 300 fps level - this is a rule.

In France, an airsoft will be considered as a weapon if its power exceeds 2 Joules. With 0,25g BBs, its 350/400 fps. We don't fire on humans, but it may be carefull to avoid being considered dangerous, but also, We need a limit to avoid an arms race
... but who says we'd have to limit the fire rate or the number of guns on board ?

Fred

In France, an airsoft will be considered as a weapon if its power exceeds 2 Joules. With 0,25g BBs, its 350/400 fps. We don't fire on humans, but it may be carefull to avoid being considered dangerous

This is surprising, in Poland there is 17 Joules limit for all kind of airsoft you can buy and use without any permission.

But I like idea to stay with 2 Joules limit : )
And also I like idea to allow many guns on board

Are steel BB's allowed below 2 Joules in France ?
What do you think to use steel BB's in this hobby?
These are 4,5mm airsoft steel BB's weight 0.35g each.
I think they are more dangerous thank plastic, but also more compact and with better range and penetration ability which may matter if we will have to stay in 2 Joules energy limit.

Anyway I'm going to make my guns in both 4.5mm steel BB and 6mm plastic BB variants.

cugi a écrit: This is surprising, in Poland there is 17 Joules limit for all kind of airsoft you can buy and use without any permission.

That's our problem, here : very restrictive laws on everything for honest citizens, rarely enforced, rarely controlled, but if anything appens when you violate one or if a journalist is interested in an activity he disapproves, you are treated like the worst of terrorists  

cugi a écrit:Are steel BB's allowed below 2 Joules in France ?
What do you think to use steel BB's in this hobby?
These are 4,5mm airsoft steel BB's weight 0.35g each.
I think they are more dangerous thank plastic, but also more compact and with better range and penetration ability which may matter if we will have to stay in 2 Joules energy limit  .

[/quote]
I don't know if it is allowed here. I suppose not. but anyway it's a limit I decided not to cross. It's probably the law here, but it's the image we'd give too. I already got a lot of disapproval when I say I fire plastic BBs on RC planes, (every knows they are made to fire on humans! where is the probem with planes? ) no need to give some more reasons. And anyway I'm not sure it'll be really usefull because when a plane is 10 m far, it is small on the screen, and it moves.
But if you test metal BBs, please let us know how it works, I'm sure it'll be interresting

Fred

OK. So a bit of summary od RC air combat plane:

Wingspan >= 2m
Motor electric
Total motor power <= 350W (can be split to one or many engines)
Number of cells for power supply : does not matter
Only airsoft guns allowed operatin at CO2 or HP air
Maximum gun power 2 Joules
Number of guns unlimited
Number of bps unlimited
Planes must have and must be flown by RC-fpv system
Landing gear? (I would say mandatory)

What do you think about landing gear?
Should flying wings or deltas be allowed ?
What about video TX power and frequencies ?
Any suggestions welcome

cugi a écrit:

What do you think about landing gear?
Should flying wings or deltas be allowed ?
What about video TX power and frequencies ?
Any suggestions welcome

I have no opinion about landing gear. It depends if the "airfield" owns a track or is high grass covered. My Vautour (Vulture) takes off on a catapult because it flyes frequeltly on a high grass field.

Deltas are particular flying wings. they are efficient when they fly straight ahead but drag like anchors at high pitch. A 2 metters delta would have a huge surface. In this case, we should give a surface to exceed, not a wingspan, but a small aspect ratio will give a high roll rate that is a problem for human time of response No, the span law is the best suited. But with this law, delta wing is a bad choice . I think we should allow any shape and let natural selection act

Video power and frequencies? no opinion

Lets let natural selection do his work, it could be interesting


What do you think about fight with differents planes? see : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGMHbV8p6_w
The performance differences are not important, the hunter has no problem to find his prey, the big plane don't really try to escape because his gunner needs a stable flight, don't need to be FPV piloted, and the gunner dont need to be a RC plane pilot. It could be friendly

Fred

I'm perfectly OK with "defensive" planes as long as they keep allowed parameters.
As fo me you can build 5 gun turrets on your plane if you want
I'm fighter born pilot for me defensive planes are just like easy prey

I'm not afraid delta as much as flying wings.
Not sure about roll/pitch rates but we need smooth planes being able to be hit.
Flying wings may be way too maneuverable, and impossible to hit.
Also without landing gear and hull they can save a lot of weight.
But I'm not sure about that, only suspect.
Like you say natural selection seems best option in this case

What FPV frequency and power you use ? What frequency for radio?
You know, if few ppl will come, and one will use fpv video at 2.4G and the other will use radio at 2.4G it will be bad.
Thats why I think it should be clarified.

Now I use 2.4G for radio and 5.8G for video.

cugi a écrit:IFlying wings may be way too maneuverable, and impossible to hit.

When you limit the power, if you want good performances (speed, climbing...) the best way is a high aspect ratio. It gives good gliding but lower the roll rate. It's true for any shape, flying wings too

Most are flying with 2,4giga radio, so do I. My video is 1,3 but may be I'll go to 5,8 to be more legal.

Fred

My fighter has a 1500 mm wingspan, 3100 g take-off weight or more, with landing gears because hand launch is impossible, take-off power is in the 600 W range, 2 motors, and I don't think it's overpowered.

My opinion is that the main problem is visibility. Maybe we can use reflectors ? and/or limit the "combat zone" size.

We should work on a working plane carrying a working gun before thinking about rules.

I mean that if we go for a limited power and a minimum wingspan, then this may lead to a "light" plane with low wing loading, so a very small turn radius... very low inertia... and I'm not sure this makes the game easier.

Let's built planes and guns no matter how and give it a try !

Main problem is speed. If you have a lot of speed then you will be always hard target and can do effective defensive ACM.
If you have 1.5m plane 3kg mass 600W engine that means you are forced to fly fast if you want to stay in flight.
And you will be always hard target or you just crash without high speed.

With low wing load and weak engine your speed is low and also this makes defensive ACM less effective.
Your maximum speed is reduced but you can fly at low speeds. Turn radius is maybe smaller, but it is slow.
I played over 3 years in online WW2 air combat simulator, various planes and only human opponents, scored few thousands of air victories, and I can say that all it is about speed.
Low speed target is poor maneuverable and is easy target. High speed target is very hard to hit ( if he is not surprised of course : )) ) because has very good maneuverability.

I think visibility problem may be solved by LEDs. There are very powerful and efficient LEDs available this days, we can experiment with LED lights and cameras and find a solution.

The rules should help to build plane for multiplayer fun : )

That's very interesting to think about all this (makes me want to look what I can do more with the MAC612 ).

I really don't know what kind of plane is needed for "FPV - RC - airsoft gun - air combat". I understand your point, I just say "who knows ?"

What power limit is easy to test since it only needs to change the propeller or the battery, but the minimum wingspan limit needs to redesign the entire plane. I think it's a bad idea to give limits before trying.

But that is very interesting and I love to talk about RC air combat even if I hadn't really try

I also have a solid experience of air combat sims (against human or software, since I was 11 or 12). I know there is differences between how we fly large planes (in sims or not) and how we fly RC size planes. For example, when fighting Hellcat vs Hellcat I know that I can push the plane almost to its limits every moments, but when trying to follow an other RC plane from my FPV plane, I'm almost never close to the stall speed, I don't really need to reach the max rate of roll, etc. What limits the "fight" is not the plane's parameters (wing loading, rate of roll, rate of climb, etc.), it's the pilot's brain and reflexes.
With the Hellcat, the pilot has enough time to make the good corrections in order to get close to the ideal road, meaning he can get close to stall speed, he can push the plane in the fastest roll and still stop it at the right angle, etc. Air combat is a question of time, you need to act as fast as possible. With a RC size plane, every pilot will waste some time thinking or acting due to its slow reflexes, the pilot is most of the time overwelmed by the situation, so we are more looking at a plane that will ease the pilot's work.

In this case, I'm not sure a slow and light plane can do better than a faster and heavier plane. I think in both case the pilot will adapt the speed to its perception of the world around him, but also the heavier plane (supposed higher wing loading) will have more inertia and inertia can act as a damper and ease the pilot's work. We can (in fact we need to) limit the roll rate by acting on the ailerons angle, we can limit power (we always do throttle management), but a low wing loading plane is always more nervous because it lacks inertia.

Sorry for my English

Well... I don't really know what's the best, we need to do tests

yomgui a écrit:My fighter has a 1500 mm wingspan, 3100 g take-off weight or more, with landing gears because hand launch is impossible, take-off power is in the 600 W range, 2 motors, and I don't think it's overpowered.

200W/kg, it's not underpowered either!

yomgui a écrit:
We should work on a working plane carrying a working gun before thinking about rules.  

It's a bit early to think about rules, I agree but not for this reason. I think that I... we  first have to concieve a reliable and cheap machinegun, then found friends to play with us. At this moment only we'll need suitable planes and rules.

yomgui a écrit:

I mean that if we go for a limited power and a minimum wingspan, then this may lead to a "light" plane with low wing loading, so a very small turn radius... very low inertia... and I'm not sure this makes the game easier.  

Are the trajectories of a racer easier to follow than those of a motorglider?
The total mass of a fighter will hardly go below 2kg. If the max power is low enough, trajectories will not be nervous, I think.

yomgui a écrit:Let's built planes and guns no matter how and give it a try !

100%  agree!
Of course, we are free (for how long ?   ). These are only wild imaginings and suggestions  

Sorry, I'm to tired to read and answer your last messages

Fred

Not so tired, it makes me think...

yomgui a écrit: We can (in fact we need to) limit the roll rate by acting on the ailerons angle, we can limit power (we always do throttle management), but a low wing loading plane is always more nervous because it lacks inertia.

I dont like very much the idea to limit the ailerons angle. How do you do that? Each plane's ailerons are limited at the same angle?

A very low wing loading would result from a very low aspect ratio, that is not a good choice for a good gliding with low power. You know as well that a good aspect ratio is a compromise and should not be too low or too high. I think the wing loading won't go very low.

I think most RC planes are overpowered with high trust to wight ratio , often more than 1 and planes are like rockets or helicopters.
In this case your plane will never stall and you can do ACM forever and ever.

My tiny T-28 flies good but it has engine thrust 70g, and plane rtf weight is 45g. It take off after 60 cm runway. And so on.
But I was experimenting other P.51 micro, except I removed 70g thrust to 20g Thrust, and plane was lighter - 35g.
And it was really difficult task to fly this : ) But it was flying, just need pilot skill, slight climbing , conservation energy and so on.
And take off distance required some 5-10 meters.
Thats how I think It may be a way to model bigger planes, just put less power less thrust, and force people to how to learn how to fly and planes start to behave normally - like stalls etc. : )

Fred Van.H. a écrit:
200W/kg, it's not underpowered either!

No, of course, but not a rocket.

Fred Van.H. a écrit:
Are the trajectories of a racer easier to follow than those of a motorglider?
The total mass of a fighter will hardly go below 2kg. If the max power is low enough, trajectories will not be nervous, I think.

I don't know... I'm not seduced by the idea of a light underpowered glider-like fighter. "Light", "High aspect ratio" and "dogfight" don't sound good to my ear when put all together There is contradictory requests making me bug. There is Something wrong I don't know exactly what.

I'm not sure it's the way to go... I don't know... I think a sport-like plane, not overpowered, should be a better firing Platform, if well set up. I need to trust the solidity of the wing, I'm not confortable with gliders (probably my mistake).

Fred Van.H. a écrit:
I dont like very much the idea to limit the ailerons angle. How do you do that? Each plane's ailerons are limited at the same angle?

Sorry, that's not what I mean ! I didn't mean we must define a max aileron angle...

I was more thinking about how we can limit the aileron angle because we find it more confortable to fly, not that we should be forced to do so.

cugi a écrit:
Thats how I think It may be a way to model bigger planes, just put less power less thrust, and force people to how to learn how to fly and planes start to behave normally - like stalls etc. : )

Yes, and you need to add mass. A glider can turn very tight before stalling.

It is only discussion. It is better to talk about hipothetic plane construction before you build it : )
I would say even if you have old gun plane then most likely it is your expensive sophisticated project and you should build new expendable one anyway.
Expendable, designed for fpv gunnery (which means you will scratch!) , cheap, easy to repair or replace. I plan to build at least two : )

Assuming normal plane propellers, how many thrust can be expected from 350W engine?