Comme on pouvait le prévoir, le coût des homologations pour la compétition tue la création, et les entreprises. Nous le savions, l’avions annoncé, mais une fois de + certains ont du mal à mesurer les conséquences de leurs décisions.
C’est à peu près bien résumé par Mads Syndegaard dans ce post.
En gros, quand vous avez payé l’homologation de vos modèles et qu’au final vous êtes à la rue, c’est invivable économiquement.
[quote=http://www.paraglidingforum.com/viewtopic.php?p=p449140&highlight=#p449140]It seems to me that the pilot community needs to wake up to the realities of the game - the practical implications of the current rule set is that there will be, over time, just one manufacturer present in the comps scene. That goes against my sense of fairness - OK, so does the fact that small and large pilots struggle to be competitive, but given how these things work we seem to need to make up our minds about what we value the most. I suspect the answer to that is going to be along weight lines, but if we could just look a little beyond our own little pond for a moment?
As an industry insider, watching the Worlds and the Icepeak 8’s there really hurt me - just thinking of all the money and effort that went into that endeavour was really painful. In the old days this happened too, but the manufacturer could just show up at the next meet with a new/updated model, and all wasn’t lost. Now, with the money invested, if it didn’t work out you’re just f*cked. And anyone who thinks that the revenues in this business are big enough to weather that are sorely mistaken.
One of the big innovators of the pg design process is Gibus at AirCross. The business he founded stands absolutely no chance to play in the current game - so all his clever thinking is kept from us. The same may most likely be said for many other super smart people, who just aren’t able to be in the game because they weren’t at the very top in 2011, when the whole upheaval happened. I find that a big waste of creative opportunities, because the comps scene has an important function as a laboratory for ideas. In just a few short years, that laboratory will be reduced to 3-4 people at Ozone (maybe they’ll need, and be able, to hire a few more). That isn’t right, seen from the pilots’ viewpoint (not to mention seeing it from the competitors’ viewpoint, but we’ll let that pass at this stage).
The only solution I can see is to change the rules to say that one size must be certified according to CCC rules, and the others must be scaled from that size. People more clever than me can surely define how much each size is allowed to deviate from true scaling, so that the XS wings will actually fly. I still don’t like that solution, but it just may be palatable to the 'crats, and it could be a way forward for the real world paragliding comps scene.
Mads S
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A rapprocher des commentaires de Torsten Siegel
[quote= http://www.fai.org/component/phocadownload/category/?download=9265:comments-from-torsten-siegel-on-pg-matters]CCC – Glider range
In order to have more manufacturers in FAI 1 comps and make it attractive for small brands I’m absolutely in favor to skip the current regulation regarding sizes / weight range. With the current regulation for the Europeans it’s necessary the certify 4 (!) sizes – a no go for small brands and even for us at Gin Gliders a point where we think about to stop this. Especially after the experience with the IP8 at the Worlds (the wing was at this stage not competitive) it’s crazy to spend a huge amount of time and money for 4 sizes and then you recognize it’s all for nothing as a competitor did better.
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