Communicating run times and penalties

George Bright · **Posted:** Sun Mar 27, 2005 7:24 pm

MikeWhitney wrote:

I hope most people agree that I have a pretty good idea of a balance between complexity/cost/maintenance on this stuff.

You are kidding right?

MikeWhitney · **Joined:** Wed Aug 20, 2003 9:15 pm **Posts:** 4724

Explain.

I AM the one who got the club to quit setting up speakers at the events, and mounted them to the bus.

I AM the one who pushed for fixed, not fold-up tables. One less thing to do.

I AM the one who has been pushing for simplicity, ease of use, labeling and documentation EVERYWHERE.

I estimate that our event setup/teardown time is probably half of what it was before.

Take a look in the bus sometime. The PA? Flip the switch and talk into the mike. Noise comes out of the speakers and over FM. It's that simple. That's a hell of a lot easier than it used to be.

I'll only tolerate complexity in when it's needed for a LUXURY item that we can do without. Like the wireless timer.

MikeWhitney · **Joined:** Wed Aug 20, 2003 9:15 pm **Posts:** 4724

By the way, I renamed this thread because we are NOT just talking about communication techniques for courses with remote finishes. My comments have been about communication for any of our courses, remote or not.

David Teague · **Posted:** Sun Mar 27, 2005 10:19 pm

If we need a lable Printer I can get one for the club to test with I have several Zebra tLP 2844 and 2742 Label printers setting around work, what Label size dose AXWare need, I Probably even have some of that.

Graham Jagger · **Joined:** Fri Aug 29, 2003 12:53 am **Posts:** 1718

MikeWhitney wrote:

I hope most people agree that I have a pretty good idea of a balance between complexity/cost/maintenance on this stuff. The wireless timer ended up being slightly more complex than I had hoped, simply since it's like 6 pieces that need to be put together to make it complete.

I'm not picking on you or complaining about the wireless timer Mike. I like the idea of having it. Like I said, it gives us more flexability with courses. Also after having worked with you a bit on that project I don't think it is overly complex. I think the final solution is nicely packaged and it works. It's just a shame that in order to appease everyone with instant times at the end of their run we're now talking about putting start/finish together again.

I see nothing majorly wrong with the FM radio solution for times and just being able to listen to the announcer. Also the speaker added in the pits is a nice touch.

My concern was with costs and putting money into upkeep of things we already own. I think Scott has just addressed that.

There has to be a solution that is cost effective and doesn't require more expensive electronics. The solutions above, $400+, probably cost more money than what the laptop is worth. And we run the whole event on it.

Here's an example for you of what I'm getting at:

The astronauts had a problem in space writing upside down and in 0 gravity. So NASA spent a $1,000,000 with Fisher designing the Fisher Space Pen. Great little gadget, writes anywhere, and is available to the public. I have one.

When faced with the same problem, Russian cosmonauts used a pencil :wink:

Graham

MikeWhitney · **Joined:** Wed Aug 20, 2003 9:15 pm **Posts:** 4724

Graham Jagger wrote:

about the wireless timer Mike. I like the idea of having it. Like I said, it gives us more flexability with courses.

Just for a little background on the wireless timer. It was really bought because of Sanford. In 2003 we were considering not running there at all any more after putting multiple cars off on the taxiway. The wireless timer is the only way to run safe at Sanford.

Honestly I have been surprised at how often it has been considered for use already. I'm just glad that the efforts are paying off

SimonWright · **Posted:** Mon Mar 28, 2005 9:04 am

MikeWhitney wrote:

Donnie Barnes wrote:

But if we really wanted to "get geek" here for a second, half of the above solution (the 802.11 WAP and antenna) would allow folks with 802.11 laptops or handheld devices to access T&S data relatively easily, I'll bet. It would probably be pretty easy to setup a web server on the T&S laptop. Then save HTML results to the proper folder on the laptop and *bang*, they get "published" to the web right there at the event. Setup the WAP to hand out DHCP IPs on the "THSCC" SSID and point your browser at the right IP and you have up to date results. Wheee....

Drool, drool

<snip>

Now, on the 802.11 stuff - range will be the killer for using it beyond the bus. I think line of sight it doesn't even do 250ft. I could be wrong.

Todd and I did briefly discuss this last weekend - a remote standings board. He said that there is capability to do an auto web update. A spare laptop on the table outside the bus could be pretty easily rigged to show a web page via 802.11. This could actually *reduce* the amount of trash at the event if we could skip printing results pages. I think the laptop screen thing would be too small and dim to be useful for a crowd of people though.

If my poor results suddenly, inexplicably improve part way through the day then you must be imagining it.

Simon

Carl Fisher · **Posted:** Mon Mar 28, 2005 9:17 am

Graham Jagger wrote:

It's just a shame that in order to appease everyone with instant times at the end of their run we're now talking about putting start/finish together again.

Graham, I don't think the wireless timer was ever considered to be "the new way" of doing things. It's pretty clear that having the start and finish both near the bus works out best for competitors and the Timing & Scoring folks alike. It was just, as Mike said, a tool to give us more flexibility in course layout and provide solutions for problems like we have at Sanford.

I know when you get a new tool the tendency is to want to use it everywhere you can, but I think in this case it's becoming clear that it should probably only be used in certain situations.

Scott Johnson · **Posted:** Mon Mar 28, 2005 9:24 am

One thing that the wireless is actually quite good for is creating flxibility in bus placement.

We used the wireless at the novice school (for the start) simply so we wouldn't have to have to drive over the cables. I see this as a huge benefit, probably worth the expense in and of itself.

Scott

David Spratte · **Posted:** Mon Mar 28, 2005 11:40 am

Why not have a boombox or something put down near the finish? Hell the announcer can wait until the finish car pulls up next to it.

"Thank you, please drive thru."

Really, it was great having the radio in the pits, but the PA was certainly loud enough to hear both the PA and the radio where it was. If you just slide the radio closer to the finish it takes care of the people without radios or with car radio difficulties.

joedobner · **Joined:** Thu Apr 01, 2004 3:15 pm **Posts:** 85

Graham Jagger wrote:

Here's an example for you of what I'm getting at:

The astronauts had a problem in space writing upside down and in 0 gravity. So NASA spent a $1,000,000 with Fisher designing the Fisher Space Pen. Great little gadget, writes anywhere, and is available to the public. I have one.

When faced with the same problem, Russian cosmonauts used a pencil :wink:

You know, I heard about this while doing a spacewalk study in the Duke hyperbaric chamber. The problem wasn't that we weren't able to write in space, it's that we were using pencils in the first place. They're fine on the surface, but in microgravity the little chunks of graphite that break off while you write with a pencil float around the capsule and into eyes, ears, and lungs of the astronauts you'd just spent years and millions of dollars training. How'd you like to scrub a mission because of an abraded cornea caused by a floating pencil lead? Also, at 100% oxygen at ATM (the older space capsules and lunar landers used 100% O2 in the cabin to reduce the risk of decompression sickness during spacewalks, since our space suits are only pressurized to about 1/3 ATM) wood has a nasty tendency to catch fire if exposed to relatively high heat, and if that wood were to ignite the graphite you'd have a fire that's basically impossible to extinguish. Fire in space is very, very bad.

It's not that the Russians found a better solution. It's that they weren't as good at recognizing existing or potential problems. The Russkies never did learn their lesson about the dangers of burning graphite, either. In the space program's budget, $1,000,000 is chump change. We don't think much of writing intruments, but when you've got no atmosphere to communicate to your crewmates and you happen to suffer a radio failure, being able to write gets to be rather important.

EDIT: The moral here is that it never hurts to think about what could go wrong, and there's always a better way of thing things. If we were to model THSCC off the Russian space program, then response to a Miata flying off the pavement and rolling would be "That's OK, we've got 15 more!"

MikeWhitney · **Joined:** Wed Aug 20, 2003 9:15 pm **Posts:** 4724

^^

That right there gets my vote as Post of the Month.

RobLupella · **Posted:** Mon Mar 28, 2005 1:33 pm

joedobner wrote:

EDIT: The moral here is that it never hurts to think about what could go wrong, and there's always a better way of thing things. If we were to model THSCC off the Russian space program, then response to a Miata flying off the pavement and rolling would be "That's OK, we've got 15 more!"

I think Graham would see this as a benefit, know your audience :wink:

Graham Jagger · **Joined:** Fri Aug 29, 2003 12:53 am **Posts:** 1718

joedobner wrote:

EDIT: The moral here is that it never hurts to think about what could go wrong, and there's always a better way of thing things. If we were to model THSCC off the Russian space program, then response to a Miata flying off the pavement and rolling would be "That's OK, we've got 15 more!"

Intersting answer Joe. I never knew that. Nonethless I like my story better :wink:

Simple point, we don't need expensive high tech solutions to solve all our problems. Until THSCC really goes intergalactic we can use a pencil...

RobLupella wrote:

I think Graham would see this as a benefit, know your audience :wink:

Who me

Graham Jagger · **Joined:** Fri Aug 29, 2003 12:53 am **Posts:** 1718

Thanks for the explanations on the wireless Mike, Carl, Scott.

I guess I saw it as a way to remove us from the start/finish we were tied with the cabled approach that is very limiting. I think being able to have them seperated improves the freedom to have different courses. I would hope that might not make all our courses seem so boring to those of you who have been doing this for a long time.

Graham

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