NAMBA Propwash Web October 2022.pub

Four years ago, Lenny Blake and Russ Stark began working on a transponder system from Lithuania to test in our district with the goal of sharing it with our organization. Lenny began testing the system at his local pond using a tree and pole as anchor points for the transponder feed line and had some luck. He then decided to try it at our local club races in Tucson. The system worked okay but missed picking up boats as they passed under the transponder feed line. The Lithuanian system was tested for over a year. It’s a good system, but was not a good fit for our application and unfortunately, it was back to the drawing board… Lenny and Russ took it upon themselves to research another transponder system used in RC car racing. The program that we are now using is called My Laps in conjunction with Live RC. The combination of the two programs will prove to be exactly what we need. Russ and Lenny purchased the software and hardware as well as paid for the annual subscription fees to make this work for our district. Lenny went to work fabricating all the necessary cabling and attachments needed to utilize the system at all our ponds within the district. Some are fixed, and some need to be removed, depending on the site rules. Two years ago, Lenny and David Siembor began testing the new system at my local pond in Tucson during our club races. It was also tested on one class (G-1 Mono) during a couple district races that year. Progress was slow at first but continued to get better and better. At the start of the 2022 racing season Lenny reached out to the host club of each district race to see if he could test the system on one class (G-1 Mono) during their Races. His requests were approved and the real testing began. As the season progressed the system worked better round by round and with David’s help, they began fine tuning the program. By the middle of the season Lenny had requested that anyone that had a transponder could run them outside the G-1 Mono class which most took advantage of the opportunity. The program allowed racers to see their lap times and overall times. It would also report jump starts, which is where the help is most needed. Racers were now coming up to the drivers stand to see their lap and race times. Some CDs even started to announce fast lap times creating excitement for our fellow racers. PROPWASH 12 October 2022 Mike and dad Tom Cinquegrani Brian Bounds and son Caleb PJ Foster with dad Jim Justin Terpstra and son Carsin News from District 19 (Continued from page 11)