Turbine scales

[Doug Smock]

Todd,
We are having a BOD meeting next month. I'll see if we can get something on the agenda for you as promised.
It would be cool to see these run for records.

This doesn't sound like someone that is trying to hold someone back.

But what am I doing? This kind of thing should be left up to the resident experts that have all the answers.

Better check the T class rules you are referring to Jay.

Later fellas.

[Doby]

T class turbine

[T.S.Davis]

Must be.
If the boy scouts had used the lake the weekend before, I don't think the scout leader has anything to worry about.

You can come up with a million unlikely hypotheticals but an organization that used the lake at a different time would not be liable. If you think they are, exactly when would this term of liability end?
If I go run a 12s boat at Thread Lake this weekend, when is it ok to hold an event there again? A month? A year? 10 years? Ever?

Keith, in a suit everyone that has a two pennies to rub together gets named and has to defend themselves. If there is a lake management association they get named. Then some will be eliminated through the process. Still have to defend yourself out of the suit. Seen it after a building fire. Everyone that built the building got named.

Here's the real risk.

Guy buys a big boat and plans to run 12s. He's not a complete idiot and recognizes these buggers are dangerous. So he seeks out some additional insurance coverage. Finds NAMBA has good insurance. Reads the book. Gets to the end of the safety section of the book where it tells him how to maintain coverage. He stops reading. The class rules don't matter to him because he isn't trying to race it. So who cares? The book doesn't say "must be a NAMBA class boat to maintain coverage" so he figures he's good.

To say "well, common sense would tell you that" doesn't mean anything in court. Remember the women that poured hot coffee in her crotch?

So he goes out and runs his boat and has some mishap. Good news (he figures) and tells the recipient of the mishap that he has good insurance. Then the claim goes in.................and it's declined. Now his home owners will pick it up right? Seems reasonable. Accept they don't want to foot the bill all alone. Why should they? "He has additional coverage" Accept that the coverage that was dropped. Unfortunately the reason for it being dropped can't be tracked back to section and verse from the book. Time is ticking by while each entity denies the claims. The injured is covering the costs and is starting to get pissed because he realizes the only fix will be through the courts. The suit will now escalate into something stupid. Medical costs will turn into pain, suffering, mental distress.

If Dave is still reading, this sound close?

Soooooo......now we'll have the injured person with a lawyer because nobody wants to pay, the guy with the boats lawyer (same reason), the homeowners insurance with lawyer, NAMBA's insurance underwriter with a lawyer and likely NAMBA would need a lawyer.

All of that cost money. NAMBA will lose the suit because there is a gaping whole in the text. NAMBA will not be able to get insurance following the mess because nobody will underwrite them.

It wont satisfy Todds desire to run his boat but to protect NAMBA there only needs to be a simple line of text added to the safety rules.

Running boats and/or setups that do not fit a NAMBA legal class will cause a loss of insurance coverage.

This would drop NAMBA's exposure down considerably. That would fix the 12s exposure too. Soooo simple. Why they're so obtuse on this is a mystery to me. I can only assume that they enjoy having the turbine debate about every three years.

[PatrickM]

The NAMBA board of directors is the only group that has the power to change the rule book regarding safety and insurance issues. Your time would be better spent lobbying the BOD members rather than blowing smoke on a forum.
On the other hand, grandstanding can have its benefits amongst ones peers..........

[Doby]

Just to be literal, if safety dictates insurance coverage, then this was a major issue at the Nats this year...

A. GENERAL SAFETY REGULATIONS
1. NAMBA members must have their NAMBA numbers on their boats and their backs
for easy identification. Minimum number sizes will be 1-1/2” on the back and 1” on
the boat, except where noted in specific class rules. R/C Combat ships do not require
numbers on boats or members.

Didn't see to many boats or NAMBA members that followed this...now, the way most people drive (myself included), the boats could be considered as "Combat" ships.

12. All rules, laws, ordinances, and regulations of any federal, state, county, and/or
municipality will be observed at all times.

Ummmm...does anyone actually check this...can this actually be verified??? Or is this just a catch all phrase to get out of any coverage is something happens. I'd love to see the documentation review of this requirement that happens before every NAMBA race. I'm pretty sure that there are some pretty funky laws/ordinances in place that no-one knows about.

Just to say in all seriousness though, This years FE Nats was probably one of the safest races I've ever been at. Kudos to the MMEU gang.

But would coverage have been nullified for the above???

[Jeff]

Here is another scenario, guy has a rc floatplane. Goes to lake and flies it, not worried about all the expensive houses and boats cause he has ama insurance. Has a mishap. Rich guy finds out he is a namba member, guess what.... they get named. Namba insurance has to fight claim... world comes to end...namba gets non-renued. How is that any different?

[Peter A]

What was the original question? Oh yeah some one was keen to see if they could set a record for a turbine powered boat, (which are way cool). Sad that it all comes down to arguments about insurance, even as valid as it is.

"...send lawyers, guns and money"

I like that song, and Roland the thompson gunner.

[T.S.Davis]

The NAMBA board of directors is the only group that has the power to change the rule book regarding safety and insurance issues. Your time would be better spent lobbying the BOD members rather than blowing smoke on a forum.
On the other hand, grandstanding can have its benefits amongst ones peers..........

Really Patrick? My very best friend is on the BOD and I've been arguing with Al for two days.

Grand standing. That's a new one. It will stick with me though. Thanks.

[Todd Fleury]

Heard from Al on another forum. To alleviate most of the issue, I will not be renewing my membership to NAMBA. As Dave put it, if I want to run my boat, turn in my NAMBA card. I thought NAMBA was about bringing boaters together, but I have been mistaken.

[jaike5]

Todd,
maybe you can hold off on that decision to see if the BOD ( experts ) can work this out.
Cheers, Jay.

[T.S.Davis]

Well, after about 72,000 words of text between Al and I ........I think I understand now. Man has the patience of a saint.

An analogy is in order.

Say you need car insurance since I used that before. You call the insurance company and they'll want to know what your driving. You can't tell them "it doesn't matter, I'm going to obey the law" (safety rules in our case). They want to know what they're potential exposure is. The rate will vary based on the vehicle. If you're driving a Honda Prius the price is very different than if you're driving a Ferrari 458. You're still going to obey the law with both cars (safety rules again) but the potential for catastrophic error is a wee bit higher with the Ferrari.

In NAMBA's case they asked for insurance and told the underwriter basically.......we run this, this, these, and those (I think there's 4 types) up to "X" amount of power, size, etc. Took it right out of our rule book. So the insurance is written to insure what the organization said we were going to do. Even if somebody took the time to develop a turbine class, NAMBA would still have to change the policy to include them which may drive the price to the moon. Or worse make the organization un-insurable. Not because turbines are going to kill us all but because the insurance company might feel there is higher inherent risk.

NAMBA doesn't feel it should have to spell all that out. The safety rules are there to remind us of how not to hurt ourselves. They aren't the only rules though.

I'm sure that IMPBA is similar.

Gonna post this over on IW too.

[Rookieboater]

Todd,
As in the e-mail I sent you earlier in the year and the conversation that took place about your Turbine... It is not covered under our insurance. Its not a rule I made up. If you want it covered and to be made a NAMBA recognized power plant there are procedures you can take to start it moving forward. When that happens and it gets passed it probably still WON'T be insurable. Our insurance company does not want to insure them.

Terry,
I appreciate your enthusiasm for finding gaping holes in our rule book as you interpret it. The basic rule book was written 40 years ago and added upon almost every single year. Somethings can get redundant and others just completely missed. I did not see or hear about this being a possible problem until last night. The people that read and interpreted it 20 years ago see it differently than we do now. I can see where you can come up with your version and I see it completely differently. I will forward your concern to the BOD and see if we can add something that closes the loop on the safety section vs racing section. Maybe you can forward me a revised rule that would close this gap. Lets get this taken care of.

Thanks,
Robert Holland

[Rookieboater]

Heard from Al on another forum. To alleviate most of the issue, I will not be renewing my membership to NAMBA. As Dave put it, if I want to run my boat, turn in my NAMBA card. I thought NAMBA was about bringing boaters together, but I have been mistaken.

Todd,
NAMBA is about furthering model boating. How is your action taken furthering model boating? I talked with you and sent you and email letting you know our insurance does not cover your turbine. Now the rule book may not expressly spell that out for you as it does me but you were informed many months ago that it is just not covered. Now here we are discussing this issue on at least two forums because you did not like the answer. How is that promoting model boating? One of the task that the BOD is burden with is protecting the masses and making sure we have insurances in place. If you feel the need to run your turbine while toting your NAMBA card around then maybe it best that you do not renew. If you want to become part of the solution then you should renew. I would you rather renew and help NAMBA understand turbines and how they can fit in our future. When all of that is spelled out and rules put in place or proposed then NAMBA can look into insurance coverage. To be honest I doubt we can find any carrier to cover at an expense suitable for all members.

Robert Holland

[kevinpratt823]

An interesting read for me as an "outsider", no clubs for me to run in around here. I do however have a couple thoughts. There has been talk about changing the policy, such as

"Running boats and/or setups that do not fit a NAMBA legal class will cause a loss of insurance coverage".

I think the wording could be better than "loss of coverage" as that implies termination of policy. Perhaps something more on the lines of "Any boats not falling within the stated class guidelines will be the sole responsibility and liability of the owner/operator and will not be covered under this policy". I know that kind of leaves it up to the property owners to allow or not, but it at least protects the organization and insurance co.

Also, has it occurred to anybody that there are many clubs flying airplanes, including those enormous jets, capable of ludicrous speeds that most of our boats probably don't even compare to, covering enormous ammounts of ground, with volatile fuel and components, over peoples heads, with the potential to leave the controlled area and cause considerable harm and damage upon malfunction, and a much greater liability I would imagine. Perhaps it would be worth looking into what they are doing for insurance. I understand it may just boil down to a cost thing, and they obviously may have more members to offset a higher cost if that's the case, but I just thought I'd throw that out there, as I don't think a turbine boat is nearly as dangerous as that stuff. It might be worth reaching out to those guys if anybody is that serious about bringing the turbine boats into the equation.

Plenty of videos from this jet club in Florida, and IMO this would be far more of a liability than a turbine boathttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6UWqIGC4JA

[T.S.Davis]

My new found understanding is that it isn't necessarily the "class" definitions but more the various power sources.

You can put 6s in a 34" boat and it's a legal Q boat.
You can put 4s in a 36" boat and it's also a legal Q boat.
You can put 37 volts nominal in a 20" boat and it's a T boat. You're legal but yer a moron.
You can put 3.7 volts in a 59.9" boat and it's a T boat. Again legal but yer a moron.

If this is confusing to any of you go back and read it again.

The key where the insurance company is concerned is the maximum power.

With nitro and gas it's the maximum displacement.

They don't care about our 65% sport transom rule or our 34" P limitation. This is why it may not be a grand idea to just say "follow class rules or else"

All they care about is the power output, size, and weight.

So maybe possibly perhaps we just need something that makes it clear to the average human that those power limitations aren't simply class structure but are in fact what is insured.