{"id":2551,"date":"2015-09-03T15:35:32","date_gmt":"2015-09-03T19:35:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/amablog.modelaircraft.org\/amamuseum\/?p=2551"},"modified":"2015-09-22T12:07:24","modified_gmt":"2015-09-22T16:07:24","slug":"nmpras-50th-anniversary-a-common-question","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amablog.modelaircraft.org\/amamuseum\/2015\/09\/03\/nmpras-50th-anniversary-a-common-question\/","title":{"rendered":"NMPRA\u2019s 50th Anniversary & A Common Question"},"content":{"rendered":"

Happy 50th Anniversary National Miniature Pylon Racing Association (NMPRA)!\u00a0 Founded in 1965 to help deepen and develop the country\u2019s interest in RC Pylon Racing, for the last 50 years, NMPRA has been an active part in developing pylon racing competition around the world.<\/p>\n

In honor of this anniversary, museum staff wants to take a moment to answer one of the most common questions visitors (especially school children) ask during their museum visit.<\/p>\n

Why is that man in a cage? Is he in jail?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>
The mannequin in the pylon cage tends to startle most visitors as they come around the corner.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The short answer:\u00a0 No, he is judging the competition.<\/p>\n

The long answer:\u00a0 Safety is an important factor in all competition, but especially when model airplanes are careening above one\u2019s head going 150+ miles per hour during a pylon race.\u00a0 Made from a double layer of chain link fence and positioned on the course in such a way to lessen a full-on crash, the cage was designed to be a protected space where the pylon judge could watch the race and manipulate the shutter to inform the pilot\/caller teams how they performed.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
The RC pylon racing exhibit<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Cage use first appeared in the AMA Rule Book section on Pylon Racing in 1996.\u00a0 There was to be one cage for each pylon, so each course had a set of three.\u00a0 The largest cage was placed at the first pylon and was big enough for four judges (each judge was responsible for watching one competition aircraft).\u00a0 The cages at the second and third pylon each contained one judge, as the way the course was set up the judge could watch all four aircraft at once.\u00a0 When stored, the smaller cages would stack inside the larger cage, like a series of nesting dolls.<\/p>\n

The cage in the museum\u2019s collection is one of the smaller cages for the second or third pylon.\u00a0 It is outfitted with shutters that the judge would open and close to communicate with the callers and pilots during the race.<\/p>\n

\"There<\/a>
The shutters opened and closed as a method of communicating with the callers and pilots off the course.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The use of safety cages fell out of use after only a few years.\u00a0 Judges were moved off course entirely and a light system was set up to indicate the turns.\u00a0 Recently, a similar light system was donated to the museum\u2019s collection;\u00a0 we are still talking about the best way of placing this on exhibit.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
A view of the Scale Exhibit, as seen from inside the safety cage.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"When<\/a>
Inside the pylon safety cage, this is what you see looking up and to the right.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"When<\/a>
This is the view from the pylon cage when looking up and to the left.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

While the NMPRA is going to keep racing into the next 50 years of its future, the cage, shutters, light system and collection of pylon racing aircraft will continue to tell visitors its history by answering, \u201cwhy is there a guy in a cage?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Happy 50th Anniversary National Miniature Pylon Racing Association (NMPRA)!\u00a0 Founded in 1965 to help deepen and develop the country\u2019s interest in RC Pylon Racing, for the last 50 years, NMPRA has been an active part in developing pylon racing competition around the world. In honor of this anniversary, museum staff […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":2558,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[47,112],"tags":[56,133,163],"class_list":["post-2551","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-museum","category-radio-control-2","tag-artifact","tag-model-airplane","tag-radio-control-pylon-racing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amablog.modelaircraft.org\/amamuseum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2551","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amablog.modelaircraft.org\/amamuseum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amablog.modelaircraft.org\/amamuseum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amablog.modelaircraft.org\/amamuseum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amablog.modelaircraft.org\/amamuseum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2551"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/amablog.modelaircraft.org\/amamuseum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2551\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2587,"href":"https:\/\/amablog.modelaircraft.org\/amamuseum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2551\/revisions\/2587"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amablog.modelaircraft.org\/amamuseum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2558"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amablog.modelaircraft.org\/amamuseum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2551"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amablog.modelaircraft.org\/amamuseum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2551"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amablog.modelaircraft.org\/amamuseum\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2551"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}