Possible error with new FIE foil timing specifications

[Epeecurean]

Originally Posted by Barry Paul

I agree with JEC and therefore propose that what the F.I.E. and S.E.M.I. should do is clarify the rules thus

Non-valid timing should be changed from old regulation 2 10 ms to new regulation 5 – 15 ms. This would allow all apparatus made by all the manufactures to stay unaltered for this years trial. This compromise would be sensible as the F.I.E. are very likely to push next year for abolishing the non –valid light altogether, in which case the argument about non-valid contact time will become pointless.

That's a very reasonable compromise. It's nice to see your concern for your fellow brethren in the fencing equipment manufacturing trade! (or maybe your compromising mood stems out of a fear that despite the technical correctness of your position, the FIE may make a decision against you?)

[TheArmourer]

Does anyone have an email address for someone (who's likely to reply) at Allstar and Favero?

At the moment, as far as I can see, the only person involved with production of scoring boxes who is making any comment on this board is Barry Paul. And with all due respect to Barry, this does make for a slight imbalance in the argument. I would be very interested in seeing Allstar and/or Favero publically representing their side of the discussion and, if appropriate, defending their implimentation which has been alleged to be incorrect.

[Barry Paul]

Here is Gino Favio reply to my suggested solution. You also have the contact details. Barry Paul

Hello Paul,

Very good solution!
I agree with you for a non valid time of 5-15 msec. This would avoid a lot of confusion on an already confused situation.

Best regards
Gino Favero

FAVERO ELECTRONIC DESIGN
Via R.Lombardi 64 - IT31030 Arcade (TV) ITALY
tel +39 0422 874140 - fax +39 0422 874141
web: http://www.favero.com

[TheArmourer]

Thanks Barry.,

[DHCJr]

Barry, I want to applaud you also, but I must disagree. We have to go by what was voted on by the Congress.

As JEC noted the FIE does not publish the appendix, so we do not have any verifiable proof of what the delegates spoke of. Dan has the appendix and has read it, but that cannot be independently verified, so I do not offer it as proof.

But I can offer proof of what the USFA delegates believed they were voting on and all USFA members can verify this. If you check the American Fencing Winter 2004 Issue on Page 6 under the title “Rule Changes Being Tested For Saber and Foil This Season”.

1. The off target light in foil will remain as is.

I believe that can be considered explicit what was voted on by at the Congress and it should be respected.

[oiuyt]

Originally Posted by JEC

We will have to live with the differences, in the same way the blade size for youth events are not specified by the FIE.

Why would the FIE make any such specifications? The FIE doesn't allow fencers under 13 in any of their competitions, much less run the Y10 competitions where the USFA requires #0 or #2 blades. It's a USFA rule, not an FIE rule, as such it's the USFA's responsibility to have the rule make sense. Reasonable example to present, but at least attribute the blame to the correct entity. :)

-B :)

edit: changed punctuation

[Robert (2)]

Originally Posted by DHCJr

But I can offer proof of what the USFA delegates believed they were voting on and all USFA members can verify this.

Are you trying to cost Barry money? You tell British, French and Italians that they have to do what the US wants and guaranteed they will do exactly the opposite.

As Epeecurean points out, Barry is not really being generous. He actually raised this issue (with a little bit of glee at being able to rub other people's nose in the mistake) and it has backfired on him. It looks like SEMI may well back-track and go with a standard debounce for both on and off target. If they do he has a lot of boxes to change, so now he is proposing a compromise to head off what would be a costly problem.

The real problem with Barry's solution is that the two timings (LP and everyone else) feel completely different in competition, and they encourage very different sorts of fencing. So on the + side the FIE gets two trials for the price of one, and on the - side there is a great deal more confusion.

Robert

[DHCJr]

No, I am not saying to do what the U.S. wants. I am saying to do, what the FIE voted on, which the U.S. only has one vote. It has been said that we don't have proof of what was voted on from the FIE web site. We only have the summary which is true. But we have some proof of what was voted on.

Also, we have proven that one manufacturer has the wrong timing. Do we know what St. George timing is? I have a e-mail to Ted Li and he will find out this weekend. What if they are correct. Does anyone know the timing for the off-target for the other manufacturers, not just impressions.

I wish the FIE posted the appendix, but they don't. No offense to Barry, but the manufacturers do not make the rules, neither does the USFA, except within the U.S. for USFA competitions, the rules are voted on by the FIE and they voted for no change in the off-target.

I for one, will wait to here from Ted, and other manufacturers.

[Robert (2)]

Originally Posted by DHCJr

Also, we have proven that one manufacturer has the wrong timing.

Have we? All we have shown is that Barry and LP implemented the letter of the instructions that were distributed. You have shown that this is what the US thought it voted for. However, if you read Barry's fax from SEMI you can see that the head of SEMI initially thought that wasn't what the congress voted for.

And all of this is moot. The FIE can choose to clear this up any way they choose, including ignoring the technically correct interpretation of their own instructions.

Robert

[DHCJr]

Originally Posted by Robert (2)

Have we? All we have shown is that Barry and LP implemented the letter of the instructions that were distributed. You have shown that this is what the US thought it voted for. However, if you read Barry's fax from SEMI you can see that the head of SEMI initially thought that wasn't what the congress voted for.

From what I read from the British Forum was Marcello agreed with him on the fax. It was also posted in the forum that Marcello, told Favero the opposite. It did not say it was in writing.

When you say FIE, whom do you mean? The FIE Congress voted one way, but you probably don't mean them. Do you mean the FIE president, or Marcello by himself, or the SEMI commission? One thing we seem to agree is, we will have to wait for more information. I hope it is soon.

[DHCJr]

Originally Posted by Robert (2)

Are you trying to cost Barry money?

Your first point was so illogical that I didn’t even consider it. But in considering that the perceptions of some might believe I am out to get at Barry, because of some of the disagreements we have had on this forum. Let us look at what I suggested and see what effect it would have on Leon Paul’s bottom line.

If they were to make the changes to the off-target and the FIE does nothing or agrees with those changes, then they would have spent a certain amount of money for they would need to change the boxes already out there as well as any that are already made. If they wait and the FIE wants the off-targets changed, they will spend the same amount of money, but if they do nothing or confirm the rules as is they will spend less money.

If the FIE confirms the rules and Leon Paul changed the boxes, they will have to spend more money to put them back. In other words, my suggestion does not force them to spend money, but has a potential to save them money.

Neither of which was my intention, I have no financial interest in any fencing manufacturer or vendor.

[oiuyt]

Originally Posted by DHCJr

1. The off target light in foil will remain as is.

I believe that can be considered explicit what was voted on by at the Congress and it should be respected.

I have a different interpretation of this note which I believe is what was intended in the article.

I believe that American Fencing (or rather the author of the article) was merely affirming that white lights weren't being eliminated rather than making a comment about the timing of the lights. I'd be surprised if the author of the article even was aware that there might be a controversial issue with the differing timings of the lights.

-B :)

[MikeHarm]

Reading this I have to wonder if they're trying to make the off targets a problem to make it easier to get rid of them the next time the vote comes around.

[JEC]

Originally Posted by oiuyt

Why would the FIE make any such specifications? The FIE doesn't allow fencers under 13 in any of their competitions, much less run the Y10 competitions where the USFA requires #0 or #2 blades. It's a USFA rule, not an FIE rule, as such it's the USFA's responsibility to have the rule make sense. Reasonable example to present, but at least attribute the blame to the correct entity.

-B

edit: changed punctuation

Brad,

It is not only a USFA rule. We do not make blades here. We import them with labels attached. The blades are labeled by the forges or manufacturers as #0, #2 and #4. I know that there are rules in the German Federation (where some of the older forges have been) for their use in youth competitions (along with FIE 800N uniform). Thus, it is likely that this sizes were grandfather in and never been regulated. However, my point in the prior comparison to the non-valid hits refers to rules for the sport of fencing that the FIE has never stated.

[JEC]

Originally Posted by Barry Paul

Here is Gino Favio reply to my suggested solution. You also have the contact details. Barry Paul

Hello Paul,

Very good solution!
I agree with you for a non valid time of 5-15 msec. This would avoid a lot of confusion on an already confused situation.

Best regards
Gino Favero

Mr. Favero also emailed me earlier today to express his support for this idea. Clearly, the FIE (or at least the SEMI) needs to make a clarification.

Originally Posted by Oct 19, 2004 9:07 AM (CST)

I agree with the proposal to consider the non valid time from 5 to 15msec, so all the new machines will be ok, but obviously this will have to be approved by the FIE. I hope so.

Best regards
Gino Favero

Incidently, he also sent me an email about the Mini-02 buzzers. They continue to make them with old debounce timing, but they can be ordered specially (at an additional cost) to the new debounce timings.

[MTD]

Last I knew (it's hard to keep up), the behavior of Eigertek Eclipse boxes with "Leipzig" chips was still not generally known. Lacking a post from the horse's mouth, or a laboratory test, I offer a tentative report. The Eclipse "Leipzig" firmware uses the old off target timing.

This conclusion was reached by having a flicking fencer flick a volunteer repeatedly on the shoulder near the lamé armhole. Rarely did the colored light come on when the flick was to the lamé. Most of the time the white light came on when the flick was to the jacket. We lacked any obvious reason to believe that the mechanical characteristics of the lamé on top of the jacket and just the jacket of this fencer were significantly different. We also lacked any obvious reason to believe that the velocity of the point, its orientiation in space, and the orientation of the target differed significantly between the on-target and off-target hits. So, we were forced to conclude that the off-target trigger time was shorter than the on-target trigger time, which could most easily be explained by assuming the on-target trigger time was around 13 - 15 ms, and the off-target trigger time was significantly shorter.

[Barry Paul]

On about 11 October I faxed a letter to the Head of SEMI Mr Marcello Baiocco just to confirm I had understood correctly the instructions regarding the timings of the non-valid foil hit issued Athens 20 August 2004. On the 13 October I had a reply confirming that our understanding of the regulation (no change in off target timing) was correct.

Since then I have received two faxes both Mr Baiocco, The first explaining that the F.I.E. (Mr Roch) thinks differently from the S.E.M.I. The second fax dated 18 October 2004 (received last night) addressed to all the manufacturers stating that non-valid time should be the same as valid time.

The Eden Cup and Leon Paul competition at the weekend in London will be run with the new timings as confirmed in S.E.M.I latest rule update.

We will contact our customers regarding re-doing the apparatus already updated at our cost. We will be asking the F.I.E. for compensation. Barry

[TheArmourer]

I have been in correspondance with both Frank Messemer of Allstar and Gino Favero.
Frank tells me there will be an official response from Allstar shortly.
I am trying to clarify Favero's stand on the issue and solicit a public statement.

In the light of Barry's comment about having to make changes to boxes already modified, I reiterate my comment of 24th Sept, "I would say wait till any potential bugs are sorted".

Barry. I hope you don't feel I'm having a go at LP as last time. I'm not and I wasn't then. I'm just interested in saving clubs time, money and hassel and an open, honest, fair and competitive makret place.

[Epeecurean]

In light of the new information from Barry, I tried to edit the title of this thread to "Possible error with new FIE foil timing specifications" so as to not prejudice any readers against a particular equipment manufacturer. However, it seems to only allow me to alter the title of my first post and not the title of the entire thread. Does anyone know how to do this?

[oiuyt]

Originally Posted by JEC

Brad,

It is not only a USFA rule. We do not make blades here. We import them with labels attached. The blades are labeled by the forges or manufacturers as #0, #2 and #4. I know that there are rules in the German Federation (where some of the older forges have been) for their use in youth competitions (along with FIE 800N uniform). Thus, it is likely that this sizes were grandfather in and never been regulated. However, my point in the prior comparison to the non-valid hits refers to rules for the sport of fencing that the FIE has never stated.

It certainly isn't an FIE rule, the FIE doesn't run any competitions that allow that age-group, much less competitions for that age-group. It is a USFA rule. That's true whether or not it's also a German rule, or a British rule, or a rule in any other federation. There is absolutely no reason why the FIE would have a rule regarding how competitions should be run for a group of fencers that they don't allow to compete. This is NOT an example of the FIE not specifying rules that should be made explicit, which is what you were presenting it as.

Perhaps the FIE should specify the exact dimensions of a V2 grip vs. a V3. Not that they have any reason to do so, but different manufacturers might be makings things to different specs and giving them the same number.

No. This is completely on the federations which make a rule specifying #0 or #2 blades. The only reason that it matters that different manufacturers can forge their blades to different specs is that these federations have additional rules -- beyond the FIE rules -- that start talking about these sizes. I think the USFA needs to specify at least a maximum length for Y10 competition blades if that is what they want, rather than the number system currently in place. I think the Germans also need to do so. And any other NGB that has similar rules. But don't blame the FIE, their competitions don't require these non-specified sized blades. The FIE explicitly states the maximum length, and implicitly defines the minimum length of blades in any of their competitions.

-B :)