Should the PDGA standardize flight ratings?

[Casey 1988]

I think does it matter? I say flight ratings are not great and if more players discs had a small little flight on them the way the old old Discraft discs or the Discs like Wham-O Touchline series having both right and left flight on the disc.

[rocthecourse]

Originally Posted by Karl

Speed
A terrible word to explain whatever they're trying to explain. Understand that ALL discs - throw as hard as possible - come out of a player's hand at the same 'speed.

I though that generally thinner rimmed discs come out of the hand faster then wide rimmed discs*+. So a full power throw with a putter will leave the hand at a higher speed than a 14 speed driver. My understanding is the wide rim decreases your leverage.

I do agree that "speed" isn't the right word.

*You might also have to factor in diameter too, but I don't know.
+Assuming all discs are the same weight.

[bogeyfreetilinfinity]

nah, only as much as they should standardize any other aspect of marketing.

[Three Putt]

Originally Posted by rocthecourse

I though that generally thinner rimmed discs come out of the hand faster then wide rimmed discs*+. So a full power throw with a putter will leave the hand at a higher speed than a 14 speed driver. My understanding is the wide rim decreases your leverage.

I do agree that "speed" isn't the right word.

*You might also have to factor in diameter too, but I don't know.
+Assuming all discs are the same weight.

I mean I'm not a scientist so I don't know, but I thought the wide rimmed discs have more mass on the outside of the disc so they rotate faster, which causes them to go where they are going faster i.e. go out in a field and throw a spike hyzer with a super overstable high-speed driver and then throw a putter over to the same spot. Assuming you can get them to both land in the same spot, the putter will take a slow floaty route that spends longer in the air than the high speed driver. That's what I thought "speed" referred to.

I'm not even sure how you would observe something like speed out of your hand, wouldn't that depend more on your throwing form than the disc? Like I'm sure Paul McBeth could get a trash can lid out of his hand going faster than any golf disc I throw.

[Armus Patheticus]

If "speed" means anything approaching quantitative, it might mean that higher speeds feature decreased deceleration. All discs fly, out of the hand, as fast as you throw them.

[wims]

Speed refers to the speed you need to throw the disc at to make it fly as it was designed. This is why it's not recommended for beginners to throw high speed discs; their form typically cannot accelerate the disc to the speed it needs to fly at

[Armus Patheticus]

Originally Posted by wims

Speed refers to the speed you need to throw the disc at to make it fly as it was designed. This is why it's not recommended for beginners to throw high speed discs; their form typically cannot accelerate the disc to the speed it needs to fly at

This is a common interpretation that is somewhat useful, but not always accurate. Many high speed discs are very throwable, and fly their turn and fade numbers at slow speeds. They were "designed" to sell to low-speed throwers.

[BillFleming]

Originally Posted by autocrosscrx

I'm not sure about speed or load rating, but the treadwear number is pretty much as arbitrary as the flight numbers we see on discs.

Okay, interesting story time (okay, maybe not interesting for all). My brother used to work selling tires and passed this information to me.

Tire treadwear (ie...lasts this many miles) is not arbitrary. BUT it is less than the actual wear time. Why? Let's say the average treadwear for the normal car tire is 80,000 miles. The manufacture will say that is what their treadwear is. But then a different brand now says 90,000 miles. The other brands want to equal or better that, so they say their tire is now rated for 90,000 miles. Did anything change? No...the tire may actually be rated for 100,000 miles, but the manufacturer won't say that; because then to improve the rating they have to come up with a new tire. But, having their tire rated to 100,000 miles, but only claiming 80,000 lets them slowly increase the treadwear rating without actually changing anything. The tire brand my brother sold was rated for 150,000 miles, but only advertised (at the time) for 88,000 miles (or something close to that value).

[autocrosscrx]

Originally Posted by BillFleming

Okay, interesting story time (okay, maybe not interesting for all). My brother used to work selling tires and passed this information to me.

Tire treadwear (ie...lasts this many miles) is not arbitrary. BUT it is less than the actual wear time. Why? Let's say the average treadwear for the normal car tire is 80,000 miles. The manufacture will say that is what their treadwear is. But then a different brand now says 90,000 miles. The other brands want to equal or better that, so they say their tire is now rated for 90,000 miles. Did anything change? No...the tire may actually be rated for 100,000 miles, but the manufacturer won't say that; because then to improve the rating they have to come up with a new tire. But, having their tire rated to 100,000 miles, but only claiming 80,000 lets them slowly increase the treadwear rating without actually changing anything. The tire brand my brother sold was rated for 150,000 miles, but only advertised (at the time) for 88,000 miles (or something close to that value).

Yeah, they will rate performance tires lower because the general public sees the lower rating and equates that to better performance.

I used to run a class in SCCA and the rule required a 140TW or higher tire. There was a tire that was pretty dominant, but wore pretty quickly and people complained about the wear and got the rule changed to 200TW. The hot tires immediately got bumped up to 200TW.

So if a tire goes through a test and receives a certain rating, but the manufacturers are free to market their tire as a totally different rating, that seems arbitrary to me.