Discussion: EMIT touch free

You touched every control and still one didn't register?
I'm lucky then. I touched everything on Sunday and started off looking for the flash but found I didn't have the time so eventually gave up. It didn't help that it was bright sunshine or that the tag was loose and slipping around all over my lower arm.
Mr EMIT was very defensive when I jokingly mentioned the word 'beep' but I think it's a major weakness compared with SI Air.

Agreed.
I touched every unit on Sunday, and particularly remember touching the one at the road crossing on the way back as I was keeping a careful eye on the seconds before heading off again... DSQ. Ho hum. W40S isn't particularly important or competitive, anyway, and I enjoyed my run :)

The touch free emit controls emit a signal above and below the plate. It doesn't emit much signal at the sides of the plate (if that description makes any sense). At WOC last year we were trying out the system before the racing and noticed that you could touch the control from the side and not register a punch. The emit representative there didn't really understand that this was a problem. He seemed to think that since it is touch free, you don't ever have to touch the unit but my argument is that if you have touched the unit, you shouldn't have to worry about getting a punch - it should just work.

Lesson was to put the emittag over the top of the control and not from the side but I still think it is silly to have a knack to touch free punching.

Yep definitely touched every one. Can't remember whether it was from the side on that particular one, but it might well have been.

In fairness to mr EmitUK , whenever I have seen him demonstrate the system, whilst he usually wafts his hand over the unit, he does so as one smooth movement, finishing with it in front of his face so that he can easily see it flashing. ( or not, I guess) .

Anyway I still quite enjoyed the run - well, as much as any Urban race.

There were considerable problems at the sprint and middle at Aldershot, where it was reported a trial (army event?) had none. see There seemed to be two factors, a variability in distance at which the unit will react and a time lag between punches. (Perhaps there is variability between units, manufacturing tolerances etc.)
We have subsequently used at several Army events with no issues, (its never occurred to me to touch the control just waft across the top) but again no close controls, road crossings etc.
Kris comment perhaps may start to make some sense of the issue.

My thinking is that it is (very slightly) faster to touch and not check than it is to try to eek out an extra few centimeters and check every time. If this is the case you have to be certain of getting a punch when you touch the unit. I can't remember whether I ended up checking at WOC or not but I went for touching the far side of the plate which put the emittag over the plate no matter what..

Thanks for the tips Kris. I'll be touching the top of the unit in future and keeping my fingers crossed that it's registered. I need to be concentrating on where I'm going next rather than looking for a flashing tag.
It would also help if next time we could have our tags before getting to the start so that we have more time to work out the best place to attach it.

I did a lot of experimentation when they were used at the British and there was a warm up area where you could mess with it for as long as you wanted.I found upside down in the palm of the hand worked best,ie with the strap in the crook of the thumb.This lets you grasp it in your hand like a normal emit when not punching, and when you do punch it's more natural to wave your palm at something than your wrist, and you can also see the light better in bright sunlight since you can bend your fingers around to shade it.