On Tuesday, September 26, 2017 at 8:19:04 PM UTC-4, Richard Wilkening wrote:
Look at the resistance to Flarm.

In the contest community (i.e. where Flarm makes sense), the equipage rate seems to be North of 80%, DESPITE the fact that Flarm is expensive, hard to set up & test, has customer service that is pretty much non-existent.

In high traffic corridors (NYC, Reno...) transponder installations are nearly universal among XC guys.

So... your premise that safety doesn't sell appears to be incorrect.

Going forward, the obvious thing to do is send a bottle of smart pills to the guys at the FAA that can pave the way to approval for a low cost VFR only TABS system for low cost VFR only aircraft. Safety is a much easier sell when the cost is reasonable and if the FAA were concerned with VFR **safety** they'd act on this obvious fact.

Oh and btw: the airliners can see me at 6 miles RIGHT NOW by adding flarm. Quit laughing, I'm serious. Send the serial output data to TCAS or whatever. I don't expect them to do this. The airlines, like the FAA, are more interested in having some powerless victim to blame when the **** hits the fact than they are in prevention.

best,
Evan Ludeman / T8