An interesting trial flight attempt...

wrote:
Marc, by your math (admittedly back of the envelope), if 200 glider
pilots each chipped in $500, someone could design it? I know nothing
about the costs of production of such a device, but say (worst case)
another $500 per unit? So for a grand those pilots would have a
working system. That's in my price range...

You could get 200 US glider pilots to chip in $500 on something that
won't increase their L/D? You must be quite a salesman 8^)

FLARM costs around ~500 Euros, so it is certainly possible. The most
sensible thing is to license the FLARM design for production/sale in the
US. Payment of a suitable license fee, and indemnification against the
evils of the US court system would likely bypass their liability
concerns. It would be necessary to swap in a wireless module using FCC
acceptable frequencies.

An entirely new system would require a significant amount of hardware
design, software development, and testing. Paying for this would push
the amortized costs over even 500 units beyond your price range. This
would only work with an essentially volunteer effort.

In either case, a testing lab would need to be hired to do FCC Part 15
conformance verification as an "intentional radiator". This is way
outside of my area, but I would guess that the cost for this alone is
somewhere in the $20K to $50K range.

The point is - I see lots of guys sticking expensive transponders in
their ships which (in my opinion) provide little protection from most
mid-air collision threats, while there is little being done in
exploiting more useful avenues.

Perhaps transponders aren't useful in your area, but they are in mine.
I have had more surprise encounters with commercial and military
aircraft, than I have with other gliders.

I also suspect that FLARM won't do much to help where I'm most concerned
about a collision with another glider, the ridge running down the White
and Inyo mountains near the CA/NV border. FLARM advertises an effective
range of 2-3 km, or 1 to 1.5 nm. Given a head-on approach between two
gliders, each running at a TAS of 150 knots, you'll be lucky to get 10
seconds of warning. Might work for an ex-fighter pilot, but that's not
much time for someone like me...

Perhaps a market for flight schools, that have a lot of power trainers
working VFR in busy airspace? (again - all xponder equipped but no TCAS
or warning by ATC if not on ATC freq).

ADS-B is a much better solution for this, particularly with the ground
stations in place (as they are now on much of the east coast), which
will allow ATC to see you. If you have a traffic display (which could
be implemented using a PDA), not only will you see other ADS-B equipped
aircraft, you'll also see Mode C/S equipped aircraft through the data link.

Just saying it can't be done guarantees it won't be done. And just
thinking/talking about it doesn't make it happen, I know - but you have
to start somewhere.

True, but to get much farther, it'll take time and money. Any
volunteers? I can help with the software and bad advice...

Marc