Help us with this petition for security on anti-collision systems

On Friday, May 29, 2015 at 4:40:38 AM UTC-5, Lucas wrote:
On Friday, May 29, 2015 at 10:41:02 AM UTC+2, Lucas wrote:
On Wednesday, May 27, 2015 at 12:45:08 PM UTC+2, Kevin Neave wrote:
Since you ask...

The first hit from Google for "dsx systems t-advisor" is

http://frank.schellenberg.nl/wp-cont...r_07_12_19.pdf

This states..

"The Traffic Advisor, notifies the pilot the presence of all planes that
enter within the radio operating range (that for the T-Advisor is up to 7
km)"

I may be dim but I read that as "T-Advisor tells you 'that there are lots
of gliders flying within 7 km' ".

So I'll rephrase that.

It *would* tell me that there are lots of planes flying within 7km of me if
they were fitted with DSX.

The aircraft I'm interested in are the ones that are that are converging
with me. Flarm warns me of these as long as they are also Flarm equipped
Flarm is intended as an aid to lookout, generally I've seen most contacts
by the time Flarm generates a warning, occasionally I get a wake up call.
Flarm reminds me that my lookout is not as good as it could be.
(Of course I have no idea how many I'm missing and Flarm isn't picking up)

I don't see what T-Advisor would give me

A large number of the gliders flying XC in the UK (possibly a majority by
now) are using Flarm. I don't know of ANY using DSX.

So I repeat the question, how many gliders in Europe are using DSX?
Or more specifically how many in the UK are using DSX?

KN



At 23:44 26 May 2015, Lucas wrote:
Kevin Neave, can you show in which website you read that the T-Advisor
tells you "that there are lots of gliders flying within 7 km" ?

Kevin, I understand that the sentence can be read in a way different from what was intended: the T-Advisor notifies the pilot of the NEW presence of a glider within range. It blimps once, to tell the pilot that there is a glider there, and will not continue indicating it to the pilot (how could it indicate continuously all gliders in range, on a led display ? Obviously this is impossible, beside useless).

Your comment derives from the fact that you have not had the chance of flying with a T-Advisor, otherwise you would have noticed how it works. Way differently from what you think. But you have forgotten to read the rest of the manual, where it is clearly specified that the system warns the pilot only about gliders that are going to possibly collide.

All pilots with T-Advisor, that has been developed with the input of all of them, are extremely happy to be notified when a glider enters the operating range of the system: it is very helpful to spot another glider at a quite long distance, not mainly for collision avoidance but for information. Also in competitions.

Therefore, the T-Advisor doesn't keep beeping for *any* aircraft in range, buto only for those that are close to possibly collide, warning the pilot with different levels of beeps and led flashes depending on the severity of the situation. This doesn't mean it decides which plane is more dangerous: it tells you what planes are going to hit you based on the approaching speed/distance = time to impact. The warnings are prioritized according the time to impact.
The pilot decides, ultimately.
What it doesn't is to decide which threat to display and which not, based on a "prediction", that, I reiterate, is impossible for a glider not flying with a regular trajectory (straight of stable rate of turn - it's enough to look at the glider traces of any flight to understand this).


.... I think that your worries are

Sorry: it was posted inadvertently, before completion:
I think that what worried you is clear now.
Again: pity you hadn't got the chance of flying with a T-Advisor.
Most T-Advisor pilots have been reporting their satisfaction about how the system warns them about surrounding traffic and risk of collisions.
None of them has ever said that it's annoying in thermals and has to turn down the volume. And this is another difference to the other system.
All of them reported that the function that informs them about the position of another plane entering into the range is very useful.
Many T-Advisor pilots are ex-Flarm pilots.

Ok, so finally it all boils down to: a small group of Flarm users don't like the Flarm display setup, and want something less intrusive. So instead of DSX licencing the Flarm protocol and using their own display logic, they come up with their own system - despite the fact that there is already a huge installed base of Flarm users.

So now that Flarm decides to encrypt their protocol (due to the OGN hacking and privacy issues), suddenly DSX T-advisor users are out in the cold.

Hmm, anyone remember VHS vs BetaMax? Best system doesn't always win - but when only one system is left, it becomes the de-facto protocol!

Kirk