PowerFlarm and transponders while towing?

On Feb 25, 9:26*am, Dan wrote:
On Feb 25, 7:10*am, Andrzej Kobus wrote:









On Feb 24, 7:05*am, Andrzej Kobus wrote:

While aero-towing a Mode-C transponder equipped glider, and using
PowerFlarm and transponder in the tow plane, most of the time the
glider will show up on the PF as a threat aircraft. Since the PF
prioritizes threats, this precludes another more distant "intruder"
aircraft as being displayed as a threat.

Do you mean PF can only follow one Mode-C threat? This would be a
significant step down from what my PCAS can do. If this is true the PF
PCAS implementation is very poor. Could anyone who flew with PF
comment on this? How many transponder threats can PF follow?

Based on your statement, the same problem will occur in a gaggle of
gliders with transponders. You will have no choice but to disable the
PCAS or filter out codes 1202, but if you do that any glider without a
Flarm but with a transponder is not going to be visible to you. The
only way this problem can be solved is with Mod-S transponders. You
will then associate Mod-S code with a Flarm ID and filter out
transponder signals coming from a glider equipped with both.

Can anyone using PF comment on my question? Can you see more than one
transponder equipped aircraft at a time? *I found this in the manual:

"The nearest aircraft not equipped with ADSB-OUT or FLARM devices, but
is indicated as
a light green circle, in the example, that
target is 2400 ft below. The circle radius
gives a distance estimation based on signal
strength.
The green circle turns red when close. In the
example, the target is 200 ft above"

From the wording it looks like PF can only track one Transponder
equipped aircraft, which is pretty bad!

If you don't have any capability to track one Transponder, and now PF
gives you the capability to track the closest transponder equipped
aircraft, and tell you if he is higher/lower than you (and by how
much), and closing or opening, how can that possibly be a bad thing?

In addition, it does flarm/flarm collision warning, and eventually,
igc-format logging and logger approval (summerish according to the
PowerFLARM talk at the SSA Reno Convention). I expect that the
capability to see others' climb rates on some PDAs will make
recreational cross-country a lot less stressful too...

One man's opinion.

Dan

It is bad because my PCAS can track many transponder equipped aircraft
at the same time and give me this information for each one.

I am not talking about Flarm I am all for Flarm but the PCAS
implementation is not good if the PF can only track one transponder
equipped aircraft at a time.

Your assessment is correct. You only ever see an indication for the
closest transponder only target. Since I haven't used a pcas system
before, I don't know how it displays multiple targets, but I think the
flarm implementation is pretty good since it filters out all but the
most relevant threat. That said, we are in a lightly populated area
for traffic, so I haven't been in a situation where there were
multiple targets within say, 4 miles.

So far with 3 flights under my belt with the powerflarm, I've only
managed to find one unknown transponder target. Range and height
variation were very good, but 3-4 miles and 2000ft below is pretty
hard to spot a small power plane. I have yet to be relatively close
to any power traffic. One flight I was getting a transponder beacon
from a friend in a glider and the estimated range was quite good.

The issue with the towplane transponder and glider masking other
threats is a good problem to solve though. Our towplane doesn't have
a transponder so we can't test that at our little club.

Morgan

On Feb 25, 7:43*am, Andrzej Kobus wrote:
On Feb 25, 9:26*am, Dan wrote:









On Feb 25, 7:10*am, Andrzej Kobus wrote:

On Feb 24, 7:05*am, Andrzej Kobus wrote:

While aero-towing a Mode-C transponder equipped glider, and using
PowerFlarm and transponder in the tow plane, most of the time the
glider will show up on the PF as a threat aircraft. Since the PF
prioritizes threats, this precludes another more distant "intruder"
aircraft as being displayed as a threat.

Do you mean PF can only follow one Mode-C threat? This would be a
significant step down from what my PCAS can do. If this is true the PF
PCAS implementation is very poor. Could anyone who flew with PF
comment on this? How many transponder threats can PF follow?

Based on your statement, the same problem will occur in a gaggle of
gliders with transponders. You will have no choice but to disable the
PCAS or filter out codes 1202, but if you do that any glider without a
Flarm but with a transponder is not going to be visible to you. The
only way this problem can be solved is with Mod-S transponders. You
will then associate Mod-S code with a Flarm ID and filter out
transponder signals coming from a glider equipped with both.

Can anyone using PF comment on my question? Can you see more than one
transponder equipped aircraft at a time? *I found this in the manual:

"The nearest aircraft not equipped with ADSB-OUT or FLARM devices, but
is indicated as
a light green circle, in the example, that
target is 2400 ft below. The circle radius
gives a distance estimation based on signal
strength.
The green circle turns red when close. In the
example, the target is 200 ft above"

From the wording it looks like PF can only track one Transponder
equipped aircraft, which is pretty bad!

If you don't have any capability to track one Transponder, and now PF
gives you the capability to track the closest transponder equipped
aircraft, and tell you if he is higher/lower than you (and by how
much), and closing or opening, how can that possibly be a bad thing?

In addition, it does flarm/flarm collision warning, and eventually,
igc-format logging and logger approval (summerish according to the
PowerFLARM talk at the SSA Reno Convention). I expect that the
capability to see others' climb rates on some PDAs will make
recreational cross-country a lot less stressful too...

One man's opinion.

Dan

It is bad because my PCAS can track many transponder equipped aircraft
at the same time and give me this information for each one.

I am not talking about Flarm I am all for Flarm but the PCAS
implementation is not good if the PF can only track one transponder
equipped aircraft at a time.

On Feb 25, 11:20*am, Morgan wrote:
Your assessment is correct. *You only ever see an indication for the
closest transponder only target. *Since I haven't used a pcas system
before, I don't know how it displays multiple targets, but I think the
flarm implementation is pretty good since it filters out all but the
most relevant threat. That said, we are in a lightly populated area
for traffic, so I haven't been in a situation where there were
multiple targets within say, 4 miles.

So far with 3 flights under my belt with the powerflarm, I've only
managed to find one unknown transponder target. *Range and height
variation were very good, but 3-4 miles and 2000ft below is pretty
hard to spot a small power plane. *I have yet to be relatively close
to any power traffic. *One flight I was getting a transponder beacon
from a friend in a glider and the estimated range was quite good.

The issue with the towplane transponder and glider masking other
threats is a good problem to solve though. *Our towplane doesn't have
a transponder so we can't test that at our little club.

Morgan

On Feb 25, 7:43*am, Andrzej Kobus wrote:







On Feb 25, 9:26*am, Dan wrote:

On Feb 25, 7:10*am, Andrzej Kobus wrote:

On Feb 24, 7:05*am, Andrzej Kobus wrote:

While aero-towing a Mode-C transponder equipped glider, and using
PowerFlarm and transponder in the tow plane, most of the time the
glider will show up on the PF as a threat aircraft. Since the PF
prioritizes threats, this precludes another more distant "intruder"
aircraft as being displayed as a threat.

Do you mean PF can only follow one Mode-C threat? This would be a
significant step down from what my PCAS can do. If this is true the PF
PCAS implementation is very poor. Could anyone who flew with PF
comment on this? How many transponder threats can PF follow?

Based on your statement, the same problem will occur in a gaggle of
gliders with transponders. You will have no choice but to disable the
PCAS or filter out codes 1202, but if you do that any glider without a
Flarm but with a transponder is not going to be visible to you. The
only way this problem can be solved is with Mod-S transponders. You
will then associate Mod-S code with a Flarm ID and filter out
transponder signals coming from a glider equipped with both.

Can anyone using PF comment on my question? Can you see more than one
transponder equipped aircraft at a time? *I found this in the manual:

"The nearest aircraft not equipped with ADSB-OUT or FLARM devices, but
is indicated as
a light green circle, in the example, that
target is 2400 ft below. The circle radius
gives a distance estimation based on signal
strength.
The green circle turns red when close. In the
example, the target is 200 ft above"

From the wording it looks like PF can only track one Transponder
equipped aircraft, which is pretty bad!

If you don't have any capability to track one Transponder, and now PF
gives you the capability to track the closest transponder equipped
aircraft, and tell you if he is higher/lower than you (and by how
much), and closing or opening, how can that possibly be a bad thing?

In addition, it does flarm/flarm collision warning, and eventually,
igc-format logging and logger approval (summerish according to the
PowerFLARM talk at the SSA Reno Convention). I expect that the
capability to see others' climb rates on some PDAs will make
recreational cross-country a lot less stressful too...

One man's opinion.

Dan

It is bad because my PCAS can track many transponder equipped aircraft
at the same time and give me this information for each one.

I am not talking about Flarm I am all for Flarm but the PCAS
implementation is not good if the PF can only track one transponder
equipped aircraft at a time.

I am surprised that such a poor solution that does not even handle a
tow plane/glider combo was released. I am also surprised that the PF
will only track on transponder. What about a situation where you have
one aircraft below and one above and they are both close. You will be
looking for one above while the other is about to hit you form the
bottom (say high wing Cessna). Every day I see more power traffic than
I see gliders on XC flights especially being within 30 miles of two
major airports Boston and Manchester (plus a few smaller airports). I
had many too close encounters with power traffic and that is why I put
in a transponder and bought a PCAS. Now it seems if I buy a PF I can
not remove my PCAS because the one in PF leaves me blind to all but
one power plane. Not a good combination. The PCAS part of PF is just
not good and it needs to be fixed. It seems this is one big experiment
(talking about PCAS in PF).

On 2/25/2012 10:56 AM, Andrzej Kobus wrote:
had many too close encounters with power traffic and that is why I put
in a transponder and bought a PCAS. Now it seems if I buy a PF I can
not remove my PCAS because the one in PF leaves me blind to all but
one power plane. Not a good combination. The PCAS part of PF is just
not good and it needs to be fixed. It seems this is one big experiment
(talking about PCAS in PF).

What are you using for a PCAS now?

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to
email me)

Eric,

I'd guess he is using the Proxalert R-5. I've got one and like it. It
tracks several and displays the 3 most significant treats along with
their squawk code (so you can tell if their are talking to ATC or
not). But, the R-5 is much larger than the tiny Zaon MRX - - I had one
of those too, and it displays only the most significant single threat
like the PF. The additonal functionality of the R-5 is nice, but the
MRX gets the job done. I figure I can only dodge one at a time
anyway. If there's two coming at me at once, the plan is to wait 'till
the last moment, duck, then turn and watch the confusion.

I tested the R-5 alongside the PF in the Husky - - about 3 inches
apart. Half way through the flight, realized the R-5 was interfering
with the PF, so had to toggle power on and off to test and compare
PCAS function in both. The PF PCAS works as well as the R-5. In
addition, the PF displays discreet info on ADS-B out aircraft, and way
out at 32 nm.

bumper





What are you using for a PCAS now?

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to
email me)

On 2/25/2012 7:52 PM, bumper wrote:
Eric,

I'd guess he is using the Proxalert R-5. I've got one and like it. It
tracks several and displays the 3 most significant treats along with
their squawk code (so you can tell if their are talking to ATC or
not). But, the R-5 is much larger than the tiny Zaon MRX - - I had one
of those too, and it displays only the most significant single threat
like the PF. The additonal functionality of the R-5 is nice, but the
MRX gets the job done. I figure I can only dodge one at a time
anyway. If there's two coming at me at once, the plan is to wait 'till
the last moment, duck, then turn and watch the confusion.

I tested the R-5 alongside the PF in the Husky - - about 3 inches
apart. Half way through the flight, realized the R-5 was interfering
with the PF, so had to toggle power on and off to test and compare
PCAS function in both. The PF PCAS works as well as the R-5. In
addition, the PF displays discreet info on ADS-B out aircraft, and way
out at 32 nm.

My understanding is the MRX will track more than one target, but only
display the greatest threat. Not quite as informative as the R-5, but
perhaps better than it appears from just the display.

--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to
email me)