Power Flarm Display

My Butterfly 57mm display is running firmware V.2.9.4. FLARM promised in December that the "next PowerFLARM release which will come soon in the new year" will upgrade displays without using the special Butterfly cable. The only PowerFLARM release I can find is V2.40 from July 24, 2012. This of course is older than the V2.71 that was used to get the PowerFLARM IGC flight recorder approval.

QUESTIONS
1) Does V2.71 have the display updating code?
2) Can one download V2.71 from somewhere? If so, what's the URL?

-John, Q3


On Monday, December 17, 2012 2:43:38 PM UTC-5, Evan Ludeman wrote:

You guys do know about this, yes? (From external display manual)

"Updates

Update through PowerFLARM®

After Q4/2012 it will be possible to update the displays through any PowerFLARM® unit directly without the need for a special cable."

-Evan Ludeman / T8

Yes. There is a beta version which works well, but I think it is not public. Not sure why.

Ramy

Interesting and encouraging. Hopefully the beta will be released publicly soon.

When you say "works well", do you mean that it updates the display without special cables, as well as doing the FLARM anti-collision and logging work?

I did find version 2.60 from Oct 2012. For some reason (maybe the formatting on the PowerFLARM.us site) I missed seeing it yesterday.

-John, Q3


On Sunday, March 17, 2013 1:53:35 AM UTC-4, Ramy wrote:
Yes. There is a beta version which works well, but I think it is not public. Not sure why.

Ramy

On Sunday, March 17, 2013 8:35:16 AM UTC-4, John Carlyle wrote:
Interesting and encouraging. Hopefully the beta will be released publicly soon.



When you say "works well", do you mean that it updates the display without special cables, as well as doing the FLARM anti-collision and logging work?



I did find version 2.60 from Oct 2012. For some reason (maybe the formatting on the PowerFLARM.us site) I missed seeing it yesterday.



-John, Q3





On Sunday, March 17, 2013 1:53:35 AM UTC-4, Ramy wrote:

Yes. There is a beta version which works well, but I think it is not public. Not sure why.



Ramy

2.60 adds (non igc approved) flight logging but not the display update pass through. I flew with 2.60 today. My only complaint about log file transfer is that it's blind since I use a USB extension and I can't see the little blinking light on my Core unit. Flarm guys **please** give us some way to monitor file xfer on the butterfly display.

Other comments... lots of adsb traffic visible on ClearNav today, most in the flight levels of course, but two contact down around 6k - 7k. Tens of miles range. Right now, CN displays these adsb targets as other *gliders*. I've put in a suggestion about that. Sadly, my mode c/s pcas range on powerflarm still stinks, it's one or two miles *at best*. Saw a bizjet rip by at less than 2 miles. Not a peep :-(.

-Evan Ludeman / T8

On 3/17/2013 6:03 PM, Evan Ludeman wrote:
My only complaint about log file transfer is that it's blind since I
use a USB extension and I can't see the little blinking light on my
Core unit. Flarm guys **please** give us some way to monitor file
xfer on the butterfly display.

How about the light on the USB stick? It should blink while files are
being downloaded, and stop when it's done. That's how I know CN is done
downloading the IGC file.

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

On Sunday, March 17, 2013 10:02:10 PM UTC-4, Eric Greenwell wrote:
On 3/17/2013 6:03 PM, Evan Ludeman wrote:

My only complaint about log file transfer is that it's blind since I

use a USB extension and I can't see the little blinking light on my

Core unit. Flarm guys **please** give us some way to monitor file

xfer on the butterfly display.



How about the light on the USB stick? It should blink while files are

being downloaded, and stop when it's done. That's how I know CN is done

downloading the IGC file.


I'm using el cheapo 4 GB half size USB drives for soaring, like these: http://tinyurl.com/c722utl, no lights.

CN gives feedback from display, lets you know what's happening. Flarm should do likewise. My $0.02.

T8

On Mar 17, 6:03*pm, Evan Ludeman wrote:
*Sadly, my mode c/s pcas range on powerflarm still stinks, it's one or two miles *at best*. *Saw a bizjet rip by at less than 2 miles. *Not a peep :-(.


I'm glad to hear another report of this. It exactly matches my
experience. Head on traffic less than a mile away - in sight ,
alerted by ZAON PCAS, and Power FLARM portable indicated nothing!

I hope FLARM will eventually recognize this problem and correct it.
Until then I don't fly without my ZAON MRX.

Andy

On Monday, March 18, 2013 10:44:54 AM UTC-4, Andy wrote:
On Mar 17, 6:03*pm, Evan Ludeman wrote:

*Sadly, my mode c/s pcas range on powerflarm still stinks, it's one or two miles *at best*. *Saw a bizjet rip by at less than 2 miles. *Not a peep :-(.


I'm glad to hear another report of this. It exactly matches my

experience. Head on traffic less than a mile away - in sight ,

alerted by ZAON PCAS, and Power FLARM portable indicated nothing!

I hope FLARM will eventually recognize this problem and correct it.

Until then I don't fly without my ZAON MRX.

Andy

I seem to remember about a year ago Darryl Ramm wrote about the difficulties involved in doing what the Zaon MRX does so well. There are a lot of non-trivial problems to be solved, it's by no means straight forward.

I'll see if I can find his post; if I do I'll write again. Or perhaps Darryl will see this and re-post his excellent explanation.

-John, Q3

On Monday, March 18, 2013 11:37:46 AM UTC-4, John Carlyle wrote:
On Monday, March 18, 2013 10:44:54 AM UTC-4, Andy wrote:

On Mar 17, 6:03*pm, Evan Ludeman wrote:



*Sadly, my mode c/s pcas range on powerflarm still stinks, it's one or two miles *at best*. *Saw a bizjet rip by at less than 2 miles. *Not a peep :-(.





I'm glad to hear another report of this. It exactly matches my



experience. Head on traffic less than a mile away - in sight ,



alerted by ZAON PCAS, and Power FLARM portable indicated nothing!



I hope FLARM will eventually recognize this problem and correct it.



Until then I don't fly without my ZAON MRX.



Andy



I seem to remember about a year ago Darryl Ramm wrote about the difficulties involved in doing what the Zaon MRX does so well. There are a lot of non-trivial problems to be solved, it's by no means straight forward.



I'll see if I can find his post; if I do I'll write again. Or perhaps Darryl will see this and re-post his excellent explanation.



-John, Q3

Darryl had two really good posts on the Zaon MRX that I was remembering:
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!ms...U/zhcTC9v2SpkJ
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!ms...E/edTRxve7aMAJ

Darryl's first post explains some of the problems Zaon deals with in detecting another transponder. His second explains some of the limitations of the Zaon.

It's pretty amazing that the Zaon works as well as it does, and it's also clear that FLARM had a pretty big technical problem on its hands in getting the PowerFLARM to work as well as the Zaon.

-John, Q3

On 3/18/2013 7:44 AM, Andy wrote:
On Mar 17, 6:03 pm, Evan Ludeman wrote:
Sadly, my mode c/s pcas range on powerflarm still stinks, it's one
or two miles *at best*. Saw a bizjet rip by at less than 2 miles.
Not a peep :-(.


I'm glad to hear another report of this. It exactly matches my
experience. Head on traffic less than a mile away - in sight ,
alerted by ZAON PCAS, and Power FLARM portable indicated nothing!

I hope FLARM will eventually recognize this problem and correct it.
Until then I don't fly without my ZAON MRX.

Are you using the Core or Portable (if so, has it had the recent
hardware upgrade)?

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