ELT requirements

[lktiller]

Here's the new thread Hank.
What we need from someone is the new requirements for the ELT on our aircraft. I only know what I've read in the rags about the upcoming deadline for the frequency the current ELT uses.
Nothing says we must stop using the old ELTs, just that no one will be monitoring the frequency.
We will have to invest in new technology at a considerable expense. One good part is there is an overlap in time so we can wait until the prices start to fall before purchasing anything.

[Hank Jarrett]

Re: ELT requirements

The original concept was to do an entry level system with incrementally increasing capabilities for incrementally more money, but ALWAYS making the extra expense worth the investment. The first level (mandatory equipage) system was to be a transmitter with an imbedded GPS that sent out the position and altitude every couple of seconds. EVERYBODY had to have this. An orbital platform (satellite) received the signals, did some basic processing and passed the positions of everybody to the ground station. If a plane went down, the signal stopped and the system flagged that signal. If the stopping point was at an airport, no problem. If it was on the side of a mountain, well, at least we knew right where you were. There were lots of screams about "Big Brother" and worries about automated flight violations but this was a safety system and that wasn't to be allowed, plus there was no aircraft identifier.
For a few extra bucks you could get a Lat, Long, Alt read-out for your panel. The cost of this system made it worth it to pay the extra just to have a cheap GPS capability in the cockpit and no one expected to sell many of the required basic system. Why would you when for $100 extra you got the readout? More and more capability was added with each additional package but the idea was to always make it worth the extra money to upgrade to the next level. We laid out the concept with a business plan first and regulation second so it would be much less painful than a straight mandatory equipage.
This was all developed as part of the AGATE project at NASA and it was a great concept but I retired before implementation.
Hank

[lktiller]

Re: ELT requirements

I can see why that one wouldn't 'fly'. Someone would have to continually update the database of all the possible landing sites.......Meaning all the cow pastures, hay fields, lakes, rivers, snow fields, & glaciers we could set down on.
Otherwise it would be flagged as a questionable landing.

[lktiller]

Re: ELT requirements

Here's a good article

http://www.aopa.org/whatsnew/regulatory/elt.html

[Hank Jarrett]

Re: ELT requirements

Not really. An intentional shut down would involve an approach, landing, taxi and shut down. Even if you made a straight in approach to your "private pasture" you would be stopped for a while with the engine running and that would tell the system you had landed, not arrived. There are ways to tell when the plane suffered a sudden decelleration. As for storing the data, you don't. Once a plane has a confirmed landing at a known operations site it is dropped from the system. If the signal termination is at a flat location preceeded by at least 30 or 40 seconds of taxi ops with a normal shut down, again it is dropped (doesn't help you in a successful forced landing unless you manually activate it). If the signal goes from 25 knots or faster to loss of signal in the next time hack, something (probably bad) has happened and the local authorities are notified to do a SAR. I can't think of an occasion where I could go from 25 knots to no signal in less than 2 seconds that didn't involve a bent plane.
Hank