Might sound a silly question, as I gather similar systems have been working all through the states, but do the lights suddenly go out after a given time period? Would it be possible/useful to do this gracefully (e.g. gradual dimming over 10 seconds). I keep thinking about the lights suddenly going out leaving you in a dark hole… Something I’m sure any night-rated pilot __should __be able to cope with, but that might be better to avoid.
Who would have thunk it – there is one on eBay indeed.
That’s amazing. The surprising thing is the total weight of 6T. That is a lot…
I actually have a PCL VHF switch which I bought years ago for a project at our local private airfield, but don’t think we’ll ever get the lights installed anyway, if anyone is interested, PM me. I was going to put it on Ebay in the next few weeks.
Similar to this (same shop, previous version):
http://www.bestwindsocks.com/HTML/pilot-lighting.html
PCL via VHF R/T is not failsafe in my experience, not even at licenced airfields (permitted in Denmark). I fly somewhat frequently to and from 3 licenced and 2 unlicenced airfields using PCL in total darkness, and I would say it works 9 out of 10 times. For what I know, the problem might not always be at the reciever end, maybe it could be something on the aircraft, bad antennas, unstable carrier wave or whatever – I would not know.
An advantage with the SMS could be an ensuing automatic SMS reply comfirming that the lights are activated or stating details of malfunction. But, using a cell phone could be a critical distraction when handflying VFR in the darkness.
Yes, the frequency for turning on the airfield lights is known by everybody but we do not see much abuse here. I would say that an advantage of VHF commanded PCL is just that, everybody knows the frequency, including pilots that did not intend to land there, but had to divert.
Besides, the power consumption of the full equipment of the latest PCL installation I know is 180 W, so noone is going to be ruined by the electricity bill even if there is a little abuse.
All the PCL systems I know switch off suddenly, without any warning, after approximately 30 minutes. Of course, when doing circuits, it usually seem to happen on short final.
The details of the unit that is for sale on here say that the lights flash for a bit to warn of the impending blackness, allowing time for an inbound pilot to press again to reset the timer.
As far as I know it is possible to reset the timer at any time in the cycle, so people I know re-key on finals.
I fly a LOT in the USA where pilot controlled lighting works just fine.
If Peter’s device is reliable and circumvents the daft rules regarding use of VHF frequencies, then it should be quite a handy piece of kit, although it would always be a fairly niche market.
I have just ordered a load of these for our airfield in Northern Thailand.
http://shop.brightportalresources.com/
They may not last all night, but they should certainly last for the operating hours we need.
They are due to be delivered later this month. I will let you know how we get on.
E
I just discovered by chance that at LFPA (5 nm from LFPT), a guy developped, built and got approved a PCL system with autonomous lights charged with solar panels.
His system is triggered by PCL, smartphone, GSM or SMS according to his spec.
I used it a few days ago, it is very nice (LED lights).
This is his website : http://www.heurtevant-aerosystems.com/
The spec is here (French-only as 
as it sounds) : http://heurtevant-areosystem.gandi.ws/documents
I can help translating if somebody is interested.
The guy made it with very good quality components, all made in France. I don’t know him, ok
Another real-life evidence that French people are good technically but do crap in marketing/sales 
