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Operating cost (to the airport) of VOR DME NDB or ILS, and LPV?

A good proportion (I am not sure how much, from the documentation, but possibly up to 100%) of the flight validation of an RNP approach can be done on a sim, it would seem.

I don’t really understand how that can be right, as part of the FV is checking the lights and observing obstacles, but that is what I have been told by someone who works in the field.

I have to fly the approach five times, and also check the visual manoeuvring area. Three flights by day and two by night, so a landing is required between, so I can’t see that a range of 200nm is required. More like 90nm per sortie. But I am doing two opposite ends, so 200nm is closer to the mark for that, with a total of about 300nm across the 10 approaches.

I can see how an ILS would be more though, as it requires more calibration and checking. The satellites are just there.

EGKB Biggin Hill

Peter wrote:

I was told by one navaid calibration guy, when I asked why they don’t use drones, that they can’t use them because during the average ILS calibration they fly over 200nm and no drone can last anywhere remotely near that long. So I wonder how these people have solved it?

An aircraft can only move forward. A drone could move vertically up/down or sideways at the same distance from the runway to check glideslope/localiser signals at different angles. I would guess that would save an enormous amount of time and distance.

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden

Indeed.

So if the real limit is the weight of the equipment, there should be an opportunity for the development of miniaturised electronics. Nowadays you can do a complete NAV receiver with software running on a DSP and perhaps some FPGAs. Whereas the calibration flights probably carry big old 19" rack mounted stuff.

The volume will be reassuringly low so it will command a reassuring price It’s quite funny… a few years ago I started developing a cheap handheld VOR/LOC/GS tester. In the end I didn’t bother because I concluded almost nobody cares, and there are (somewhat crappy) products in the US for under $1k.

Presumably whatever it is, it needs to be officially calibrated by some lab. Nowadays everybody is supposed to calibrate everything to a traceable national standard. If some of my customers got their way they would have us calibrate the temperature of soldering irons, back to the National Physical Laboratory And this is very expensive.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

The requirement for accuracy and calibration drives me potty. Discussions of 20cm in a 500’ DH. Just barking.

I started an engineering degree (before I saw the light and moved to science) and the thing that drove me most wild was having to calculate everything to five places of decimals, then double it! NIne times out of ten I could estimate it by eye and get within a gnat’s whisker.

What are we trying to achieve with Cat 1 approaches? They get you down to ⅖ of VMC. Big deal. I can see why Cat III takes some effort, but to use the same mindset for Cat I, or even NPAs, is silly and destructive. People are dying because the approaches don’t exist, but, even knowing that, the CAA puts in artificial barriers of precision to prevent them being introduced.

EGKB Biggin Hill

As stated above, discussion of UK CAA behaviour on GPS approaches belongs elsewhere. A new thread has been created for it.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

ILS calibration is to the same standards everywhere.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

It sounds like any real numbers are not publicised, presumably for competitive reasons.

I recently heard an NDB service contract runs around 10k a year, but you can get it for less if it is an old chap with a van full of old 1970s circuit boards, but if you are doing that you won’t be publicising it

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

The news from CAA/DfT is likely to mean that UK airfields can get approaches for virtually no outlay, if my understanding is correct. I guess they’ll still have to pay EGNOS fees, though.

EGKB Biggin Hill

Are there EGNOS fees, payable by airports with LPV approaches?

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

In an aviation conference in Copenhagen today with the transport minister and the industry present, the Danish CAA indicated that they finally agree that IFR approaches do not require manned ATC at the aerodrome in all cases. If this materialises, it will realistically allow GPS IFR ops at aerodromes with quite low traffic volumes. At least 4 existing VFR aerodromes have applied, all with some kind of conventional IFR approval in the distant past (2 with ILS, 1 with NDB and 1 with SRE radar).
I am told that special procedures (still to be specified, to separate VFR from IFR) will be required, but saving the AFIS man in the tower will make the crucial difference to the running costs. We have all fingers crossed.

huv
EKRK, Denmark
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