As I asked earlier, is there any indication of subscription cost? Obviously it won’t be free. It might be absorbed into the SD annual sub, for example.
But there is another aspect: there is very little “Eurocontrol IFR” i.e. high altitude IFR flight within the UK. This is because you can fly more or less everywhere, non radio even, VMC or IMC, in Class G. In the winter you may need de-ice because the CAS structures (mostly Class A) prevent a climb to VMC on top. Accordingly, there is little drive behind the full IR for pilots who fly within the UK. Nearly all the drive behind the IR is for flying around Europe – because the airspace structures are such a mess and make VFR hard to plan and in most cases hard to fly.
And if you are flying at a few thousand feet (as perhaps 99% of UK PPLs are) you can pick up 3G/4G. Not all the time by any means but well enough to get by. Even when I do long IFR flights across bits of Europe, say FL100-180, and even though I get absolutely zero connectivity over Belgium, and close to zero over France, I usually get a signal for long enough to pick up tafs, metars, radar, sferics, IR. In the Alps the signal is usually very good. So I hardly ever use my Thuraya satellite phone these days. I still carry it just in case…
So if I was the customer for this service I would end up not paying most of the time. That’s unless it got wrapped up in the annual sub to some tablet GPS nav product, for which I was paying anyway.
What would be nice would be the ADL type of georeferenced (aircraft position shown) wx graphics. That needs a dedicated server, delivering a custom feed to each subscriber, unless you have enough bandwidth to radiate everything all the time. But again, in the UK, you are usually on a “VFR” flight i.e. no clearance and have to be OCAS so the scope for wx avoidance is minimal.
What does the RAF use the UAT band for?
Noe wrote:
What about IridiumGO?
That is not currently a viable option.
As I asked earlier, is there any indication of subscription cost? Obviously it won’t be free. It might be absorbed into the SD annual sub, for example.
It will be available on other devices in the future so GDL39 etc could receive it and display on Garmin Pilot. It seems to be part of NATS trying to get the weather to pilots rather than a money making opportunity.
Interesting and admirable (though still surprising to me) that NATS would fund it for the UK GA community, nearly all of which can pick up 3G/4G in flight. When I visited them regarding the AFPEX thing, they made it very clear that nothing gets approved for GA unless there is a financial case.
About the use of 3G/4G in flight, I have mixed feelings :
Murphy’s law : you get it except when you need it 
So I don’t trust it.
978Mhz belongs to a band shared by DMEs, ATC radars and a NATO data link system (it’s public knowledge). So its use will have to be negociated in each country (especially NATO ones, if you see what i mean). I don’t want to put more info about it here until I find the open source I got it from (quite sure it’s here but can’t find the thread).
I am tempted to fly to SD’s HQ just to try the experiment
The cheapest ADS-B receiver seems to be this one.
you get it except when you need it
So I don’t trust it.
Same with Thuraya, which works about 90% of the time (it stopped recently and I hassled them to fix it – hard to believe!). One needs multiple tools when flying. I doubt Iridium is 100% (from what I hear, it isn’t) although it is probably the best of the lot. In the end one can ask ATC (well, some ATC, not any busy unit) for a metar.
However, if you are flying low down, you get terrain masking. The 150nm radius mentioned by Jason will never be available to most UK GA due to this, unless significant money is spent on hilltop antennae. This is also why VOR/DME nav doesn’t work well for UK VFR OCAS flight. The navaids have a small range.
You can receive ADS-B with a €10 USB TV stick. That is for 1090MHz. Whether it does 978MHz I have no idea. It definitely isn’t reliable however.
Peter wrote:
In the end one can ask ATC (well, some ATC, not any busy unit) for a metar.
To me there is a big difference between scribbling individual metars and having a map with metars and radar picture on your ipad. And I wouldn’t dare to ask anyone more than 2 metars.
Peter wrote:
if you are flying low down, you get terrain masking. The 150nm radius mentioned by Jason will never be available to most UK GA
Sure. In fact, ADS-B could have the same reception low-level than 3G/4G which would make no difference for the VFR-only PPL (don’t tell CAA ) who has to remain VMC when planning his course of action. But at least, he will be able to better evaluate and avoid an IMC area before reaching it. WPeter wrote:
ould be interesting to hear our US fellows about their ads-b reception at low altitude.
You can receive ADS-B with a €10 USB TV stick. That is for 1090MHz. Whether it does 978MHz I have no idea. It definitely isn’t reliable however.
An antenna designed for 1090 MHz will work OK at 978 MHz. Depending on polarization. Part of my job
Dimme wrote:
We can. At least near Milborne Port.
Hey that’s great!
Progress :)
JasonC wrote:
That is not currently a viable option.
Care to extend a bit?
I am looking into getting a satellite solution, and the fact that Iridium GO would apparently integrate with Garmin Pilot is tempting.
Noe wrote:
Care to extend a bit?
I am looking into getting a satellite solution, and the fact that Iridium GO would apparently integrate with Garmin Pilot is tempting.
Data rates are unusable on it currently. Perhaps after the next gen satellites are operational it will improve. Works OK as a phone.
The thread has diverged into wx delivery over links not related to ADS-B (edit: thread cleaned up later) but still nobody has posted the cost of this UAT proposition. Obviously it can’t be free.
