Peter wrote:
what is the beneficiary of this new CAA position? I am sure they are not doing it for the benefit of GA (e.g. the TAS function) especially as mid-airs are extremely rare.
Well, they appear to be doing it with GA as the beneficiary. I’m sure GA airfields that can’t possibly afford a radar feed from NATS for £££££££ will benefit greatly too. Even at our quiet airfield we’d be ecstatic if the majority carried ADS-B, and we could have a laptop set up in our glider launch point vehicle showing all the ADS-B targets. It’s very cheap to receive ADS-B – it can all be done with SDR (in other words, a £10 WinTV dongle and antenna, and a laptop) – the problem is not enough people are radiating. Make it inexpensive and make it portable and more people will do it, especially if small GA airfields promote it – because pilots will see and get a benefit from it.
Mid-airs are rare but as you’ve pointed out yourself on numerous occasions, Mk.1 eyeball just isn’t adequete (either air-to-air, or ground-to-air, especially with the dodgy position reports some people give) and there are an awful lot of airproxes. Just going through the Manchester LLR on a nice day would be much better if most people had an inexpensive EC system.
If you look at the UK NATS ipad app., which to me seems like a much better version of FR25, it amalgamates UK NATS radar data, and ADSB. It is also stated that it is a cut down version of a system they use far ATC, so I think by implication they can see ADS-B.
In the link I originally posted they talk about trials of a traffic display system in Scotland
It was true very recently, Timothy. None of the Farnborough units for example could see it, or so they said.
The main NATS radars (London Control etc) always could; they developed some software for managing holding stacks (I saw a demo) which they tried to sell to other countries. But these absolutely never offer a service to VFR GA.
Does any UK ATC see ADS-B OUT? I think this is a key Q because if they can’t (like many/most can’t see Mode S?) what is the beneficiary of this new CAA position? I am sure they are not doing it for the benefit of GA (e.g. the TAS function) especially as mid-airs are extremely rare.
Aveling wrote:
mode S, even though apparently most UK ATC can’t read it.
Where does this myth come from? I suspect that one person once wrote it out of ignorance and it has been endlessly repeated since.
Nearly all UK ATC can see Mode S.
I doubt there’s the appetite for a UK mandate that’s not of direct benefit to the airlines Peter, unless they plan to occupy class G more than at present?
An airliner gets zero benefit from ADS-B OUT. Its TCAS sees only Mode C.
I posted a Q on separation etc here but it looks like it’s been missed; too many posts 
I think alioth you misunderstood what I wrote. I was not defending Mode S and I am not defending 8.33. Both are useless in GA terms. The stuff about loose change behind the sofa is utter bollocks. With my family having come to the UK in 1969 with about £20 in total, plus our clothes, and with locals doing a collection to pay for a new pair of trousers for me so I could go to school here, I know the value of money rather well.
Peter wrote:
it’s easy to lose sight of that when you’re wealthy enough to buy a brand new TB-20 and fly it 150+ hours a year!
I don’t think that’s relevant. A new GTX330 installation would have still been about 3k. I am not defending Mode S; a near-100% Mode C mandatory use adoption would have achieved vastly more. I was just laying out the background to it.
It’s massively relevant. In fact it’s probably the most relevant part of it all: spending 3k on a transponder which gives the owner no benefit at all has massive opportunity costs if 3k to you isn’t just loose change behind the sofa cushion. For a low end aircraft owner, having to spend 3k on a new transponder that brings them no benefits at all means maintenance has to be deferred or useful upgrades (e.g. an engine monitor) has to be sacrificed, or flying hours need to be cut back. In the case of the really low end (owners of vintage wooden gliders) it would mean ownership would have to be simply given up altogether, with the problem that all low end glider owners are getting out leading to such a glut of airframes that you’d struggle to even give them away.
Peter wrote:
One could make the same argument for a shagged transponder.
Actually, you can’t make that argument. Most low-end spam can owners never fly somewhere a transponder is required and don’t really care if it works well or not – so long as ATC gets enough returns it’s fine, it doesn’t matter to them if it doesn’t show on your TB’s TCAS till they are within 3 miles because ground radar has really good directional antennas and will see even a marginal installation. At the time of the Mode-S consultation there were no cost-effective TCAS-type systems for light aircraft for the forseeable future, so having to spend a lot of money on a transponder and get zero benefit over the existing shagged out Narco AT50 that was 30 years old and would probably last another 20 just wasn’t attractive.
With a COM radio it’s different – most people use a radio every time they fly and are directly affected when trying to copy a scratchy transmission. Radios that crap out might deny them access to airfields they like to go to, and also cause distraction as pilots fiddle with the radio instead of flying. It’s amazing how much less painful it is to listen to London Info today than it was just one year ago, because so many scratchy old pieces of junk have been replaced with something better!
In contrast to the Mode-S debacle, now we are talking about low cost ADS-B units – some of which are truly portable and self contained – AND low cost ways of displaying ADS-B data. This is a much better proposition when contrasted with the Mode-S debacle, which was just big costs and zero benefit for the majority of aircraft owners – not even the promise of getting rid of low level class A airspace and improving GA’s airspace access.
I doubt there’s the appetite for a UK mandate that’s not of direct benefit to the airlines Peter, unless they plan to occupy class G more than at present?
Radiating ADSB must by now have a tangible benefit considering the number of Pilot Aware and similar ADSB-in boxes apparently sold. Quite a few certified UK aircraft will have non-WAAS GNS430 and TT31 transponder, for which there is no STC or other approval to hook up ADSB. However, I’m given to understand that some are hooked up anyway. I wonder if instructions for doing this are in the public domain, does anyone know?
And regarding benefits, I’ve had far fewer (or zero) transit refusals since installing mode S, even though apparently most UK ATC can’t read it. And no difficulties in foreign airspace either, a completely different story to the old KT-76 transponder. And while we’re at it 8.33 was crucial last week negotiating Dutch airspace.
It would make more sense to me to create a huge ADS-B out Mandatory Zone ten miles around and below all controlled airspace, such that if people want to be free of all shackles they can be in Devon, Norfolk, and parts of Wales and Scotland, but if they want to be under or near CAS they have to be visible and conspicuous.
Provided that ADS-B is light and either very cheap or free, that seems reasonable.
Not really any indication, but certainly aspirations.
Back to the original topic, is there any indication that ADS-B OUT will be made mandatory for VFR in UK Class G?
