Charlie and Tupper England wrote:

Paul wrote:

Charlie and Tupper England wrote:

Paul wrote:

Radar?  Why?  Everyone has GPS right?  So transmit your Lat/Long/Altitude
to a ground station where a PC can plot the positions of everyone
and then broadcast the results.  Geez an old 286 could do the job even in LA

snip

Paul Jr.

There was an article in (I think) Sport Aviation a few years ago about a
system developed by a university in the midwest which does this without
the need of a ground station. It is effectively a transponder that
doesn't have to be queried. It listens for several microseconds to see
if another 'transponder' is transmitting in a particular window. If that
window is available, it spits out your ID & GPS position in a very short
burst. It is also continuously listening for others of its kind, and
displays their ID & relative position on your display screen. This can
give you position info on all equiped a/c within a several hundred mile
radius without need for ground stations or regulation by ATC. It used
off the shelf tech & was supposed to be very inexpensive considering
what it is capable of. I think the price they were talking was $2-3k.

Charlie

The advantage of the orginal idea is a cheap $100 portable TV is all that
would be required in the airplane. The FAA already has the data.

Paul Lamar.

The idea is that it replaces your transponder, FAA gets the info without
radar coverage (big problem in some parts of the country), everyone gets
themselves on the center of their own display.

Charlie

You still have to buy it and install it. Particularly if you have a 
transponder already. FAA has some data from flight plans alone and some
they get from military radar. With a cheap TV everybody would have instant
information. Tune to the FAA weather channel for local radar maps of the weather. 

Paul Lamar
 
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