This ADS-B In is AWESOME!

[fliier]

All good points I agree, but perhaps we are MORE distracted without the onboard traffic.

Here?s the ugly truth about my brain. When the controller calls out ?RV2JA, traffic, 10 o'clock, 2 miles, south-bound, Cherokee, 4,500.? , in my mind I have to remember what an analog clock looks like, then lay that out horizontal and superimpose the cardinal compass points over it to figure out which way is southbound (because I?m following my moving map track up). I then try to remember what altitude he said the Cherokee was at, and then mentally picture what an aircraft that size is going to look like at that distance (?what distance did he say??) at a point relative to the horizon, assuming some WAG at closure rates. Then I pull my trusty finger out and physically point to the point on the windshield through which I expect to see the other airplane. While I?m pointing like an idiot I double-check the whole calculation in my head, all the while wondering if the controller laid out the clock right in HIS head and if I should really be looking at 4 o?clock instead of 10 o?clock.

But now. . . I?m sitting there in front of the EFIS and I ?see? the Cherokee relative to my position with an arrow pointing to her direction of flight and a data box saying she is 1,450 ft. below me. I look in her direction but realize that I don?t need the analog clock or the compass points or the other aircraft?s altitude or the distance. I happen to be monitoring the frequency and in a few seconds I hear the controller call out ?Cherokee 4SA, traffic, 8 o'clock, 2 miles, west-bound, type unknown, indicating 6,500.? I?m not hyper-focused on the Cherokee. I AM looking for it but I?m also looking for that Red-Tailed Hawk, or for the next target that just appeared on the screen.

The point being, the Controller didn?t bring anything to the table (for me) in this scenario, except had I been talking to him we would have consumed bandwidth while he told me what I already knew. I could just as easily be listening to Mahler without the distraction of radio-cutouts and/or watching for that NORDO traffic. The ADS-B was not a distraction, it was 10 times better than having my head constantly on a swivel trying to pick targets that might be there out of the ground clutter.

Isn?t this the vision of ADS-B, with controller?s having to do less radio chatter telling us to ?Look OUT!!!, thus freeing up the bandwidth so they can help all those poor souls whose brains have locked up after their third practice approach.

So here?s my current question. Right now I have my ADS-B set to always transmit my identifying information, even when squawking VFR. I originally did this because it helped to get my FAA report without actually having to get an assigned squawk. Now, however, I?m thinking I will leave it on. The primary reason is so when I do need to speak with a controller it should be quicker to identify me, since he will already my numbers and type on the screen. The second reason is that if I?m not using flight following and something happens, there will still be a record associating me with my flight path ( I?m not really worried about the FAA ?busting? me, since in the past 30 years of flying in the system I have never had to make a phone call) Does anyone know if my assumptions about how the system works are correct?

Oh, and this ADS-B mandate that I once thought was just another heavy-handed mandate by the FAA. . . it's a freakin' gift. My bad.

John Allen
RV-6A flying since 2001

[BobTurner]

Originally Posted by fliier

Isn?t this the vision of ADS-B, with controller?s having to do less radio chatter telling us to ?Look OUT!!!, thus freeing up the bandwidth so they can help all those poor souls whose brains have locked up after their third practice approach.

01

I hate to disillusion you. The FAA's vision is to have pilots pay for ADSB so the FAA can stop paying for expensive radar equipment.

[ChiefPilot]

Originally Posted by BobTurner

I hate to disillusion you. The FAA's vision is to have pilots pay for ADSB so the FAA can stop paying for expensive radar equipment.

...and that's a fail too because primary radar is never going to go away. Not in a post-9/11 world, and not so long as ADS-B is an insecure/unencrypted system.

[RV8iator]

And less than half the fleet is equipped currently, so there are a LOT of bandits out there that are not showing up on your screen...

[fliier]

Regarding. . .

Originally Posted by RV8iator

And less than half the fleet is equipped currently, so there are a LOT of bandits out there that are not showing up on your screen...

The ADS-B traffic also displays aircraft that are not ADS-B equipped, as long as they have their transponder on. From the FAA website:

"TIS-B is a client-based service that provides ADS-B Out/In equipped aircraft with surveillance information about aircraft that are not ADS-B equipped. To qualify as a TIS-B target, an aircraft must be equipped with a transponder, and be within radar coverage."

http://www.faa.gov/nextgen/equipadsb/ins_and_outs/

[BobTurner]

Originally Posted by fliier

Regarding. . .



The ADS-B traffic also displays aircraft that are not ADS-B equipped, as long as they have their transponder on. From the FAA website:

"TIS-B is a client-based service that provides ADS-B Out/In equipped aircraft with surveillance information about aircraft that are not ADS-B equipped. To qualify as a TIS-B target, an aircraft must be equipped with a transponder, and be within radar coverage."

http://www.faa.gov/nextgen/equipadsb/ins_and_outs/

So the uplink supposedly only sends up traffic plus/minus 3500' vertically of you (or something like that). What do they do with mode A traffic? Send it all, altitude unknown? Send none?

[jeffk]

Good point Bob. Any idea how much more A traffic there is?

[dynonsupport]

Mode A traffic is uplinked with no altitude data, and it's up to the cockpit display to make this clear to the pilot. The only traffic not shown on ADS-B are aircraft with no transponders at all.

In hundreds of hours of flying with ADS-B and tens of thousands of targets I've only ever noticed one target without altitude. Technically that could have been a Mode-C with a failed altitude encoder or in no-alt mode as well.

[MikeyDale]

After 9 months flying with ADSB traffic, I wouldn't trade it for anything!... Theres no telling how many times I have flown close to another plane in the past and never knew they were there! It has trained me in finding aircraft outside with my eyes. There are so many I still cant spot but I'm aware of them anyway. I originally thought this device would cause pilots to become lazy about watching outside but has had the opposite effect on me.

[jliltd]

I regularly fly a 1946 Luscombe without an engine-driven electrical system. NORDO quite often. Negative transponder most all the time. Lots of Cubs, Taylorcrafts, experimentals, antiques and classics w/o engine-driven electrical systems do the same. Our Luscombe 8A is based at a Class C airport so we charge up a battery to run our transponder until clear on the way out and then again prior to contacting approach on the way back in. It is off the rest of the time. Remember that these types of aircraft are exempt from the ADS-B 2020 mandate and will continue to operate, even within the currently defined Class B Mode C veil areas, after 2020.

NORDO is nice sometimes. At pilot-controlled fields there are no nitwits announcing they are about to start their engine at the T-Hangars or are taxiing to the gas pumps while I am on short final with real traffic in the air.

Even if an owner of a non engine-driven electrical system aircraft decided to install a rechargeable battery and an ADS-B out unit just to be neighborly, it wouldn't work. The current regulation states that if an aircraft is ADS-B out equipped the ADS-B out equipment must be on and operating at all times during flight without exception. So a non-electrical airplane configured this way would run out of electrical battery juice before reaching their destination at which point in flight they've become non-compliant. Without the ADS-B equipment on board this violation scenario cannot occur.

We may have to reposition our bird to another field in 2020. Which may be one of the alterior bearueacratic objectives.

Fortunately all these non-electrical aircraft (except for the occasional Breezy) are equipped with the most advanced moving map displays, with resolutions exceeding 4K and more nits of brightness than any of the displays offered by Apple, Dynon or Garmin. They will make a Cirrus pilot edgy and envious between chute deployments. There are no drill-down menus. They always have the latest firmware and software version, updated instantaneously in flight. These dispalys are affectionately referred to by their owners (who can read them confusing analog clocks) as "windshields".