406 vs 121.5/243 ELT

This subject has most likely been discussed to death but can't find it. It's time to buy an ELT. Do I, or will I in the next say 3 years, need a 406 ELT? What about the potential for a flight to the Bahamas? Hope to be inspected in less than a year and fully flying early to mid 2015. Any advice
Thanks
Dan J

Get out the popcorn.

My personal opinion, always look forward with technology. I installed 406 maybe 5 years ago in my non-RV plane, and just in the lower maintenance department (longer battery life) it was nice to reduce the population of used batteries on my hangar shelf.

Others might argue that you will be dead anyways, so who cares. I am more optimistic than that. And the satellites don't monitor 121.5.

mculver said:

Get out the popcorn.

My personal opinion, always look forward with technology. I installed 406 maybe 5 years ago in my non-RV plane, and just in the lower maintenance department (longer battery life) it was nice to reduce the population of used batteries on my hangar shelf.

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But you have to open it up every year to check for corrosion anyway, so it barely saves any maintenance time. And after 5 years what does that Li-ion battery cost? vs the half dozen C cells I have in my 121.5 unit. (which go right into a flashlight at home, btw).

popcorn ready......

since this is in the -9 forum ( no particular reason!?) I'll comment.
In the last handful of incidents, which I make no judgement about, the same proportion of 406 have failed to activate, or were rendered useless by snapped antennae, submersion, fire etc. as the old 121.5 ( a very rough estimation).
So all the features of the 'improved' 406 spec were for naught in these cases.
Perhaps for the other 20%, they were beneficial.
Still no legal requirement to equip light aircraft in Canada, so I am waiting for the cost to come down, or the built-in GPS units to become more prevalent.
(I hear that Transport Canada is writing yet another specification for ELT's, even while procrastinating on implementing the 406 requirement.)

I would lean toward a 121.5 for $150, so they might find the wreckage, ( benefiting the insurance companies or your widow).....and for the live humans, spend my other $800 or so on a good tracking system, whatever flavour might appeal to you; SPOT, deLorme InReach, spidertrax, etc. Each having their own pros & cons of course.
the PLB strapped to your butt is yet another element in a multi-faceted S&R strategy ....In my opinion.

The real benefit of 406 is the satellite monitoring, which does not exist for 121.5. We've had a few incidents recently where the satellite monitoring is what saved the day.

As Perry pointed out, having more than one SAR alerting device is always a good plan.

flyboy1963 said:

since this is in the -9 forum ( no particular reason!?) I'll comment.
In the last handful of incidents, which I make no judgement about, the same proportion of 406 have failed to activate, or were rendered useless by snapped antennae, submersion, fire etc. as the old 121.5 ( a very rough estimation).
So all the features of the 'improved' 406 spec were for naught in these cases.
Perhaps for the other 20%, they were beneficial.
.....

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Beneficial would be much greater accuracy - if hooked up to your GPS - and a quicker response time. Probably worth it since the cost is now down.

Did 80% really fail?

Looks like the entry-level 406 MHz are $589-$600 or so (Aircraft Spruce and also Chief Aircraft)

Just a thought from one who has searched for both the 121.5 devices, and the 406 devices. The 121.5 has an accuracy of 10 to 20 miles, meaning someone would have to search that diameter circle to find you. The 406 without the GPS hookup has an accuracy of 1,000 to 3,000 feet. I advocated putting 406's in both our club planes. When one went nose down on a snowy runway at night, our club got a call from the Rescue Center before the pilot could even call. The 406 has lots of data within the signal that the 121.5 does not have.

And I agree with Az. The 406 plus one of the other devices is the way to go. It's all insurance, and insurance on your life is priceless. The faster the first responders can respond, the better off you'll be.

novipilot said:

I advocated putting 406's in both our club planes. When one went nose down on a snowy runway at night, our club got a call from the Rescue Center before the pilot could even call.

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I have a similar story to demonstrate why you should have a 406. All of the aircraft at work have them. Our normal procedure is to depart and climbing through 10,000' to radio back with an off time and eta to destination. In a jet the time from lift off to 10 isn't much. I was in the office one day and the phone rang. The rescue center was on the line telling us they were picking up the elt near the airport from one of our aircraft that we knew had just departed. About this time they pop up on the radio with the standard off message. We advise the rescue center that we are in comm with the aircraft and everything is fine. We call the aircraft back and have them cycle the elt switch. After everything calmed down we compared the time the rescue center called against them time the aircraft told us it was airborne. There was a two minute window.

For about $400 extra you can get the 406 over the 121, IMO it's money well spent!

Another advantage with 406 is that for little extra bucks you can put GPS position into the ELT and SAR has your position to 10 meters of accuracy. Reduced time to extraction, assuming that you have actually crashed somewhere.

We moved to our island home in 2010. In 2011, I added the 406 mhz ELT. We do a lot of flying up and down the (largely uninhabited) island chain between South Padre Island and New Orleans, and I certainly don't want to survive the crash only to die of thirst. (A very real possibility here.)

And then, in 2013...I sold that plane.

Our new (to us) RV-8A still has the (largely useless) 121.5 ELT. I was gonna upgrade to the 406 mhz at OSH this year, but opted to add an O2 system instead. Next year, for sure.

There is no reason to buy the 121.5 anymore. No one is listening for it except the CAP kids, and down here that ain't worth much.

Mine went active in October. Fire department had coordinates before I even called in. Wife was on the way to get me... since she got a call too.
Prices are down... and the GPS built in now. Put the antenna someplace safe.
AND... turn the **** switch on yourself if anything looks amiss. You can always turn it back off. Don't wait for G spot switch.
Apology easy. Permission difficult. Government....

...and there's the rub.....'safe' !

flightlogic said:

Mine went active in October. Fire department had coordinates before I even called in. Wife was on the way to get me... since she got a call too.
Prices are down... and the GPS built in now. Put the antenna someplace safe.
AND... turn the **** switch on yourself if anything looks amiss. You can always turn it back off. Don't wait for G spot switch.
Apology easy. Permission difficult. Government....

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....all comments on here are totally valid...but so far, all that has been conclusively proven is:

1. false alarms result in immediate response by SAR ( which is a good thing, saves resources etc.)
2. actual activation & signal transmission, in a crash, is NO better than the old ones, because we are relying on the same weak link; the antennae.
When the antennae, and ship survive, and have a clear view of the sky, they are the next best thing to ET phoning home.
yep, punching the remote 'on' while airborne should be SOP.

Perry hit the main points. Here in the US if your 406 goes off you'll get a phone call from AFRCC. They know where you are based on the GPS coordinates. Even if you don't have your GPS hooked up to the 406 it will still at least send the data burst which is monitored by the satellites and it more accurately positions for SAR crews to search. That data identifies your ELT and they have your registered contact info.

Regarding activation while going down and losing your antenna when you hit, if you hit the panel switch on a 121.5 while going down it will do nothing since it is not monitored. At least with the 406 there will be data picked up by the satellites that will require AFRCC to follow up on. Of course if your ELT antenna is mounted per it's instructions the chances of the wire being cut at the crash are minimized. I'm not a big fan of running the antenna wire all the way back through the fuselage to the empennage so the antenna can be hidden under the fairing and blocked by the VS and HS.

CAP has very few ELT searches these days. There was one going off on my airport a few weeks back and apparently had been for quite a while. A buddy that had just flown in and was monitoring 121.5 heard it when he landed. I didn't even bother to call it in. Simply grabbed my handheld radio and homed in on it to one of the maintenance shops on the field and let the mechanic know that it was activated. Now if that had also been a 406 beacon, the owner of the plane would have been called many hours prior by AFRCC and told his beacon was activated at which point he would have called his A&P and told him to turn it off. It would have spoiled my hunting fun but also saved me a few minutes of waling around the airport.

flyboy1963 said:

yep, punching the remote 'on' while airborne should be SOP.

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I would also suggest everyone actually test their remote and verify it works, I find a suprising number of them inop. (many have never worked becuase the installer used phone line).

Model / Brand ??

I have a Ameri-King 450 (121.5 only) installed and I've been thinking about upgrading to a 406 ELT.

The Ameri-King 451 (non-GPS) is the least expensive ($579 from ACS) and the easiest to install. However, I've read some negative comments on this forum regarding Ameri-King, so I hesitate to to purchase the 451.

The Kannad Integra looks like a nice unit. It costs more ($968 + $180 A-K 450 retro-fit install kit) but it has a built in GPS. It also had an internal 406 antenna that's a back-up to the primary antenna. To be properly installed, the primary antenna must be installed, but if the primary antenna/cable is damaged the ELT will transmit using the internal antenna. I saw the Integra at Osh and I almost bought one.

Any comments in the Kannad Intergra, Amer-King 451, or other brands/models?

novipilot said:

Just a thought from one who has searched for both the 121.5 devices, and the 406 devices. The 121.5 has an accuracy of 10 to 20 miles, meaning someone would have to search that diameter circle to find you. The 406 without the GPS hookup has an accuracy of 1,000 to 3,000 feet.

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Rich, great info here! When I built I put in a 406, but didnt put in the GPS option due to price. This makes me feel good knowing it does get close!

Here are a couple phone numbers I put in my phone so "if" I have a false signal (from my airplane or company aircraft) going off I know immediately who is calling - Its the USAF in norad AFRCC

8 five 0 283 595 five
Eight 00 851 3 zero 51

Without having them I would of thought a telemarketer was calling and ignored it.

jjhoneck said:

There is no reason to buy the 121.5 anymore. No one is listening for it except the CAP kids, and down here that ain't worth much.

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Not true. Airliners still monitor it regularly. I cross country on 121.5 and anytime someone accidentally transmits on it, there is an immediate response. People are listening.

My problem with 406 is the frequency in which they report incorrectly and push the panic button, freaking out family etc. Spot for me.

ColoRv said:

Not true. Airliners still monitor it regularly. I cross country on 121.5 and anytime someone accidentally transmits on it, there is an immediate response. People are listening.

My problem with 406 is the frequency in which they report incorrectly and push the panic button, freaking out family etc. Spot for me.

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Not just the airliners....

Corporate too.

Since 9/11 I would say more pilots monitor it now then ever before. Its a real active frequency used by ATC anytime someone loses comm.

By losing comm I mean when Airliners and Corporate cross ATC boundaries and loose communications with the last controller. ATC and others quickly call out on 121.5 with the new freq.

So, yes, an ELT using 121.5 would be heard very quickly if operating.

Rick - I can't comment on the Integra, other than to say that is almost a given for installation in the aircraft we're building.

With respect to Kannad products, I have installed about 8 of them in other aircraft, all certificated aircraft, plus one in my "flying" homebuilt aircraft. Each of these units is required to be recertified annually by an avionics shop (Canadian regulations). None of them has had any troubles whatsoever. The Kannad units are solid performers.

On the other hand, the Ameri-King products remain pretty much the bottom of the barrel in terms of quality and reliability. A shop near here that makes its bread and butter on ELT sales and recertifications indicates the 406 from Ameri-King is only marginally better than their 121.5 unit, which was undisputedly the poorest ELT in recent production. Their failure rate annual recertification approached 50%. Their whip antennas are also famous for breaking off in flight (not even in a crash scenario).

I'll also relate another little anecdote here regarding ARTEX. Their ME406 ELT is a nice unit, compact, fairly easy to install and competitively priced. The reliability of the G-switches in these units is suspect, as is attested to by an Australian AD. ARTEX's customer service, on the other hand, is nothing short of abysmal.

My ME406 went off while sitting on the carpeted steps in our home. It's not supposed to go off if the aircraft wiring harness is not connected, but it went off anyway. Faulty G-switch. When I called ARTEX I got the run-around. When I mentioned the Australian AD they denied it, then hung up on me. When I escalated to the head of sales and the head of support, neither one deigned to respond. My response? I turfed the ARTEX product and installed a Kannad 406 AF Compact. Haven't had a problem since.

(I have no affiliation with any ELT manufacturer. The only reward I get from recommending any particular ELT is the satisfaction of knowing somebody may benefit from my experience and the painful lessons I learned as an early adopter.)

What is the collective experience with the 406 ACK E-04 ?

Bevan

ACK

I had an ACK 406 in my RV-4, no issues with it. I have also installed one of these in my Rocket - not flying yet.

Bevan said:

What is the collective experience with the 406 ACK E-04 ?

Bevan

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I'll be installing this unit in my plane. It's not flying yet. I was able to purchase everything but the actual unit, so I could complete the wiring and installation of the bracket, etc. now before riveting on the top skin of the aft fuselage. No need to have battery life draining away on the shelf for some months before I'm finished. I won't need the actual unit until I'm flying; even through phase 1. Then I'll just snap it in place and plug in the wires.

Cost from Pacific Coast Avionics was right around $600

I might add, if you plan on flying outside the U.S., the 406 is necessary in some areas in order to legally cross the border.

Walt said:

I would also suggest everyone actually test their remote and verify it works, I find a suprising number of them inop. (many have never worked becuase the installer used phone line).

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Walt, I'm installing an ACK E-04 406 unit in my RV-7A. The kit comes with a phone line in it, to wire the remote switch and audio alert in the panel. The ELT itself has a phone connector coming out of it. Would you elaborate a bit more on your comment, please? I'm curious what you would recommend.

BSwayze said:

Walt, I'm installing an ACK E-04 406 unit in my RV-7A. The kit comes with a phone line in it, to wire the remote switch and audio alert in the panel. The ELT itself has a phone connector coming out of it. Would you elaborate a bit more on your comment, please? I'm curious what you would recommend.

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The supplied wire is not "phone" wire. ELT's use a straight wire configuration while phone wire use a cross wire configuration. If you use "phone" wire the remote will not work.

Looking for opinions......

Since many if not most off airport landings in RVs tend to wind up with the plane on it's back, would it not be a good idea to mount the antenna on the belly?


I know there are restrictions regarding distances from other antennas but if they are not transmitting is that still a problem?


Glenn Wilkinson

Spot?

My experience with Spot has not been so good. When using their tracking feature, I got gaps as much as 40 minutes between location points. Called them, and they blamed it on me...mountains (nope, not between Yuma and Phoenix), or signal blocked by airplane (fabric covered). The real clincher came when I was in the CAP - we wanted to do a SAR exercise using Spot, and called them to advise. They said I would incur a "false alarm fee" if it wasn't a real emergency. Not co-operating with the primary SAR entity for down aircraft didn't give me a warm fuzzy feeling. I've been out of CAP for a while, but as of a couple years ago, there were no Spot assisted CAP saves in Arizona.

If you're down anywhere near an interstate try texting a 911 message with your cellphone (text goes a lot easier than voice, and in less favorable conditions). The CAP cellphone forensics guys can locate you fairly well with that, and even better if your cellphone has GPS activated.

I agree with everyone who says go for the GPS equipped model 406. Interesting side note: The 406 transmits a short (500ms, if I remember) burst every 55 seconds, so they are harder to track with the radio direction finders that the CAP ground team uses. They also emit a 121.5 signal, but it's weaker. Airliners and control towers monitor 121.5 still. We got a lot of calls from airliners, unfortunately at 35,000 ft, the search area covered most of the state!

"phone wire" use

"...ELT's use a straight wire configuration while phone wire use a cross wire configuration. If you use "phone" wire the remote will not work..." is exactly correct.

I snipped one connector off, crossed the wires over, and crimped on a new connector, and Bob's your uncle: my ELT/remote worked and passed inspection.
I'm not recommending a 121.5 unit, mind you, just pointing out how to make a functional installation.

(back to shopping for a 406 my ownself...)

As an air operator(rotorcraft in northen quebec) the ELT 406 is an improvement over the 121.5 mhz type for us. The spot cant replace the ELT as they required human to be activated. just to make a short story ,we retreived a crew that made a force landing with a piper navajo wich caught on fire immediatly . the crew escape and didnt had time to retrieved anything from the aircraft. the surprising fact has we retrieved the crew is the S.A.R got the signal from the wreckage. also during the retreiving of the badlyburnt hull, guest what, the elt was still transmitting after 3 days in the snow. antenna was melt and only a piece of wire was doing the antenna.

the brand was ameriking. the elt was partialy meltdown.

if someone want to post the picture of the melted elt, please send me a PM as i am not a computer guy.

Michel
C-GVFR

CAP in Texas monitors 121.5 on each flight. There are still a lot of 121.5 ELT in the state that CAP flies regular missions to locate, mostly errant non-crash, signals.
I agree that multiple ELT(406 GPS/ 121.5)/PRB is prudent.
CAP missions are evolving with the change in technology as the field units are primarily 121.5 equipped so aircraft are (slowly) being equipped with FLIR to assist ground teams locate missing/downed aircraft, especially at night.
CAP ground teams are pretty much on hold until 121.5 signal is located by aircraft or the 406 signal is verified by AFRCC and GPS coordinance are given. With that said, I appreciate the dedication these CAP Cadets (referenced earlier as "CAP Kids") perform. While most teens won't take the trash out, these Cadets attend weekly meetings and follow stringent Air Force criteria to qualify as ground team and urban directional finder members. Some of this training takes over a year of dedication to qualify for a team. I would want a disciplined team following trained and tested procedures to assist a search any day.

Pat Garboden
Katy, TX
RV9A N942PT Flying
Phase I complete