Which 406 ELT?

[olyolson]

Planning an update to my older 121.5 ELT. Pulled the pic below from the Acft Spruce website, any suggestions or pros/cons of these or other newer 406 ELTs?

[bret]

I just installed the Kannad, no need for external power, has a backup internal gps antenna, 6 year battery, there still may be the additional battery offer going on too! < 1K for unit and antenna. only difficulty installing was the Din connector solder task, my second try I used the potato trick that worked.

[gerrychuck]

Depends on what 121.5 unit you are upgrading from. If you have an ACK, their 406 mhz unit can be retrofitted using the same tray and same wiring. Just have to install the aural alarm unit and new antenna, all without having to run any wires, etc. Took me about 15 minutes.

Ameri-king are in the regulatory doghouse right now and most (all?) their units have retroactively lost their certification. I wouldn't touch their stuff under the current circumstances.

[rdamazio]

+1 for Kannad (and they have multiple models with different features - e.g. some are portable so you can remove them after a crash and carry them with you, some will get GPS position from your main GPS, etc. - you can pick the one that has the right features/price point for your taste)

[az_gila]

I've installed two ACK ones.

No big deal and the hardest part was adding the extra 3 conductor cable down the fuselage to get power and the GPS signal to the units...