REFLECTOR: APRS amateur radio tracking

Sat Jul 19 22:22:31 CDT 2008

Interesting a Possible  LOjack for airplanes. Maybe we call  it HIjack, ----- 
 or not? Still very  interesting, not so much for those of us that are 
flying. We know where we are  (I would like to think so?) but for those who are not 
with us during the  flight.
      Short story: Flight following returning to  FL with no problems until 
just about every big FL airport went IFR at the same  time. I was handed off to 
Orlando who would not answer my calls due to all the  IFR traffic. I 
announced I was going to squawk 1200 and land at Lakeland, again  to no response. I 
landed no problems and tied down just before the bad stuff  rolled through. 
About 20 minutes later I received a call from my Parents, who  were called by the 
ATC controller that would not ANSWER me, and told  them that they he had "lost 
my plane off his Radar" ??????  With that  news, knowing that my wife and two 
children were onboard, my parents did not  take that info very well.     No 
one should ever get that  call!!! Thank goodness for cell phones. They are not 
getting any younger  you know.   
     Having a way for those concerned to track us is a  great thing. Paying a 
little bit for equipment and taking some sort of test is a  cheap price to 
pay, to never let something like that happen again!

       Ken Mishler

In a message dated 7/19/2008 10:12:29 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,  
cjensen at dts9000.com writes:

Dave,  

We'll rename this before it dies so people can find it.  You say  studying 
for the test was not that big of a deal?

Chuck  Jensen

-----Original Message-----
From:  reflector-bounces at tvbf.org [mailto:reflector-bounces at tvbf.org]On
Behalf Of  Dave Philipsen
Sent: Saturday, July 19, 2008 6:50 PM
To: Velocity  Aircraft Owners and Builders list
Subject: Re: REFLECTOR: Armpit scoop  cooling problems

Ham radio licenses may be acquired by passing a  test given by a VEC 
(Volunteer Examiner Coordinator).  VECs are  scattered around the country 
and you can find a testing location at this  site: 
http://www.arrl.org/arrlvec/examsearch.phtml

In my area  (small town midwest) there are testing sessions every month.  
They  alternate between my town and another nearby town.  I took my test 
at  the police station.  Some tests are given at libraries or other  
locations.  I believe the fee is under $20.  If you have a basic  
understanding of electronic theory you can probably answer at least 50%  
of the questions.  If you have good short-term memory you can study  the 
entire pool of questions in a matter of a few days and do very well on  
the test even if you don't fully understand everything.  Believe me,  
anyone who has passed the pilot's written test can pass the ham  test.  
Even if you fail it, you can take it again until you pass  it.

Here's another good reason to get an APRS system up and  running:  If you 
conceal the system and wire it into your master  switch then if anyone 
should steal your plane, you will have a beacon  showing you within a few 
feet of where it is.  And, many tracking  sites on the internet archive 
the data for several days.

I'll try  to take some pics of my install and maybe even put a tracking 
demo link up  soon.

Chuck Jensen wrote:
> Dave,
>
> The APRS is  an excellent idea.  Some on the RV list have been doing this 
and seems to  work very well.  FlightAwares is fine as long as a person is 
filed and  flying IFR, but there's no tracking for VFR.  I'd intended to install a 
 system but getting around to getting the ham license was what had slowed me  
up. Where does one take a ham test? Keep us posted on how things go and share 
 whatever details you can.
>
> Chuck  Jensen
>
>
>   

-- 
Dave  Philipsen
Velocity  STD-FG
N83DP

_______________________________________________
To  change your email address, visit  
http://www.tvbf.org/mailman/listinfo/reflector

Visit the gallery!   www.tvbf.org/gallery
user:pw = tvbf:jamaicangoose
Check new archives:  www.tvbf.org/pipermail
Check old archives:  http://www.tvbf.org/archives/velocity/maillist.html

_______________________________________________
To  change your email address, visit  
http://www.tvbf.org/mailman/listinfo/reflector

Visit the gallery!   www.tvbf.org/gallery
user:pw = tvbf:jamaicangoose
Check new archives:  www.tvbf.org/pipermail
Check old archives:  http://www.tvbf.org/archives/velocity/maillist.html

**************Get fantasy football with free live scoring. Sign up for 
FanHouse Fantasy Football today.      
(http://www.fanhouse.com/fantasyaffair?ncid=aolspr00050000000020)
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.tvbf.org/mailman/private/reflector/attachments/20080719/200b91e7/attachment.htm 