Hi Giles,
You seem to be on every thread at once today. Just a few brief comments:
I have flow 10+hrs recently over the south of England with the PAW fitted - mainly around Salisbury, Popham, Marlborough, Bournemouth areas but slightly disappointingly I don't seem to have picked up a single other PAW user. ;-( Where are the 400+ other users?
Judging from the level of activity today, probably all sitting reading this forum!
I think the system is BRILLIANT, works really well and is a massive safety leap forward. Well done everyone involved.
I am using the PAW audio out directly into my headset (via external 3.5mm) which works great - although the volume seems to keep reseting - and I have runway HD. I mainly rely on the audio and I am getting hundreds of mode S traffic warnings and a some ADSB traffic but as far as I can tell no other PAW aircraft.
Having used the PAW fairly intensively in busy airspace and in and out of both large and small GA airfields my wishlist in order would be:
1. AMAZING if it could receive FLARM as I have had several low visibility gliders sailing past - I know this has been much discussed but it seems if FR24 can receive it then their must be a way.
AFAIK FR24 get their FLARM feed from the OGN (Open Glider Network), which like FR24 comprises a network of receiving stations across the country, all feeding in to OGN / FR24's servers - which then process all this information and disseminate it back out over the internet. As I have already stated elsewhere today, this means the information is not LIVE due to the inevitable processing and transmission delays. We get our ADSB, Mode S and P3i information direct from the other aircraft, so no delay whatever. Lee is currently looking into a way of combining FLARM information with the output from PAW, but that would require you to have a FLARM transceiver on board as well as your PAW. Unfortunately FLARM encrypt their data and will prosecute anyone decoding it so that's the only way forward on this. IIRC somebody did suggest feeding FR24 into PAW in flight - good luck with that! (And it still wouldn't be 'Live').
Edit: Oops, sorry Giles - just realised that was you on another thread! My apologies
2. Tweak the Mode S warnings to introduce a height separation and/or climbing/descending in the alert at the DANGER warning level alert. I find the progressive Traffic Notice - Alert - DANGER warnings can be very distracting but certainly keeps one's eyes out of the cockpit! I have been getting these warnings while on a LARS traffic service - so I assume the danger has not been too great and I have now reduced the Mode S setting to their minimums.
We have had a couple of requests to add relative altitude information to the Mode S audio alerts. This would certainly be useful, but I would want to hear this well before we get to the 'Traffic Danger' stage. If the warnings continue after 'Traffic Notice', this means that the aircraft is getting closer to you or another aircraft has entered your alert range. As you say, you can adjust the trigger sensitivity under 'Mode S Detect' - I generally run in 'Short Range' in high traffic areas or 'Medium Range' for cross country's.
3. Introduce the ability to disable the audio alerts and P3I transmissions when on the ground.
Lee is already working on this, though it's not just as simple as it sounds.
Finally I am about to start an awareness campaign around my local airfields and plan to put up notices and offer to demo the system, help set up or even lend out my system. Anyone else up for it? Let's get PAW out there into every GA aircraft, glider, microlight, paramotor plus some commercials who still only seem to have Mode S and we will all fly more safely.
I've been doing this for a while now. Still surprised at the lack of knowledge out there. I raised this with Lee and the Team just this week, so they will be working on it, but it needs to be co-ordinated to fit in with availability of the next batch of PAWS or we'll just generate more frustration.
Best regards
Peter
