by Gringo6 » Tue Nov 28, 2006 9:41 pm
Ok Swordfish 1227- ADS-B is a gauge. The face of it looks like the Garmin GPS. But it works different.
It is mostly used for airplanes on the ground at busy airports; and in lousy weather conditions it will help prevent collisions between taxiing airplanes. When equipped with an overlay for a particular airport it shows taxi-ways, etc. You can taxi in zero visibility with
reasonable confidence that you'll get where you want without running into anything. If the fuel trucks on the tarmac are equipped with ADS-B they'll show up on the screen too. I suspect that running over a loaded fuel truck, with the resulting fire, would ruin your whole day.
The way it works is all ADS-B equipped aircraft xmit their position derived from their GPS to a central place on the airport There positions of ALL these aircraft (along with identifiers etc) are re-broadcast on a common frequency to ALL other airplanes (ADS-B equipped or not). That way everybody with an ADS-B receiver know where all the ADS_B aircraft are located.
If you don't have an ADS-B transmitter you won't show up on the screens of the other airplanes. If you have a receiver (but no transmitter) you will know where they are (but they won't know where you are).
I tried to use the F-16 radar set for this but it only shows airplanes in flight, and doesn't show those on the ground, taxiing, etc. It does give a readout on the model, airline, etc. however. The range is way too great but this could be reduced I bet. The thing works off of FSUIPC so a smart "gauge-man" could program it to show ranges closer to your airplane
If the F-16 radar could be modified to show all airplanes, instead of only those in flight, and at closer range it would do the trick.
This isn'y any big earth-rocking thing, but since it is so-o-o similar to the F-16 radar I thought it might be in somebody's play-book for a future gauge.
It would look neat on the panel, too.
Billa (aka Gringo6)
