Linda, This is a tough decision as to what to buy. If your 121.5 ELT is OK and all you need is to change your battery then I would stay with that and as a backup get a PLB. When the prices come down then purchase one for the aircraft . The main thing to consider is during your emergency descent for landing, how and can you activate your ELT, after you land can you get to the ELT in the aircraft and if not and you must leave the aircraft do you have another means of being located if away from the aircraft. The best way to go is a PLB and the 406 installed in the aircraft with a panel activation switch . But we are talking big bucks.
In fact it is 8AM on Wed and I have been up most of the night looking for a 121.5 ELT at the IAD Dulles airport. The tower picked it up and several aircraft in that area were hearing it. We have the area located, in the FED EX terminal, but there are hundreds of the metal shipping containers in that area and we think an ELT was shipped with a battery installed and the bumps have activated it. Going to be a long day as it was already a long night. But we know it is not a distress situation which is most important. This brings back my earlier remarks of how the VHF signal bounces around when metal buildings or in this case metal shipping containers are involved. We checked all the Fed EX aircraft and they are OK. Seems I either get this type or the ones that are located in a landfill under piles of garbage. If you decide to remove your ELT and discard it be sure the battery is disconnected. This was the case with the landfill one. Seems the battery had an expiration date 3 years ago and the owner though it was not working - but it was chirping away. Talk about some upset ground search people. Most had to throw their clothes away after the " search". Found it under 3 feet of trash in the County land fill. Good luck in your decision. Jim ----- Original Message ----- From: Linda Abrams To: [email protected] Sent: Wednesday, February 04, 2009 4:04 AM Subject: [ercoupe-tech] Re: !21.5 Emergency Freq Ooops; my mistake. Thank you to all who corrected it. Antenna on the belly is transponder; ELT antenna is on the ELT itself which rides in a little cage on the wall of the baggage compartment inside the plane. (But it was worth making the goof to evoke the detailed lesson on emergency SAR from Jim Truxel that resulted -- thank you! And, like Ed, I'm wondering what the best alternative to the expensive new installed-ELT would be, from the point of view of the CAP folks who do the searching. What do you think, Jim? Assuming we leave the old 121.5 ELT in place, is a hand-held PLB or something like Find-Me-Spot a better addition?) Linda N3437H (Sky Sprite) L.A. 2e. Re: !21.5 Emergency Freq Posted by: "Syd Cohen" [email protected] Date: Mon Feb 2, 2009 5:58 pm ((PST)) ELT antennas are rarely mounted on the belly of an airplane. If you see an antenna on the belly most likely it is the transponder antenna. Syd
