Call me paranoid, I prefer to
carry an onboard radar too, not just rely on the ground radar etc, yes,
it's another point of failure, in pretty much the same way the Ju52-3m has a 3 times bigger chance of a flame-out as the early single
engined Ju52-1m.
[this is not directed mainly at Arnt, since I think he already knows all of this]
Even airliners don't have primary radar outside of their radar altimeters; they rely on TCAS, an expensive secondary system that interrogates transponders of nearby aircraft. TCAS works well enough, though it cannot see a plane with its transponder turned off (that's why transponders are required at higher altitudes and near airports). Light aircraft can use passive alerting systems from TPAS right down to a portable Monroy system that costs a few hundred dollars -- these tell you the altitude and distance of other traffic, but not its direction, and they rely on evesdropping on ATC's interrogations of other transponders rather than interrogating them themselves.
That said, when you spend money for safety, you have to look to see what benefits it will bring you. For example, I could spend $500K to reinforce my house against small asteroid strikes, but I probably wouldn't improve safety in any measurable way; on the other hand, $500 on smoke and carbon monoxide detectors can make an enormous difference.
Airplanes almost never collide in cruise, either in VMC or IMC. Most midair collisions take place in beautiful VFR weather, uncontrolled, near an airport, and even then, they're not all that high on the risk list. People die mainly because of VFR flight into IMC, stall/spin on takeoff or landing, and controlled flight into terrain (especially during night approaches or scud running).
All the best,
David
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