Beacons again

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In article ,
Kurt Knisely wrote:
Well, maybe a bonus this month and it's a three check month, so other than
paying down the note on the shack, I think I'll order a new beacon to replace
one of my two 12 yo analog beacons...

I'm leaning towards the Pieps DSP due to the three antennas. I don't need the
advanced one (temp, compass and altimeter). I've heard good things about the
Barryvox and of course the BA-Tracker. I read some of last year's reviews, but
these things change so quickly and I haven't read any from this year's versions.

_ Barryvox just had a recall due to a bad batch of plastic.

http://www.telemarktips.com/TeleNews.htm


Actually my old Pieps and Ortovox work fine. I can find a shallowly buried
beacon on the flats in less than 20-30 seconds (that's not on a steep slope w/
lots of debris, screaming victims, and a deep burial). I'm just not sure how
much longer 12 yo beacons will last?

Any thoughts?


_ I don't know why beacons would wear out, other than the plastic
case cracking with age. They don't have any moving parts other
than the switches. I guess better safe than sorry, but as long
as the older beacons use the same frequency as the new ones,
I don't see any obvious reason to get rid of them. Of course,
handing a BA Tracker to your beaconless buddy seems like a
good thing.

_ Booker C. Bense


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Kurt Knisely wrote:
_ I don't know why beacons would wear out, other than the plastic
case cracking with age.

I heard something about frequency drift?

with ones that use a Crystal Oscillator but the manufacturer will
service beacons for a small fee. The Ortovox F1 has a problem with cold
weather and frequency drift. There is a big article about this in The
Avalanche Review.

Kurt Knisely wrote:
In article , David George
says...

Kurt Knisely wrote:


(Booker wrote)

_ I don't know why beacons would wear out, other than the plastic
case cracking with age.

I heard something about frequency drift?

with ones that use a Crystal Oscillator but the manufacturer will
service beacons for a small fee. The Ortovox F1 has a problem with cold
weather and frequency drift. There is a big article about this in The
Avalanche Review.


'Found a PDF on this, but it's from the BCA folks, so it's not a totally
independent review. In fact getting people to "upgrade" their beacons to
Trackers certainly helps BCA's bottom line although I'd have to guess that Bruce
Edgerly IS a concerned backcountry skier too.

http://www.bcaccess.com/documents/DownCompatISSW.pdf

If I read this correctly, the older analog receivers have a wide enough
bandwidth to detect the newer digital beacons reliably?

So replacing an older analog beacon is definitely a personal decision.

Bob Lee wrote:
Those Trackers have less range and are the _same_ price as the Barryvox,
and I like the size and harness a lot.

The range on the BCA kinda scares me. I was up with Missus Danger the
other day and she was using the BCA. We did a little beacon test at
the top and I could only pick her up at about 40 feet. My Ortovox goes
more like 80 feet, easily double. I'm not sure I'd want to be looking
for someone buried in a large debris field if they were wearing a
BCA. At the same price, I think the Barryvox is the way to
go. Actually, price isn't really that big a deal.

-klaus

In article ,
wrote:

The range on the BCA kinda scares me.

There's something else that bothered me: On a hut trip a couple of years
ago to Fairy Meadows, the guides got everyone together on the afternoon of
our arrival, and we did the beacon search thing. The first thing was
"Okay, everyone switch your beacon to receive." Three BCA wearers (in all
honesty, I don't know if they'd just borrowed them for the trip) couldn't
figure out how to do it. 'Nuff said. (For me at least.)

cheers,
john

ps Kurt, I'll bring you chile, but I won't carry your beer in a skintrack.

John Red-Horse wrote:
There's something else that bothered me: On a hut trip a couple of years
ago to Fairy Meadows, the guides got everyone together on the afternoon of
our arrival, and we did the beacon search thing. The first thing was
"Okay, everyone switch your beacon to receive." Three BCA wearers (in all
honesty, I don't know if they'd just borrowed them for the trip) couldn't
figure out how to do it. 'Nuff said. (For me at least.)

Yowzaa..scary... That's why I like the Ortovox harness. Completely
teleskier proof on the harness. The range thing would bother me if for
example I ski down part way to a safe spot, and then my partner
triggers a slide which moves past me. If I don't have a reading, I don't
know whether to go up or down, so you gotta go up if they may be
buried there, because going down first would be a big mistake, like
the Twin Lake Pass Slide. If you have double the range you have a much
better chance of quickly figuring out which way to go.

Hopefully, since I'm working on this transceiver project, I can get a
collaboration going with one of the transceiver companies and get a
few to play with. I already have my old F2 hooked to my computer and
am characterizing the flux pattern using my Ortovox M1 as the
transmitter.

And I'm writing out my check for the deposit on the Monashees
trip... yah babeeee. It's a go...the lodge already has the deposit. So
now I just need to figure out what to do in March between British
Columbia and our Denali trip. And how to combine the transceiver
project and trips so that it's tax deductible.

See yah in about two weeks John! Bring snow and warm clothes. It's
gonna be cold when you get here. Oh..and don't forget all your
technical gear. We got work to do. I'll also show you my new sled rig
design... Well... if I can get it back from A. She's been beta testing
it for me between her house and the road. Judging from our descent in June,
we gotta be able to improve on that.

Happy Solstice everyone. It's all downhill from here.

-klaus