Powerflarm Pcas arrows for verticle seperation info.

This weekend I was enjoying just a normal xc flight here in central Ohio.

My Powerflarm pcas beeped at me and I took notice as the circles were getting smaller.

I was scanning like crazy as the circles were nearly down to nothing, I got nervous and waggled my wings a few times. Then I turned 90 degrees left to check for traffic and I was shocked to see a 172 coming directly at me at my exact altitude.

I did a diving turn to avoid collision and I heard the loud roar of the Cessna as he passed by way too close.

As I turned back to look at him his wings were level and I am sure he never saw me.

It appeared he was going to fly right into the back of my glider or extremely close to it.

I also find the numbers very difficult to read in flight and would much prefer up/down arrows added to tell if the traffic is getting closer or further away from you vertically.

Anyways I am very grateful Powerflarm added the beep function to the pcas as this is what got my attention in the first place.

Now If they could add arrows or something similar to make it easier to tell vertical separation I would be even more grateful!

Joe Simmers

Joe,

it's a pity that the 172 didn't have a FLARM/PowerFLARM installed,
as that would've avoided the dangerous situation in the first place.

This spring, we had an accident here in Switzerland where a Ventus
was hit by a Mooney. His tail was cut off and he parachuted out,
practically unhurt. The Mooney, severely damaged, proceeded to
make a safe landing at its homebase.

The Ventus had a FLARM (the Classic one, without PCAS),
but the Mooney didn't.

We'll take your input into consideration. Is your's a PowerFLARM Portable
or Core?

Best
--Gerhard (FLARM dev mgr)

Gerhard, I have the core with the 57mm butterfly display.

Thank you for adding the beep on the pcas, if were were not
for the beep to get my attention I am not sure if I would have
noticed this traffic on my display in the first place.

Just to clarify, the beep for new traffic (PCAS and Flarm) was added by Butterfly to the butterfly display in the latest version based on feedback provided here on RAS in earlier threads. I am very happy to see that both Flarm and Butterfly folks are paying close attention to our feedbacks. I highly recommend installing the latest butterfly display version released last month.

Ramy