My previous price was wrong, it's £1500 including VAT, not plus VAT.
The number of aircraft affected is a lot more than 13,000. According to the CAA's own GA review figures there are more than 27,000 affected aircraft in the UK fleet. 26% of these are un-registered, deregulated types (hang gliders, paragliders, powered hang gliders and paramotors), 21% are SEPs, 15% are microlights, 10% are gliders, 7% are balloons/airships, 6% are PFA types, 6% are helicopters and gyroplanes, 4% are commercial air transport, 2% are private multi engined, 2% are vintage or historic and 1% are private turbine.
The recreational aircraft sector is about 75% of the UK fleet, perhaps a little more, and is composed mainly of very light aircraft with little or no capability to carry a transponder.
With an assumed unit cost of £1500 (as this is what the only unit available is priced at), then the cost of fitting all 27,000 aircraft will be over £40M, excluding installation, inspection, approval and licencing costs. Even allowing for perhaps 10% of the fleet that already have Mode S, the cost still greatly exceeds the £20M figure beyond which regulatory impact statements have to be submitted to the Prime Ministers Office.
The CAA are pulling a fast one here, as they seem to have deliberately set the assumed unit price of a transponder, plus the affected aircraft fleet size, at figures that come in below the magic £20M.................
VP