Spotted you joining at or around your ETA and were then able to inform the rest of those in the circuit about your presence
Not quite. The airfield I fly from has quite a few non-radio aircraft based there. The way you know they're in the circuit is *gasp, shock horror* you open your eyes and look for them!
Ok, sorry about the sarcasm, but I'm always shocked that people expect to be told who is in the circuit with them. Several times I've been in a busy circuit and only remained safe through looking out
as well as listening to the radio. For example, turning downwind in a busy circuit, someone else calls downwind. You spot someone late downwind, but is that the person you heard on the radio a moment ago? Or is the guy on the radio somewhere between you and the guy you've just seen? If they're the only two aircraft in the circuit and they've both got radios, you'd probably know - but if there are 6 or 8 others? In a busy un-controlled circuit, it's just not possible to keep track of every aircraft simply from their radio calls - you
must look out, too, even at airfields where non-radio aircraft aren't allowed.
I've flown non-radio a couple of times. Nothing difficult about it. Most fields, if they allow it, require PPR so that they can give you any important information which they'd normally give you over the radio. They don't actually care whether you turn up or not, they don't keep a record of the fact that you've called, it's only so you can get all the latest information.
After that, join overhead, and, while in the overhead, have a good look-out for traffic, and check out the signal square. Then continue as for any other approach, except your lookout needs to be even better than normally. And you have to keep a special lookout for idiots with radios who assume that because you're not on the radio you're not there. And that's it - simple!
The only difficult thing is at airfields with variable circuit directions. Of course you'll know which runway (and which circuit) they're using before you leave, and when you join overhead you'll make sure your turns are in the appropriate direction. But if you look at the signal square and discover they've changed the circuit direction, you need to change your turn direction and try to keep your blind-spots to a minimum.
I'd never fly non-radio through choice... but the handhelds I've used have been so poor that I've felt I'm safer not using one. And in some open-cockpit aircraft I suspect the noise from the wind blowing over the mic would render any transmissions completely unreadable. So no, I don't believe that radios should be mandatory at all.
FFF
---------------