Can anyone help identify this object?

[paleoanthropologist1]

I have recently been involved in an archaeological dig in a cave in southern France which was believed to be used by prehistoric man. We have uncovered some fascinating objects but two of them has confused us. From paintings on the walls we believe that they were involved in a ritual where the early humans would circle for hours around some sort of red burning beacon, but we know little else, and my investigation has brought me here. I have put a picture of the artefacts at the bottom of the post, shown after being cleaned up in our lab.

Please help me identify them, as I believe that these could provide a fascinating insight in to the lives of our ancestors.

http://www.baron58.com/images/real_adf_set_1.jpg

[IO540]

Very funny :) :ok:

KR87 ADF ? I have one on the shelf above me, which looks like yours but slightly less tacky.

The indicator you have is however prehistoric. You want a KI-229 RMI indicator, and a slaved compass system...

Don't knock this - this equipment is legally required to be carried (the regs don't say "used") on all IFR flight in controlled airspace in the UK. And our CAA knows best; they employ only the best ex RAF navigators.

[maxred]

That looks as though it has been pinched from my cockpit! In fact, I undertook some additional IFR instruction a few weeks ago, and guess what, an NDB procedural let down at PIK, and those bonny instruments look remarkably like the stuff I used on that procedure.

[kharmael]

Learnt NBD Holds in a Firefly using one of those not many years ago!

[Pilot DAR]

Yup, I regognize it! It's a much newer version of what I learned to use during flights across the Atlantic 25 years ago, before GPS was a word.

I was sure wishing I was looking at a working one in the 182 I flew back from the west in April. Neither GPS could find enough satelites for a fix for 45 minutes, and there were no significant geographic features in central Saskatchewan to effectively map read. I found a feature on the ground for a reference before the GPS told me where I was....

I also still refer to a compass, whose design is seeminly unchanged for a half century!

[Big Pistons Forever]

It is a flight timer and AM radio reciever. It lets you listen to both types of music.... Country and Western, inane radio commentators, bad 1960's rock and roll .......oh and it will point towards a radio station on the ground plus or minus about 5 degs if there are no CBs near, the aircraft is not banking, The station is directly ahead , you are not near a coast, etc etc etc. :{

This post prompted me to look through my log book. As near as I can figure the last time I had to do a for real NDB approach in IMC conditions without at least supplementary (and superbly accurate) GPS track guidance was 1995 :ok:

[Chuck Ellsworth]

Those are modern nav aids.

In the days of the wooden ships and the iron men we only had a radio receiver and flew the airways in the twilight zone of the radio range leg.

And for the final approach we had to find the cone of silence to accurately time the let down.

Not only that but we had to read morse code before we could even take an instrument ride for the instrument rating....then again I'm old...real old. :ok:

The ADF was a later invention which made our IFR flying simple.

[Talkdownman]

Aaah, sweet nostalgia. The As and Ns of the 'Radio Range'....

[Caboclo]

Coool, it's digital! That's better than what I learned on.

[Chuck Ellsworth]

An ADF without a BFO function is not really a full functioning ADF.

Especially if you are flying in the Arctic or over the ocean.

When did one of you guys last need to use the BFO function to locate the station you had identified? :E

[IO540]

we had to read morse code before we could even take an instrument ride for the instrument rating

You still do, here.

[Steve888]

Jeez, hope none of you come fly in Australia. Go 50 miles inland from a capital city and there's nothing else to use but NDBs, and only then at a few airports.

[IO540]

Does the Australian government jam GPS signals?

[Steve888]

Well Stephen Conroy probably wants to to protect the people's sensibilities, but no, RNAV approaches are the main approach type here, however not everywhere has them and you need to be approved on the specific GPS model that you're using and have flown the approach 3 times on that model in VMC before using it in IMC.

[englishal]

Christ, that is modern!! Mine has mechanical numbers and weighs as much as several house bricks!!! (want to sell it?!)...

(only keeping ours for legality purposes to "back up" the GPS :})....

[tmmorris]

I'm with englishal. That looks positively space age. The one I use has mechanical numbers and doesn't even do .5 spacing (making Oxford a bit hit and miss at 367.5 - though you can have fun manually tuning it in on the ANTenna setting...)

Tim

[IO540]

The KR87, which I thought was state of the art ;) doesn't do 0.5kHz either.

To befair to the much maligned ADF, it is as accurate as a VOR, subject to certain conditions

- over a large expanse of open water or flat terrain
- a good distance from the beacon
- no significant "weather"

and of course it is great as you cross the beacon as the needle flips around.

The rest of the time it can be pretty awful.

Nevertheless I decided, back in 2002, to get the KI-229 RMI factory fitted because the basic indicator is basically unusable for real approaches. Sadly the KI-229 indicator is an even bigger piece of *&*& than the ADF, packing up several times. Usually the 400Hz inverter goes.

Nowadays I fly all NDB and VOR approaches using the GPS OBS mode, and check the RMI at the TOD, etc.

[tmmorris]

Absolutely - I would never fly an NDB approach in IMC without a GPS 'backup' of some sort, even a handheld (my Lowrance one has an excellent HSI presentation with an OBS mode). Scary, actually, at somewhere like Gloucester or Shoreham...

Tim

[IO540]

ISTM that at Shoreham most of the seasoned pilots fly the 02 approach every time. The resulting circle to land will never get you killed (in daylight ;) ) but the 20 approach passes awfully close to the terrain; only a few hundred feet above it according to measurements I did a while ago against the 1:25k O/S map.

[IFMU]

The PA28R I fly had the NDB yanked out and an IFR legal GPS put in its place. This happened before I had joined the club. I was not sad.

-- IFMU

[IO540]

That's OK for practical use; you are just illegal for IFR in CAS (no known enforcement in the UK, but the UK is not the only country that requires the carriage of an ADF; do a random scan of the AIPs) and you have to fly NDB approaches using the OBS mode :)

[POBJOY]

The "Nav" man at Oxford always said it was an early version of "Weather Warning" as it always pointed to the nearest thunder storm !!!.
Myself i always considered it to be a cunning scheme hatched up with the CAA and training schools to double the numbers of hours required to get an IR.
Pobjoy

[wsmempson]

If I'm not totally mistaken, the bench upon which the ADF sits, is in the hold at Cranfield for a procedural approach....:8

[ShyTorque]

Presumably the CAA are changing their stance on ADF. In UK NDBs are being shut down, probably partly because no-one wants to pay for their maintenance. LIC has gone earlier this year and has been replaced by a waypoint known as "PEDIG" (although it was still radiating after it was NOTAM'd as withdrawn).

[nouseforaname]

..........and i thought mine was just for giving you flight timing.