I hardly think so, given the number of remote control options on the market already. Nobody is going to be clicking on some air frequency to control his central heating. And if he really wanted to, nobody could stop him; all he needs is an Icom radio and a simple decoder on the headset socket :)

I am sure the only reason PCL is banned here is because the CAA are too scared to do anything innovative in case there is some sort of comeback, no matter how highly theoretical. Their lawyers probably told them that if the un-ban it, and somebody crashes at night when the system packs up, the CAA will get sued.

This is of course bollox, but if you ask a lawyer (paid by the hour) if there is a liability his answer will nearly always be Yes, and the lawyers working for the CAA are all of the same character profile (a #1 Pozi screwdriver stuck up their sphincter would never fall out under gravity).

Exactly the same reason why Lyco won't amend their 1960s engine menagement writings to support LOP operation.

I'd dearly love to have PCL at our strip and would be very happy for it to be restricted to base a/c only.

But the lights wouldn't last five minutes at the hands of the local yobs....

Read through that again slowly. It is a logical nonsense.
Beyond that, your airy dismissal of the law on the basis that "no one can stop them" (Oh really? Why not?) is in diametric contradiction to your assumption that nothing can be done because of some completely fictitious "liability".

Sorry you seem to swallow all that twaddle about liability, it's one of the worst diseases crippling our society at present. One day we'll realise that even lawyers can't do things that are beyond their powers and we can all get on with the rest of our lives unhindered by imaginary and self-imposed restrictions. May it come soon.

As I suggested above, had you troubled to read it, the CAA do not regulate the electromagnetic spectrum. Surprise-Surprise OFCOM do that! The restriction below is neither imaginary nor imposed by the CAA.
UK Interface Requirement 2052

See table 3.1, elements 3 and 4
That's where it says PCL isn't licenced here.

If that were true, would it not make the 'speechless code' illegal also? (you know, 1 click=yes, 2 clicks=no, 3 clicks=say again etc. for use in case of microphone failure). Red herring I think. It's just the CAA doesn't want to allow it.

Emergency procedures are different from routine operation inaccordance with the relevant regulgations. Agaricus bisporus has given you all the details about why it is not permitted in the UK. What is interesting is why some other countries allow it despite international regulations to the contrary.

About £200. Ours uses and aviation band scanner tuned to a frequency and responds on 5 clicks to activate a relay that switches a 110v transformer, has worked fine for over a decade.

???

Out of curiosity how does element 3/4 say keying your analogue voice mic on an aviation transmitter 5 times is not an authorised use (and having a machine that counts the number of carrier on /offs in any 10 second period is also illegal?)

The only rule I have seen that seems to relate to this question is the CAAs refusal to grant the PCL capability to licenced aerodromes other than for the specific use of the emergency services (so maybe there is a table 3.1ES that specifically modifies 3.1 3/4 if it is an emergency service user???)

What if you had a lighting system that simply came on if any voice transmittion on the frequnecy lasting longer than 3 seconds (to avoid random interference).

So you announce on the airfield frequency that you're inbound from the west, and when you get there the lights have already been turned on! No illegal signaling....just normal radio calls.

We used to have ours connected to a phone switch and turned them off and on by DTMF tones. worked very well.

The latest aerodrome lights are solar powered and come on automatically.

Solar Aviation Lighting, Solar Airfield Lighting, Solar Airport Lighting | Solar Aviation Lighting.com for example.

Wow! I did not realize this. I no runway lights,$50 for every "touch & go" :ugh:

Need aerospace reform in the UK or have it run out of Brussels. That should be law,just like having lights on your car.

What an embarrassing aerospace fact.

Is there anywhere in europe that has PCL?

Will it be legal if and when the UK joins EASA?

Never even heard of the OFCOM document.

However, saying that it stops PCL doesn't appear to stand up. CAP 168 Chapter 6 has already been cited as the reason GA can't use PCL, but the Emergency Services can.

It's been common practice for Police Air Support Units to operate PCL outside ATC hours, some at licensed airports. In order to facilitate this a discrete frequency is allocated (and kept secure) via I presume OFCOM.

Is there a general exemption ?

Sir George Cayley

If people fail to see why that OFCOM reference covers it I can only think that it was a very long time since they did aviation law. It clearly states that the frequency band is authorised for AGA voice traffic and ACARS under defined parameters. Clearly any other use is not authorised, and blipping the carrier five times to switch a lighting system is nmanifestly neither voice comms or ACARS. What is hard to understand about that?

So Police use it - they've got an exemption and we haven't, though I'd be surprised if there were any discrete frequencies spare in our crowded aircraft VHF band. Do they use air band, or a seperate transmitter on another band? If its airband there'll be nothig very "secure" about it - does that mean "secret"?

And I think it is also clear that the CAA have no wish for this to become commonplace for whatever reason so there is no incentive for them to relax their stance. It just ain't going to happen here.

The police do use the normal airband, it is 'secret' at my local field in that it is not published, but your normal Com box will activate it if keyed on the right frequency.

Quite probably true. However, must of us wonder Why CAA/OFCOM choose to regulate against this capability (as well as several other modern technologies), which have decades of proven implementation in other countries, improve utility and likely have a positive safety advantage (more common night flight, thus higher currency, more diversion airfields, etc.).

It is just another one of those annoying features where our safety regulator chooses to restrict utility for no benefit (other than jobs for the boys turning lights on after hours).

PS

Your logic also seems to imply that the double click acknowledgement on short final and the speechless code are also not authorised as they are neither voice coms nor ACARS and in fact are very similar to signaling

In my experience, the CAA are quite open to changing policy and rules where they can when presented with a reasoned and sound argument for the proposal. But 'It happens elsewhere' ain't going to cut it. The CAA is interested in assuring safety - PCL does present some hazards (none of which are unmanageable). If anyone really wants PCL, why not present a good case for allowing it rather than going around in circles on an internet forum?

Presumably if you want to do this at a public airfield then you can't keep it low-profile so the CAA would have to be approached.

If indeed they would care - would they?? I somehow don't think they would prosecute. I suspect that, more likely, the airfield owner would not want it for fear of the lights going out when somebody is on short final and crashes on the go-around (a climb into total blackness, on instruments). The UK is full of people who would worry about that, and looking at the calibre of some pilots, who can blame some of them?

Private strip owners can do what they like. They won't have their own VHF frequency anyway so they would use any of the existing radio control solutions on the market.

There are 720 or so frequencies in the Aeronautical VHF band (assuming 25 kHz spacing). Five clicks = five seconds, then try the next frequency. So trying all frequencies takes 3600 seconds, give or take. That's one hour at most to find the right frequency. Although you might want to share the workload between a few pilots or you'll end up with a seriously sore finger.

But my guess would be that their secret frequency would somehow be "one-off" from any of the frequencies they normally use, for ease of remembering and selecting. That would reduce the number of frequencies to try to maybe 24 or so.

(A hackers mind is a joy forever...:})

IO540 gave a pointer there, I think. Private strip owners doing what they like -such as buying PCL sets and setting them to any old frequency because they don't have an allocated one, and causing interference with who knows what else uses that freq. The inability to control that alone would give the CAA good reason to say no. And you bet the CAA prosecute illegal use of frequencies causing interference with legal users.

Bit embarassing if you picked the same freq as the police base though, and your farm strip lights up lke a christmas tree every time they want to land, and vice-versa.

They will have to notice it first, which they won't. Every radio frequency has tons of interference on it, here and there. A private strip will have hardly any use at night, and it is a piece of cake to find a frequency not used by any known airport; there is a website listing allocated frequencies for the UK and probably Europe.

Not suggesting anybody does this though, because there is little point. Google on
sms remote control
and you will get the idea. There are loads of products and sms does work at low altitudes. It takes very little interaction with the phone to do this; just store a template message in some folder and send it when you want the lights on. I have such a box right here, enabling me to control the ADSL equipment at a remote location, to reset it when needed. It cost me about £200 and that included adding a big relay to switch a higher current than the built-in one.

MPT1320 Licence exempt walkie talkies as used by bikers etc. Scanner to listen to the frequency also licence exempt. PCL circuitry recognises a specific series of clicks. In the case of ours it is 5 clicks in a specific timing.

Never fired up by interference nor failed to fire up. We can assign any frequency that the scanner can 'hear' this includes air and ground bands.

But the MPT licence exempt is the best way to go for those looking for an excuse to find illegality in use. It is also more reliable than an SMS. We don't get a mobile service in the air around our place, in fact we barely get one on the ground......

There are actually loads of other radio solutions. One can get radio modems which go up to about 20km (IIRC) and which are license-free. There are also off the shelf remote control solutions which work on 2.4GHz and which will work over more than enough distance. There are so many solutions for activating PCL that the legality issue becomes totally moot.

I know it's not in the area initially requested but on the more general topic Cumbernauld have the facility and activated for me to use for a late arrival (private use) in 2009. Unless of course the rules have changed since. It was activated on their allocated airfield frequency.

Just to be clear about who has legal powers for controlling the misuse of frequencies. It's not the CAA.

It used to be the RCA (Radio Communications Agency). I worked with them a few years ago tracking down an oik who'd stolen a radio and thought it great fun to be a bedroom air traffic controller.

He was located using RDF and 'spoken too' by a big chap in a uniform.

THe RCA was absorbed by OFCOM. The CAA collect radio licence fees on behalf of, in effect, the Inland Revenue, but the only powers they have under the ANO in this instance would include reckless endangerment.

Hope this clarifies the position as I understand it.

Sir George Cayley

Cue loud coughing noises... It's actually so trivial it wasn't even fun.

I agree, the PCL situation is pathetic. If I had a private strip I'd buy it, install it and use it without giving slightest concern to whatever rules might prohibit it.

Whilst Sir George is correct up to a point, the CAA does (or certainly did a few years ago) have a bit more involvement with radio station licensing such as approval of callsigns, approval of frequencies for particular uses and services and the co-ordination of protected frequencies (i.e. assignments designed to try to minimise the likelihoon of interference from stations using the same frequency).

A number of posters have said it is OFCOM that regulates frequency allocation and legitimate usage - With which I understand and agree.

However, it remains unclear to me that keying the voice carrier for the purpose of conveying a message is not a legitimate usage (and on this point I am already aware a number of you disagree).

However, if you are correct, why does the CAA choose to express this restriction against using the voice carrier to signal as

• only a specific instance (PCL),
• only for some aerodromes (licensed fields - at all times even if they are operating unlicensed at the time)
• with a CAA managed exception for certain emergency services use (on airband rather than police band radios)

Rather than a general restriction that 'forbids carrier key signalling within UK airspace on aviation frequencies - this includes the use in PCL'.

The regulation as drafted feels much more like addressing an Aviation Safety concern someone had/has about landing at unattended aerodromes at night.


Or is this another example where the regulations are written in an indirect and overly wordy way so as to introduce ambiguity and the opportunity for increased bandwidth consumption on PPrune ;)

Flynn, the short answer is "because it is their train-set".
I'm sure they do feel uncomfortable at the thought of light aircraft coming and going at night willy-nilly, as would a number of other Govt agencies.

Shunter, you do not belong in the aviation community with an attitude like that. You are a disgrace and a danger to the rest of us with that attitude to the rules. Aviation is not an activity for those with a gipsy mentality like yours.

IO540. Yor attitude is little better, as virtually every post you've mad so far recommends or suggests some sort of illegal activity and contempt for rules that were made by wiser people than you for reasons of safety, yet you always appear to know better.
For your (and others') info those frequencies not requiring licences are not exempt from the law, and one of them relates to height of the antenna above ground for reasons of reducing nuisance by excessive range.
It is actually rather difficult to find a frequency in Europe that is not nibbling into the coverage area of another station using the same one at or outside published coverajust ge area, and that is the licenced ones. You are not in posession of a geographical spectrum analysis so you are talking out of your fundament. It is pretty staggering to find someone so ill-informed and actualy peddling such utter crap on this forum. Does it not occur to you that although you have not heard any transmissions from ground level it does not mean that your Tx cannot reach and block someone airborne a hundred miles away, or that you just have't been listening at the right time.
Your attitude stinks too.

What's wrong with just accepting that you aren't allowed to?
Or fitting a decent landing light and using reflectors?
Or just not night flying from your private strip when there isn't enough moonlight to see.

For God's sake. We really get them on this forum, don't we?

So, how different is it for me to phone somebody at the destination, before departing, and get them to switch on the lights at the appropriate time?

:ugh:

What pompous bollox.

You must be Mr Guppy in disguise :)
Evidently, you don't fly (or are a retired ISO9000 quality inspector with FSX), for that would be illegal.

Arse

PCL obviously works and is safe. One would struggle to find a more litigious society than America and its in widespread use there without problems.

Its no wonder people question the CAA current stance.

A typical PCL transmission: - - - - -

Taking about three seconds. That's all.

Some posters here seem to live in a constant state of fear and/or anger. :hmm:

Can someone please point me at these antenna restrictions for use of an MPT exempt radio?

That's very harsh. There is no need to be so insulting. :=

:E

You have changed your position on this point. Earlier you were arguing the restriction has naught to do with the CAA and was an OFCOM regulation.

re-read my question. [PARAPHRASE]If that is true (i.e. the restriction is imposed by OFCOM) why do the CAA choose to communicate this restriction as only applying to licensed aerodromes and only one type of carrier key usage? [PARAPHRASE/]

If it is a CAA restriction rather than OFCOM (which I believe it is) then stop muddying the thread with irrelevant comments about frequency usage.

If one wants to make a case for change a good starting point is to understand who made the rule and why. To this end I believe it is the CAA’s rule, not OFCOMS and is 'safety' based)

And if it is "safety" based then the CAA needs to make a good case for retaining it, because it heavily detracts from the utility value of general aviation, which results in poorer pilot currency, a reduced safety, and economic damage.

It's pretty obvious that the case for "safety" here is about the same as the "safety" case for holding back GPS approaches. Both them and PCL work just fine in the USA....

I am sure the CAA can see this line of attack coming, which is why they are not going to go public with any reasons for being against PCL. The moment they state that they don't like it for safety reasons, they are toast. And if they give other reasons, they are toast as well. So they are just going to stonewall.

I'm not sure that the Ofcom argument is correct, although I'm prepared to be pursuaded. If so then the easy fix is to say 'click' (or whatever) each time the mic. is keyed. Voila! Voice communication.

The safety case doesn't hold water. You only need to look elsewhere to see PAL/PCL in use as a normal part of aviation - including public transport.

Very clever :ok:

Even better would be voice recognition :)

"lights on please"

What is the safety case?

I'm sometimes tasked to land at a private HLS that has PCL, just a ring of lights giving an outline of the landing pad. I know the frequency and will obviously use them if it's dark. However, if they don't come on, I still have to land there anyway. Landing without the pad marker lights is possible, because I'm familiar with the HLS but I reckon it's safer to use them.

Agaricus bisporus, people who unthinkingly and unquestioningly follow rules, just because "it's the rules", are a far greater danger than those people in this thread who have the maturity and brainpower to assess the risks themselves! If you truly believe that all rules are made by people who know better than you, you must consider yourself barely more intelligent than a newt...

PCL is a proven, safe technology (if you can even call it a "technology", it's so simple) that is kept out of the UK by lazy, unthinking bureaucrats who aren't worthy of washing our cowlings :ok:

If I owned/ran a licensed aerodrome in the UK, I would argue that the airfield is only licensed when it is published as open in the UK Air Pilot.

Bt definition, PCL is for use outside opening hours, when the airfield is unlicensed, probably unmanned, and therefore unregulated.

There is no law that I know of preventing use of an unlicensed airfield by an aircraft which is allowed to do so by the nature of its operation, by day or night, with the owner's consent. And there is no law which says that lights cannot be provided for such use at night. Neither the lights nor their method of operation is subject to regulation under the ANO in those circumstances.

Perhaps not, but the use of radio stations is, and the conditions of the radio station licence still apply.

That is not to say that I am particularly agin the idea of PCL, or that I blindly follow the rules without thinking about them. But to argue that PCL is used in another, different environment and so it should be allowed in the UK (or wherever else it is not permitted) is no better than the supposed stonewalling that the CAA has been accused of.

And some GA pilots wonder why the CAA doesn't seem to listen to them......