GPS

[500E]

http://www.aopa.org/advocacy/articles/2011/110608fcc_reckless_in_lightsquared_waiver.html?WT.mc_id=ebrief

Worth a read, have heard rumour of EU trials at some time

[rodrop]

Yes, this is finally starting to pick up some press on non aviation news sites. Sounds like it just is not going to work as is. I read an article today that indicated some investors in lightsquared are starting to back out. Good article to share.

[500F]

I sent my congressman a thank you, he signed it.

[rodrop]

Also, although this is not near a done deal..this should also be a reminder why we should focus on being able to fly, navigate withOUT gps. You never know what is going to happen huh.

[Nolapilot89]

Also, although this is not near a done deal..this should also be a reminder why we should focus on being able to fly, navigate withOUT gps. You never know what is going to happen huh.

 

Couldn't agree more. Last thing you want is to be flying around in circles hoping for a signal!

[500E]

Thought it was possible to fly gps ifr in US.

IFR certified GPS's are now commonplace it seems.

Could be a real gripping moment if the map changes to IE.

I still do the plot on map as well but in ifr ??

[Gomer Pylot]

It is possible, and common, to fly IFR with GPS. You can use GPS to fix other navaids, such as VOR and NDB stations, without having those receivers installed. Offshore, there are no VORs, and GPS is the only way to do it. LORAN was once the way we did it, but that has been out of use for years. The Coast Guard still maintains the LORAN chain as a backup, but it's not used much by anyone. Ships now use GPS, often with separate receivers on mounted on different locations to keep track of where the bow is when the bridge is many hundreds of feet away. The FAA is actively promoting the use of GPS, because they want to quit maintaining the hundreds of older navaids. WAAS was developed by the FAA to improve vertical accuracy, so that GPS could be used for precision approaches, with the goal of eliminating the current ILS facilities. With GPS, only a few WAAS transmitters are required, versus the thousands of current facilities.

 

The other GPS users are just as important as civil aviation, if not more. GPS was developed for the military, which relies heavily on it. Do away with GPS, and the military is severely hamstrung, and many newer weapons systems are worthless. Surveyors use it extensively, and the trucking industry would be in trouble without it. Anyone who thinks they can impinge upon the GPS system without repercussions is smoking something highly intoxicating, or else just having natural hallucinations. Ain't gonna happen.

[500E]

My thoughts as well GP But how far off beam are the regulators?, it should have never got to trials.

I note the Co were in discussion with GPS manufacturers regarding known problems!! the article suggested there were ways for existing GPS to be modified!! & I expect we know who would be picking up the tab for that exercise.

[500E]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/federal-communications-commission-grants-lightsquared-2-week-extension-to-report-on-gps-tests/2011/06/15/AG9AfTWH_story.html

[500E]

http://www.avweb.com/eletter/archives/avflash/1935-full.html#204828

[500E]

From Av web

"My bold paragraph" possibly the understatement of the year

 

GPS FIRMS SHOULD PAY TO PREVENT INTERFERENCE: LIGHTSQUARED

LightSquared says the GPS industry should pay to shield its devices from interference its proposed network of wireless internet transmitters might cause. On Thursday, the company launched a counteroffensive in the increasingly acrimonious battle over the bandwidth it hopes to use for the nationwide wireless network of 40,000 towers. The GPS industry says tests prove the broadband network will disrupt GPS signals and is urging authorities to reject LightSquared's proposal. LightSquared released an economic impact study (PDF) done by the Brattle Group last week suggesting the GPS industry has been and continues to be heavily subsidized in that the timing signals used in their devices are owned, operated and maintained by the federal government through the Department of Defense. Its line of logic goes on to suggest that GPS manufacturers should be willing to invest the money to shield their devices from the interference generated by the LightSquared signals. In fact, in a news release (PDF) accompanying the report, the Brattle Group suggests that it's the GPS devices that are infringing on LightSquared's bandwidth by not being adequately shielded. "Fixing this problem through the deployment of better filters in GPS devices will add some costs to the GPS industry, but those costs would only be a fraction of the $120 billion in benefits that would be created by LightSquared's deployment of its LTE network," the news release said. It says filters would add only 30 cents to the cost of a new GPS device but acknowledges that retrofitting would be substantially more costly. The study was released as two congressional committees waded into the dispute last Thursday and may have prevented the FCC from approving the LightSquared proposal.

[500E]

Looks like they are Trying to build a customer base for a product.

Modifying All the kit in use will run into 10 of millions $ & that is if the manufacturers can or will modify, then AOG cost, time delay (do the No of units x 30 minutes minimum)), commercial users pushing to front of queue.

Then the hand held & semi portable equipment, PDA, car rout finders, delivery Co trucks with AVF the list goes on.

Which Government department even allowed the trials 10s of Mil is possibly a low estimate of total cost.

This is only monetary cost then you have the safety case, with the H&Safety angle the insurance Co should be on the ball can see real problems there.

Then there is the cost to individuals will LSQ pick up the bill for these mods? I think not :angry:

 

AV web

LightSquared Lining Up Customers, Coalition Attracting Support

 

Although the issue of interference with GPS seems to be far from resolved, LightSquared is busy lining up customers for its new broadband network. The company issued a news release Tuesday saying that voice over Internet protocol (VOIP) firm netTALK has entered into a "multi-year wholesale agreement" to buy bandwidth from LightSquared. "We are extremely excited to provide netTALK with access to the wireless broadband capabilities of the LightSquared network," said Sanjiv Ahuja, chairman and chief executive officer of LightSquared. "This agreement reaffirms LightSquared's commitment to enable new and innovative companies such as netTALK to compete in the U.S. wireless market." Of course, the availability of that signal is the subject of an increasingly contentious battle with the GPS industry, which claims LightSquared's network of 40,000 towers blasting high-powered signals in a frequency band close to the minute satellite signals used by GPS receivers will effectively destroy GPS. The lobby group formed to fight LightSquared's plans, the Coalition to Save Our GPS, announced more members as it gears for a fight that will be kicked off Friday with the release of a report on the interference issues.

 

It's already been reported by some of the groups involved in the testing that LightSquared's plan will cause unacceptable GPS service disruptions and LightSquared has countered that GPS devices can effectively be hardened against the interference at minimal cost for newly manufactured devices. Retrofitting is another matter and aviation would be among the sectors hardest hit by those expenses because of the tens of thousands of pricey panel-mounted GPS-dependent avionics already in use. After the report is issued on Friday, the FCC will issue a determination on LightSquared's plan and there will be a comment period.

[r22butters]

How come I've never heard about this on the evening news? It seems like there's a good story here?

[500E]

From AV web

It's already been reported by some of the groups involved in the testing that LightSquared's plan will cause unacceptable GPS service disruptions and LightSquared has countered that GPS devices can effectively be hardened against the interference at minimal cost for newly manufactured devices. Retrofitting is another matter and aviation would be among the sectors hardest hit by those expenses because of the tens of thousands of pricey panel-mounted GPS-dependent avionics already in use. After the report is issued on Friday, the FCC will issue a determination on LightSquared's plan and there will be a comment period.

[500E]

Still wondering why the FCC were in so much of a hurry to let them go ahead, as a supposedly technical agency it beggars belief.

Read through the related comments

Lots of further information.

 

http://www.avweb.com/eletter/archives/avflash/1945.html

[rick1128]

From AV web

It's already been reported by some of the groups involved in the testing that LightSquared's plan will cause unacceptable GPS service disruptions and LightSquared has countered that GPS devices can effectively be hardened against the interference at minimal cost for newly manufactured devices. Retrofitting is another matter and aviation would be among the sectors hardest hit by those expenses because of the tens of thousands of pricey panel-mounted GPS-dependent avionics already in use. After the report is issued on Friday, the FCC will issue a determination on LightSquared's plan and there will be a comment period.

 

They 'claimed'. Are they using the same technique that Senator Joe McCarthy used when he showed his 'list of all know communists in the State Department'?

[Goldy]

They were testing again in Nevada last week. They just wont stop, and why should they? They have the full support of the FCC behind them.

 

GPS manufacturers should have built their receivers with a bandpass filter on the receiver input to filter out signals that did not exist, in a bandwidth previously reserved to not be used.

 

Yeah, that makes sense to me.

[500E]

http://www.avweb.com/eletter/archives/avflash/1955-full.html#204974

It really needs more people to write to your representatives, whoever or we will all be paying.

This takes you to comments made

 

http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/ecfs/proceeding/view?z=s4qky&name=11-109

 

YOU can post on that site & hopefully make a difference.

They are still trying to gather enough Co to steamroller the FCC into allowing this flawed product to move forward.

Remember it is you who could be relying on GPS to get rescue services to your location find your way out of the wilderness etc, forget the flying for a second.

[500E]

EUROPE FIGHTS LIGHTSQUARED

(http://www.avweb.com/eletter/archives/bizav/1956-full.html#204992)

The European Commission has added its name to the long list of those

opposed to LightSquared's plan to use satellite band frequencies for a

ground network of broadband transmitters. The proposal, which is now

before the Federal Communications Commission for comment, has been

widely condemned by pro-GPS companies and organizations in the U.S.

because it could disrupt GPS service. The European Commission is now

officially worried the broadband signals will obliterate signals from

its Galileo satellite-based navigation system, which will deploy in

three years, and Heinz Zourek, the director general for enterprise and

industry, says the signals may have an even greater impact on Galileo

equipment than the interference being reported on GPS receivers.

"Interference effects have been determined to occur in the range [of]

100 [meters] to almost 1,000 [kilometers]," Zourek said in a letter to

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski.

[500E]

We are getting closer the USER will have to PAY yet again for the poor decisions of the manufacturers and or regulators.

The manufacturers either new they were or were not producing a compliant product? The same goes for the regulators, who is going to admit they were wrong, or are LightSpeed trying to start a blame game? amongst the main opponents?

If you have state of the art gear it will have to be replaced with (like that created by LightSquared's national wireless network. And to prove the point that building such a device is possible, LightSquared has (at least temporarily) entered the GPS receiver manufacturing business and produced a product it says is up to the task.

As for the comment

(LightSquared told reporters Wednesday that it has partnered with an unnamed leader in GPS technology to create a proof-of-concept product that is unfazed by interference from LightSquared's frequency band.)

I hope we remember the unnamed Leader in GPS technology whose product I presume met ALL the requirements prior to LS asking them to build a compliant product .

Are existing products compliant? you can always exceed the regulatory requirements at a price,to produce the result you require.

 

 

 

 

From AVwebFlash

Will You Need LightSquared's GPS Receive

 

LightSquared, a start-up developed by hedge fund manager Philip Falcone, says its ground-based high-speed wireless network wouldn't interfere with high-precision GPS devices if GPS manufacturers built their receivers properly. According to LightSquared, Department of Defense standards for the operation of the GPS system are not being met by GPS manufacturers. The company says that GPS manufacturers should be building receivers that filter out interference like that created by LightSquared's national wireless network. And to prove the point that building such a device is possible, LightSquared has (at least temporarily) entered the GPS receiver manufacturing business and produced a product it says is up to the task.

 

LightSquared told reporters Wednesday that it has partnered with an unnamed leader in GPS technology to create a proof-of-concept product that is unfazed by interference from LightSquared's frequency band. The company had originally intended to make use of a spectrum close to that of GPS but found that interference problems would be encountered. In June, it shifted the network to frequencies farther from the GPS band. However, it was found that high-precision GPS devices could still be compromised. The company says that the receiver it has built uses current technology that can be adapted to other devices and put into production within months. LightSquared says production of that unit shows that the interference problem is surmountable. Whether they propose to now sell their solution to affected parties like the Pentagon, federal agencies and other aviation interests -- and whether those interests are interested in adopting the solution at all -- remains to be seen.

[500E]

From AV WEB

LightSquared Threatens Legal Action If System Denied

 

LightSquared says it will take legal action if the FCC rejects its plan to build a nationwide wireless broadband system in the U.S. that the GPS industry and Department of Defense says will interfere with GPS signals. In its most aggressive move so far, LightSquared wrote a letter (PDF) to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski reiterating the company's position that the faulty design and performance of the majority of GPS receivers is responsible for the interference detected in a series of tests earlier this year. LightSquared then called a news conference to throw down the legal gauntlet. "If it is impossible to get a decision on this that allows us to go forward, I think our way forward is pretty clear, that we then have to insist on our legal rights," LightSquared VP of Government and Regulatory Affairs Jeff Carlisle is quoted by ExecutiveGov as telling reporters. "If you have to be the bad guy, and go out and start … insisting on your property line, well, then that's what we'll do." The FCC has ordered more testing and the results are due Nov. 30.

As we reported in June, Genachowski assured Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, the FCC "will not permit LightSquared to provide commercial service until it is clear potential GPS interference concerns have been resolved." In its most recent letter to Genachowski, LightSquared makes it clear it expects the GPS industry to modify its equipment to ensure it doesn't allow signals from outside the frequency ranges assigned to GPS to interfere with their operation. There are about 500 million GPS-reliant devices in use in the U.S. LightSquared has admitted that a small percentage of them, mostly high-performance measuring and timing devices, are legitimately interfered with by its signals and says it hired an engineer to design a cheap and simple fix for those units.

 

My thought

Looks like the public will pay, remember it is not just your aircraft unit, your car sat nav, some smart phones, tracking devices for heavy plant & trucks, geo measurement for building & on.

With the sensitivity of modern GPS my personal feeling is you will require more than band pass or band stop filtering to kill harmonic or first frequency interference.

We have seen problems in the 2 way radio trade for some years with reduced coverage due to outside interference by modern processor chips radiating spurious RF signals, high power TX for world service broadcasts + numerous other technologies.

The amount of RF floating around may not interfere directly but it add to the background noise levels which require more sensitive better filtered Receivers, then you get the mix of frequencies & their harmonics which produce other frequencies, you can have 2\3\4 freq combining to produce another line of interference, why add to an all ready noisy RF environment, when it can be seen to produce problems for an established technology with users running into millions.

I also note LS say ( faulty design and performance of the majority of GPS receivers is responsible for the interference detected in a series of tests earlier this year.

Perhaps they will tell us which manufacturers units are built to the correct standard ? make & models please.

It would be nice if the regulators also came clean & let us know if they have been letting manufacturers build products that do not meet the regulatory requirements.

If we are told the regs are not being met one would presume there is a legal case against the supplier\manufacturers regarding selling goods not fit for purpose.

[500E]

From AV web

LightSquared vs. GPS: A $6 Solution?

 

LightSquared, the broadband company that has met with resistance from GPS users due to interference from its system, said last week technology company Partron America has developed a filter that costs only $6. This technology, along with several other prototypes, will undergo extensive testing in the coming weeks, LightSquared said. "Preliminary testing leaves LightSquared confident that the debate over our system and interference from GPS signals will be resolved," the company said in a news release.

 

The company said it has already adjusted its spectrum to eliminate interference with 99.75 percent of all GPS devices. "We invested $9 million to develop filters that ensured our signal did not cross into spectrum licensed to GPS, which means that any interference that remains is caused by GPS signals looking into our spectrum," the company said. "Additionally, we have committed $50 million to retrofit or replace high-precision GPS devices in use by federal agencies." The battle over the spectrum has been a contentious one, as LightSquared laid the blame on GPS users "squatting" on wavelengths that were rightfully theirs. Yet with hundreds of millions of GPS users in agriculture and industry as well as in aviation, the pushback has been equally firm.

 

We make extensive use of filtering in our business, & they are not the total cure for interference problems, the interfering can just degrade weak signals so as to make them unusable, with Hi gain receivers and Very low GPS transmitted signals, you are not starting from a good place, then add relatively high power ground based signals & the equation becomes a whole lot worse.

It is not just the fundamental signal that is a problem there are multiple access points within the receiver that can cause problems,+ the raised background noise level, this coupled with the loss of receiver sensitivity due to the insertion of filters (are these external add on's if so there will be connector losses as well, if internal the $6 will only be the start of the cost the avionics Co will have to retro fit! will approvals be forthcoming for the mods)

[500E]

From VR

 

Pay Up, LightSquared

 

 

Why is LightSquared paying federal agencies $50 million to replace affected government GPS units and not doing the same for civilian GPS units?

 

The hypocrisy of the LightSquared issue is reaching new heights. The FCC issues a license without regard for the frequency spectrum it is stated to protect. Then, when the economics of the issue become such that the FCC cannot withdraw its approval after finding out after the fact it made a mistake, it tries to kick the can down the road until a compromise can be reached.

 

Now I read all government agencies are getting $50 Million to replace effected units.

 

Where is the compensation or replacement of civilian units to correct the problem?

 

Looks like the American people are getting shafted by the FCC, LightSquared, and the politicians again.

 

Sincerely,

Benjamin S. Armen

 

If and when that $6 filter becomes available, be prepared for a half-zillion dollar cost to have it installed. And that will be three or so years after it has been submitted to FAA/FTC for approval. Your GPS may have to go back to the factory for installation, it may require an STC, [and] it will certainly require an extensive/expensive utilization of an A&P/IA.

 

Don't hold your breath, and cut back on $100 hamburgers to build up the kitty for this wonderful new invention. You may have it paid for by the time you have to upg

[r22butters]

You could always start an internet movement, warning people not to buy a GPS now, since they'll have to fork out a butt-load of money to "convert" it in the near future. That may cause GPS manufacturers to file a suit against LightSquared and possibly help the civil cause?

[500E]

HOUSE CAUCUS ACTS TO STALL LIGHTSQUARED

(http://www.avweb.com...ull.html#205667)

$72 billion how big is your share??

Note the word STALL not stop