Does Flight Aware Use ADS-B?

Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe said:
Consider how the Tailbacon gets the information - as the transponder transmits pulses it sucks up power with each pulse which, in turn, causes very small voltage drops in the wiring system - normally this would be considered electrical noise. The Tailbacon looks for noise at the right frequencies and patterns that correspond to the expected transponder output and decodes that to get the bacon code and the mode C altitude. Other sources of noise can mask the desired signal. Also, I would think that having the transponder on an avionics buss which is a number of connections away from the nav light wiring can't help with getting a "clean" noise signature. When I put the uAvionix echoUAT in my ride, I wired the breaker and ground to be as close to the transponder as I could. But, I ain't no expert in radio frequency electronics like an A&P so I don't know how much difference that really makes a difference.
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My understanding is that the Tailbeacon receives the transponder's transmission over the air and then piggybacks on it. This was apparently confirmed by uavonix when they told my friend that the reason his didn't work in anonymous mode was that his beacon antenna was shadowed from the transponder antenna, so it wasn't seeing the 1200 code.

There seem to be a lot of reports of these devices futzing out. Maybe it's just because there's so many of them.
 
Sinistar said:
Sounds like you were on flight following or filed ifr right? If so they back fed the atc radar into the adsb system. I see non equipped planes on flight aware frequently and they are using flight following.

Or maybe the light was off as mentioned above.

I would think the Ozarks is the last place someone would have a 978 pi aware receiver running. There aren't many in the country yet.
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ADSBexchange.com has decent 978 reception.
 
There are no ADS-B ground stations in Eastern Ontario/West Quebec, but FlightAware tracks every flight I take, from just after takeoff to just before landing. Even if I just take it up for a quick 5-minute circuit, it shows up. Their crowd-sourced ground network is pretty impressive.
 
Lindberg said:
1. Having a patent on something doesn't mean that's how you do it.
2. This is what they told my friend. Maybe it was wrong.
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Their propaganda says "uAvionix’s patented power transcoder technology seamlessly communicates with your existing legacy transponder over your aircraft’s electrical system." "The power transcoder decodes squawk and pressure altitude by sensing pulses in the aircraft electrical system." "Power Transcoder Decodes Mode A and Mode C via DC input" "It monitors an installed transponder, through the aircraft power wiring, for Mode A/C replies."

Plus, Garmin has a patent on getting the mode A/C from the transponder broadcast - the uAvionix "transcoder" is their workaround - a couple years ago Garman tried to shut them down, but obviously uAvionix prevailed in court.
 
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