Talk:Aircraft Flight Data Recorder Underwater Beacon
From PDI
Sounds like a good idea.
Try this: I do not know the figures, but expect that most of the power consumption of the beacon is with the radio transmitter. A radio receiver on the other hand can have a very low power consumption. What about having the beacon initially activated in a listen-only mode, and have it transmit only when it receives an external start signal? A search ship, when looking for a beacon has no problems with power supply and could transmit a switch-on signal continuously. When the beacon detects a search ship by hearing the search ship's signal, only then would it turn on its own beacon.
--Leovt 21:25, 18 December 2009 (UTC)
- Radio waves don't travel through water [too well]. On land, it's feasible, but finding the black box on land isn't all that much of a problem anyway. For underwater conditions, it's an acoustic beacon, not radio.
- Such "receiver/switch" device would have to endure tremendous conditions of the crash, and still work. The more complex it is, the less likely it is to survive. -- Wesha 21:06, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
