Thursday, April 03, 2008
Electronic Eyes for the Cockpit
by Al from Novato CA USA 
Pros: Small, good battery life, works as expected, Price is awesome!
Cons: Front rocker button is a little delicate don't let it rattle around your filght bag.
Review: A pilot in our EAA group recommended this unit and after hearing his praise I went out and got one. I loved it. The first flight I took it out and flew around looking for traffic. The unit found a couple of targets on that first flight that I would have missed. On the second flight I called ATC for VFR flight following. Most of the time just about when they were calling with traffic advisory is when it unit alerted. PERFECT. It is fairly intuitive to operate. Near airports you have to interpret data a little as it will find targets on the ground that are active. This is a good thing as it helps find traffic that may be entering the pattern shortly. It's great to have an extra set of "eyes" in the cockpit. Highly recommended! *****

Thursday, April 03, 2008
All pilots need this !!!!
by A Customer from Coahoma MS USA 
Pros: small size
Cons: be nice if crop dusters squawk
Review: Met all expectations would be 5 stars if there was a mid price version that gave direction to contact

Sunday, March 23, 2008
Adding another niche of comfort
by Bakersfield Barry from Bakersfield CA USA 
Pros: Quite accurate with alert information
Cons: Relatively brief battery life (5 hrs approx)
Review: An excellent addition to the cockpit. Provides very helpful and quite accurate alerts to nearby aircraft. I'm very pleased to have added capability for collision avoidance at an affordable price. Definitely must use the included velcro on the glareshield or it will dance all over due to aircraft vibration.

Saturday, March 08, 2008
Neato
by A Customer from Socal 
Pros: Display is easy to read in ANY conditions, including sunglasses
Cons: May distract you, but this is only a "con" when traffic is no factor or not there
Review: I gave it 5 stars because it works as advertised. There were a couple times when the unit went from tracking nothing to [ALERT] and I saw no other aircraft, could've been my transponder I guess. One thing is for sure, if you own one it will not be in your flight bag when you're flying. It's just fun to have when you're in a plane with no other electronic CAS. P.S. If you're thinking about purchasing for rental aircraft, the included velcro mounting option won't last long. Get outdoor high strength 3M double-sided tape, and use VERY small pieces of it to stick it to the glareshield.

Monday, February 25, 2008
Excellent aid to situational awareness, does exactly what it claims to do - if it's got a transponder, PCAS will find it!
by A Customer from NH 
Pros: Will detect nearly all aircraft with functioning transponder; small; multiple power options; good manual; bright screen; loud volume; removable/extendable antenna; updatable
Cons: Premium price; no case; battery life decent but could be better; must send to ZAON for future updates
Review:

The bottom-line first: I would buy it again, despite the price. I would give it 4.5 stars if that was an option. Shelling out $500 for anything this small and fairly limited in purpose can make anyone hesitate. I hope this review, combined with others, will help other pilots make up their mind. I am certainly comfortable recommending this product to anyone. 

First, why buy this unit?  Are you familiar with the Big Blue Sky theory? It goes like this.. You are a little airplane in a Big Blue Sky... so chances are you will not run into another airplane, right? Well, if you are lucky. But it is unquestionably risky to rely on luck alone, and on the hope that you will be looking at the right point in the sky when another airplane happens to come your way. Most of the time we do not see any other airplanes and that creates an illusion of safety. If you had access to radar you would know that it is just that, an illusion. When flying near airports and busy terminal areas, there is rarely a time on a good VFR day there isn't a plane within a few miles of you within a couple thousand feet of your altitude. Most of us who fly eventually survive a few close calls with proximity to other aircraft, loosely defined as where you were either not expecting another aircraft to appear, or noticed it just in time to take appropriate evasive action. I remember these situations, and they all involved transponder equipped aircraft, clear VFR days, more than one pilot in the cockpit and close proximity to airports. Incidentally, that's when most collisions occur. Since small GA planes do not as a rule have TCAS, it may appear that not much can be done other than maintaining constant visual vigilance, and, frankly, relying that luck will carry you the rest of the way. Most of us could not afford to spend thousands anyway to have something similar to TCAS.. even $1000 would put it out of reach. Still, there is nothing like raising your head from the instruments, the radio or the chart, to find another airplane on a head-on collision course with you. You did all the right things. You kept your head outside 90% of the time. You made all the radio calls. THAT is the airplane that should not be there, that is not talking on the radio, that is perhaps on the wrong frequency, or whose CFI is too busy talking to the student, etc, etc... for whatever reason, THAT airplane just came within 100 feet of you. It is a little disturbing to realize that, even though you did all the right things, you just got lucky and situation was practically beyond your control.

That kind of thing will motivate you to spend some money to avoid being in this situation again like nothing else. So when I found out about this PCAS unit from ZAON, and various competitor products as well, I started doing my research. It is a new, developing technology albeit based on the old transponder technology, and thus comes at a premium. Zaon product seems to be the best overall and that's why I chose it. 

Product specific impressions and real life use - The unit is pretty small and appears well built. It is made entirely out of hard semi-translucent plastic. There is no case or protective rubber on it so I would not abuse it too much. A protective case would be nice. It comes with little silicon rubber feet that prevent it from sliding around, but that's it. It also includes headset adapter and the cigarette lighter adapter. The manual is clearly written. The screen is very bright and the volume is sufficient.

You will get at least a couple hours out of two AA batteries, rechargeable or otherwise, probably closer to 4 hours depending on use and the type of battery. You can also plug it in your power socket.. either 12 or 24 volt will work just fine. The only gripe is if you switch power sources mid-flight the unit resets and has to be turned on again. When batteries get to about 1/4 usable life, expect the screen to flicker a little. That is normal, and adjusting the brightness up will rectify it, until the batteries are dead, at which point the unit will simply turn off.

For very loud cockpits, you can plug in the headset adapter and hear alerts in your headphones. Mute button comes handy if you do not want to hear beeping while on final approach and when already aware of all other traffic. While reading the manual is a must, the unit is a breeze to use once you know what the buttons do and what the screen tells you. It is simplicity by design. The multifunction button is very sensitive to how you press it and takes a little getting used to. PCAS works by detecting other aircraft transponder replies. In it lies its greatest strength and also its limitation. The replies originate when transponder is interrogated by ATC, TCAS in airliners, etc.. PCAS does not transmit anything, it just reads the replies. It computes distance by measuring signal strength of a transponder reply, and altitude by comparing your altitude to the altitude of the other aircraft. Perhaps the greatest feature of PCAS is that it has an internal altimeter so it can accurately compute other aircraft altitude. After using it on several flights, I must say I was impressed by the number of aircraft that it detected. The distance readout is not so accurate, because it depends on signal strength and that may be affected by various factors. But, the altitude readout, which is the most important one anyways, is very accurate and reliable, as it compares PCAS pressure altitude from internal altimeter to the other aircraft pressure altitude from their transponder, minimizing any errors.

Multiple times, the unit issued an advisory / alert close to terminal airspace when another aircraft passed within 1 mile to me closer than 500 feet in altitude. Most of the time, I never did see the other planes. Some of the time, I saw them. PCAS detected them first each and every time. I knew they were there and was able to monitor on PCAS as they were getting closer, or further away from me. One time, an alert of .3 NM and -300 feet prompted me to initiate a climb and I was happy to see altitude difference increase until the other traffic was not a factor. I suspect it was behind me as well as below me so there is no way I would have been able to see it. I never did see it until eventually it disappeared from PCAS display.

Ignorance, they say, is bliss.. but unreliable bliss at best. Knowledge is power and confidence. Often I was able to detect other aircraft inbound to the same airport even before they spoke on the radio. Once a jet reported inbound from the same sector, roughly the same distance from the airport but did not state its altitude. That was after I saw rapidly decreasing distance readout on PCAS. Ordinarily you would just talk on the radio and hope the guy was higher/lower or will see you first. The jet was moving fast and I would have been worried but PCAS showed that it was more than 600 feet above me even though it was closing rapidly laterally. I am sure he probably had TCAS, but I was glad to see him, too. I was straining the ole' eyeballs looking for him but did not find him until he was no longer a factor. Had he been a factor, I would never have known without the PCAS.

Overall, I am impressed. You can spend $1500 or more for the PCAS big brother, the XRX, and that will give you the bearing info.. but for $500, MRX is pretty much unbeatable. Even with its limitations, it is like having an extra pair of eyes helping you out.

Wednesday, January 02, 2008
Great Product
by Michael from Corona CA USA 
Pros: Does not need to be plugged into cigarette lighter
Cons: Doesn't give bearing of other aircraft
Review: Like having an extra set of eyes in the plane.